Just add water

It all started when they asked if they could play with their new water tubes/squirters (or water crayons as Andrew calls them)....so it started with filling buckets of water, and then silliness ensued:
In the end the outside of the house, sidewalk, garage floor, car, Tahoe, Barbie car, and both kids were soaking wet, but they sure had fun :)

friends, fires & firetrucks

On Friday night we had some friends from the town homes over for supper. We were hoping to be able to have a bonfire, but the wind had other plans in mind. Instead we grilled out, had fun catching up, and watching the kids play.

Uncle Paul & Daisy also came up and stayed with us. He brought up his new boat for us to check out, and then on Saturday Paul & Bruce took the boat out on the river. It sounds like they had fun fishing, and the kids got a kick out of his boat. There were all kinds of questions, but my favorite came from Andrew. He asked Paul "How come your boat has sparkles in it?" Paul told him that the only way Aunt Larissa would let him get a boat was if it had sparkles in it - he seemed okay with that answer! It's a Nitro bass boat, which is why it has sparkles it, I just thought it was funny that out of all the things he could notice, he noticed that.

Here are 2 pictures from their trip. The shinny silver fish is a Gar (for those of you that may have been wondering). It looks a bit prehistoric.

Early in the afternoon on Saturday I noticed a lot of smoke coming from behind one of the neighbors houses, but saw that they were burning their tall grass/weeds, so I didn't think much of it. As the day progressed the smoke/fire moved right along the line of houses. The smoke was pretty thick at times. This is what it looked like from our driveway:
We're not sure what happened, or who called, but the fire department showed up, so the kids were ecstatic to see this:They burned a few acres of weeds/tall grass; they had let the fire department know, so we're not sure why the trucks showed up, but it did cause some excitement :)

On Sunday night, we had dinner over the bonfire (per Andrew's request). Andrew had been asking all week to cook a hotdog over the fire, so he was happy to finally get the chance.

Jenna could have cared less about cooking hot dogs over the fire, and was much more interested in eating marshmallows and chocolate (and refused to eat them in the s'more version).

We ended up having an impromptu get together with the neighbors, along with the bonfire, which was a lot of fun. You can tell that it's spring - everyone is happy to be outside and seeing people again!

Kindergarten Orientation

After having a fun weekend, we got to start off the week, with something pretty exciting for Andrew - Kindergarten Orientation. The parents got to sit & listen to things about what our kids days will be like, and what to expect once school starts, while the kids (20 of them) were in a classroom having informal evaluations done. Andrew was super excited, and did great. He didn't even seem to notice that we came back into the room to get him....he was too busy checking things out, and asking one of the neighbor girls about their trampoline :) We took it as a good sign, and that it shows he's ready to start school. He was the 1st one to go thru orientation in his preschool class, so once we dropped him everyone was curious how it went, and what to expect. His teacher said he did a great job answering everyone's questions. Right now his class size is expected to be 20 kids, which is double the size of his preschool class, but not as large as other classes (some have 29-30 kids!). There will be 4 classes of kindergarten students at his school, with 20 kids each. He's very excited about starting school, and keeps going over the time line of when he starts.....after his birthday, after vacation, in the fall....at least he's excited :)

Bongers Easter

The 3rd egg hunt of the day took place at Grandma & Grandpa Bongers house. This time the egg hunt took place after lunch. The bunny did hide their baskets inside the house, so the kids were able to find those before eating.

Here's Jenna doing a puzzle w/ Aunt Beth (can you tell she likes puzzles?):

Once all the food was cleaned up it was time for the egg hunt to begin:
After the egg hunt the kids tested out their new water toys on the deck:
There was also time to fit in another game of baseball:Then we went out to the lake to check everything out.
The dock wasn't in yet, but the kids enjoyed looking at the water from it, and watching Dutch fetch sticks.
There were also a lot of different ducks on the lake, in the bay where the cabin is at, so Andrew had fun looking at them with Grandpa's binoculars:

Here's Jenna copying Grandpa (and most likely telling him how it is!):

By the time we got home that night we were all tired, from the long day. It was great to have such beautiful weather for Easter weekend. I know we all enjoyed being able to spend so much time outside.

Fullerton Easter

The 2nd egg hunt of the morning took place in Owatonna. The bunny also left a note at Grandma & Grandpa's house letting the kids know which color eggs to look for, and where to look (outside of course!).

Here's Jenna doing a puzzle while waiting for brunch:

After brunch everyone headed back outside to test out all the new stuff the bunny brought :)

Easter @ home

The kids had fun waking up on Easter morning and finding all the eggs and their baskets. The Easter bunny even left them a note letting them know which color eggs they were supposed to be looking for. Andrew carried the note around with him and made sure that both he and Jenna were following the instructions.

Here are some pictures from the morning:

Before heading to Owatonna and Faribault to continue the Easter celebrations, we got the kids to sit still for a few seconds & take a picture....aren't they cute :)

Jenna loves her new PINK glove, and Andrew's been using his new bat when ever possible. They were even able to test out their new umbrella's in the rain last week.

Easter Eggs

Uncle Paul & Aunt Larissa came up and helped us dye Easter Eggs. This allowed the kids to dye lots of eggs :) Both kids did pretty good with letting the eggs sit in the dye, it was getting them out of and into the dye that made a bit of a mess. We ended up with a few cracked eggs, and Sadie had some green polka dots by the time we were done, but the eggs looked great!

Callie's Birthday

Last Friday (3/26) we packed up and headed down to Chicagoland to visit Camille, Theo & Callie; we had a 2nd birthday to celebrate. We were very, very concerned about how Jenna was going to do on the 5-6 hour car trip, since she hasn't exactly done great on car trips. She amazed us, and was a complete rock star in the car - both there and back! There was no whining or crying the entire trip, which included a very long wait in a construction zone. Andrew did awesome as always, and didn't seem to mind watching SuperWhy (Jenna's choice) for the trip down. We had fun helping Callie celebrate. Here are some pictures from the party.

Birthday girl deciding if she should snag some fruit:

Her awesome birthday cake*:

Jenna & Callie playing cards:
Why are all these people singing & staring at me?

Blowing out the candles*:
Jenna waiting for cake:

* the cake was really cute, but Elmo was made out of Rice Crispies....well by the time we got around to singing happy birthday the house had heated up a lot (due to all the extra people), and he had lost his nose & an eye - oops! Good thing we could just stick them back in for a bit (you can kinda see the 'fix' in the 2nd pic of cake). It might have been a little traumatic for Callie if Elmo was sitting on her cake missing an eye & nose :)

On the way home on Sunday, the kids did great in the car once again, and this is how we found Jenna before we even hit the toll way:


She slept for 4 hours! All the partying must have worn her out. After a stop for lunch the kids were ready to go again, here they are already being silly & entertaining themselves: