Happy Easter

We had a wonderful Easter weekend filled with egg hunts, friends and family time. I even took pictures! It is a small accomplishment, but look for yourselves at the instant results--cute pictures of my cute kids.

Our friends put together an Easter egg hunt for the kiddos in our old ward. Katelyn had a really fun time.
I can't get her to look at the camera anymore. She has shifty eyes.

Looking at her loot.

Elyse just chewed on a plastic egg.

The whole crew.

Our whole crew.

In our new ward, I was called to be a ward organist. I spent the week practicing "Christ the Lord has Risen Today" for Easter Sunday. The girls like to practice too.

Sunday morning the girls "eggs"amined their Easter buckets. Kites, bubbles, wands...these girls got spoiled.

The girls all ready for church on Easter Sunday.

What a proud papa!

Coloring eggs was much more fun this year than last. Katelyn did a great job dying them, coloring them, and decorating them with stickers.

Devin thinks these glasses are over the top. Love Target's dollar section.

Stickering the eggs.

The finished product.

Say "cheese."

Better.

Katelyn's Easter picture of me.

After a weekend full of pictures, finally a real smile!

And we have so much to smile about. We are grateful for this season to remember the resurrection of our Savior. With all the eggs and candy and gifts, I hope were able to teach our kids the reason for the season.

He is Risen! He is Risen!

Tell it out with joyful voice.

He has burst his three days prison;

Let the whole wide world rejoice.

Death is conquered; man is free.

Christ has won the victory.

Happy Easter.

March goes out like a lamb....

In Ohio, March came in like a lamb too. It was such a mild winter this year. We had record breaking temperatures in March with some days in the 80s. The flowers have been blooming, the trees budding and we have enjoyed quite a few evening strolls.

Elyse has started standing up to things. It feels like she should still be teeny-tiny. I can't believe she is almost 10 months. She says "hi, dada, mama" and some version of "cock-a-doodle-doo." She is very quick to try to imitate the sounds we make. She blows on her food after I do, she jibber-jabbers to herself and she'd climb over anything to keep up with Katelyn. Another funny things she does is toss food off of her high chair tray and as soon as I get her out and put her on the floor, she crawls over and eats it. I really think she does it on purpose to save it for later! She definitely keeps me sweeping!

I absolutely love this picture. She is such a cutie.Friday night Devin and Katelyn went outside to grill some chicken. Elyse found her buddies in the window. She whined a little bit and got to go outside too. Lucky duck.

Today between conference sessions. Love my girlios.

We have been talking with Katelyn about using the potty for a while, and she has gone in the potty several times over the past few months. I didn't want it to be a stressful thing for her, so we have just talked about it and tried it out, but kept her in diapers. On Sunday, her nursery teacher brought her to me in Relief Society and Katelyn asked me to go potty. Everyone in the Relief Society room heard her, so I couldn't say, "Katelyn, you have a diaper on. You don't really go potty." (peer pressure) So I asked the lady next to me to watch Elyse. I took Katelyn to the bathroom and after three hours of church, her diaper was dry, and she went in the potty. We took that as a hint that it was time to potty train. So this Wednesday, we took the diapers away. She has done so well.

We made a fort for Katelyn this morning. She has a hard time saying fort. She switches between "fork" and "fart." But whatever it is called, Katelyn likes it!

We really enjoyed General Conference. We are grateful for the wonderful talks on parenting and families. It made us think about the sweet spirits that Heavenly Father has entrusted to us and the important responsibility that is ours to be their parents. We are also thankful for our parents for teaching us and shaping us into the people we are today. Hopefully, we can do the same for our sweet girls.