Outside at Last

I have been waiting for nicer weather very patiently, much more patiently than my children, I might add.  They liked to beg all winter if they could pleeeease go to the park.  Anyway, most days now are nice enough to go outside.  Sometimes I even get to send the two older girls out to the backyard to play by themselves. They play out there for a long time, so that is really nice.  Here is a time we all went to the backyard together.

It is a little hard to tell, but Whitney is holding a little water gun.  We gave her a pack of cheap water guns for her birthday.  One particular warm day, we decided to open them up.  The girls and I had a blast squirting each other for like a full forty minutes.  So that was really fun.

Then Will came home from work and decided to try out his bubble magic for the first time this season.

Rachel especially loved chasing the big bubbles.

The girls each tried to make their own big bubbles; the bubble wand only got dragged through the grass a couple of times.

Whitney made some bubbles for Megan, who really liked watching the water gun fight and the bubble making.  

Some days it is still a little chilly and I don't want to take the baby outside.  Megan is just watching Whitney and Rachel play.  Staring out the window is one of Megan's favorite past times.

And just a couple of cute Megan pictures because I haven't updated the blog in awhile.  We had a box fun day and even Megan enjoyed it.  She got really into hitting the sides of the box.

Now that Megan can roll over and slide herself backwards and twist herself in circles, she has gotten into some tough spots - like this one with her head under the coffee table.  Sorry baby.

So that has pretty much summed up the last couple of weeks.

Random Small Projects

Well, we haven't done anything big or major lately.  But we have done some smaller things that were fun.  Be prepared for some random pictures.

We found some pine cones along our walk and Whitney wanted to bring them home.  I wasn't sure what to do with them, but we decided to turn them into some bird feeders.

The girls did a pretty good job of putting on the peanut butter and the sunflower seeds; they only kept snacking on everything a couple dozen times.

And then we hung them on the trees outside.  It was fun to hear the girls call out (through the window in the mornings) for the birds to come and get the food for them.

Another project was the living room fort.  I was watching another three girls in the ward one morning and we decided to make a fort.  It was quite the undertaking.

I didn't have my favorite cookies over Christmas like usual, so I decided to make some magic middles one day.  Rachel and Whitney both helped with stirring and adding things.  Megan helped by chomping on the empty butter box.

Rachel and Whitney both love to play church.  Rachel has been involving Megan in it also.  Here she sings a nursery song and then she always says some funny prayers saying thank you for anything she happens to see at the moment.  It is fun to watch the sisters playing nicely.

We did the letter K yesterday for alphabet days and I decided to let the kids play kitchen.  I had planned on it being outside and keeping the mess mostly contained, but it decided to be a cold and cloudy day, so we played kitchen in the kitchen.

The kids loved the kitchen game and played for a long time, but just look at the mess that got left behind.  Next time, it will definitely be an outside activity.

With the flu and the teething going on here, there has been a lot of poop lately.  Megan thinks it is so funny being wiped down with a baby wipe.  Will and I think it is less funny.

And finally a first turn in the big bath.  She loved the big bath much more than her little bath tub, so we probably should have switched her over a long time ago.  Oh well.  Good to have a clean baby.

So I thought about calling this blog 'Random Small Messes', instead of 'projects'.  We have gone through a lot of baby wipes and paper towels lately.  Those are like my favorite inventions.  Anyway, that is what has been happening in Umatilla.

St. Paddy's Day

We did a couple of small things for St. Patrick's Day.  Maybe next year I will make it a bigger deal, but here are a couple of pictures of our little green things.

Whitney and Rachel with their green shirts.

Whitney inspecting her green butter on her toast.  And we had green milk to drink.

I let Rachel pick out Megan's clothes and told her that it needed to be green, so Rachel picked a green shirt and green pants.  

All three happy girls just chilling on the couch.

I found a little leprechaun craft online that we let the girls do.  Here Whitney and Rachel do some painting. 

Aren't they way cuter than regular leprechauns? 

And we made sausage muffins for dinner.  Whitney helped cook the scrambled eggs - green, of course.

And just a random picture of Megan trying a french fry.  We are letting her start to try some regular soft food.  So far, she isn't too impressed with anything solid, but we are trying.

We are all kind of recovering from the flu this past week.  Hopefully, next week we will all be back to 100% and will be able to enjoy the nicer weather.

A Teddy Bear Party

We celebrated Whitney's birthday this week.  It is hard to believe that she is four years old.  Does that make her out of the toddler years and into the young child?  I don't really know the cut-off.  But she is pretty proud at being four.  Here are some pictures from her teddy bear party.

Playing with balloons while waiting for the kids to arrive.  She kept asking if it was eleven o'clock yet so her friends would come over.

We played lots of teddy bear games.  I started off with a teddy bear treasure hunt, but no pictures of that.  Oh well.  Then the kids played pin the nose on the teddy bear.  The tie blindfold didn't work well; we will have to think of something better next time.

The teddy bear bowling was a hit.  I put pictures of teddy bears on empty soda bottles and the kids had fun "bowling", which was throwing the ball at the pins.

We had a teddy bear relay in our backyard.  Here we lined up the kids.  Each kid brought a teddy bear and they would run across the yard with their teddy bear, give it a drink, and come back.

It took two tries, but the kids seemed to kind of understand what they were suppose to do.  Whitney and Rachel both running at the same time for opposite teams.

We used a big sheet for teddy bear parachute.  The kids really seemed to like this game of trying to keep all the bears in the parachute.

A happy Whitney decorating her cupcake.  We let all the kids decorate their own cupcakes and I think there was more frosting and candy on some of those than the cake part.

Whitney at the beginning of opening her presents.

By the end, all the kids were huddled around watching her.  She got some really fun presents.

We gave out popsicles right at the end of the party.  Whitney prefers popsicles over ice cream.

And Whitney holding her new baby doll from Grandma and Grandpa Keeler and holding her goody bag.  We gave out little treats and prizes during the party.  So I think it was a success.  Thanks to my mom and sister for helping.

Geocaching (Treasure Hunting)

We did some geocaching while we were down in Pasco for Presidents Day.  We told Whitney that we were treasure hunting.

It was my little brother, Conner's, first time geocaching.  Will looked up three spots that were close to my parents' house to start our search.

Most of the geocaches locations were really close to the road, so I spent most of the time making sure Rachel stayed out of the busy roads.  Whitney asked us if we were pirates because we were looking for treasures; I told her that we were pretending to be pirates and she was pretty excited about that.

The girls tired of looking for geocaches after not very long and just started digging in the dirt.  It is hard to tell, but Whitney drew a ship in the dirt.

Unfortunately, we didn't find any of the three geocaches, but Conner did find some paw prints in the dirt.  It was probably just a small animal but Whitney liked to think they were tiger feet.

Conner got a pet gecko for Christmas and he is pretty proud of it.  We got to watch him eating some crickets, that was pretty cool.  He was a fast little gecko when he wasn't just lazing in his little cave toy.

And to celebrate the Super Bowl (which we watched even though the 49ers and the Patriots didn't make it, but we aren't bitter), Will holds Megan in the football hold.

Being a flying baby gave Megan some crazy hair, but she doesn't seem to mind.  Look at how cute she is.