Now Is the Month of Maying...

"Now is the month of Maying, when merry lads are playing!" Or in our case, merry children, and lots of 'em. Here's a quick recap of what we've been up to so far in May:

Little Elizabeth is growing, growing, growing, and starting to sit up in her Bumbo. We set her right smack in the middle of the kitchen table during dinner time and she loves it. And Leah loves this polkadot dress Grandma Cardon made her because it reminds her of Dorothy Gale from the Wizard of Oz, and so it has become her "Dorothy dress."

This baby! Three and a half months old and just getting to be the cutest, most loved-on, spoiled baby ever! She is so fun to have around as she becomes more socially aware. Jon had to take her out of Sunday School last week because she was SO loud-- not because she was crying, but because she was singing and talking and squawking and enjoying the sound of her own voice. 

Miss Lucy won a most prestigious award at school at their end of the year award's assembly (hard to believe there's only 3 more weeks of school!!), called the Outstanding Buffalo Award. One boy and one girl from each class are selected to win it, for displaying exemplary behavior all year long, and for being all-around awesome. Here's Lucy's teacher reading all the nice things about Lucy and why she won!

After being recognized at the whole school assembly, the "buffaloes" are then fed lunch the next day and waited on by the principal and their teachers. Lucy was thrilled! It doesn't surprise me one bit when her teacher says she loves Lucy. How can you not?? 

Some funny pictures of Elizabeth trying to talk to us in the car. She watches our lips and then tries so hard to copy the shapes we make. I have a feeling she may be a little chatter box like her older sisters...

We have to run lots of grocery store errands to keep this family of 6 up and running and well fed! I swear, I feel like I'm constantly buying food and it scares me to think what it will be like when they're teenagers! My two little grocery cart buddies on a recent Target run. 

Jon and I snuck out of the house one Saturday evening for a much-needed date night and alone time. We discovered a cute little Beehive in our ward who likes to babysit and we use her quite a bit. I haven't left her with Elizabeth yet-- I feel like Leah and Zach are enough to make her earn that babysitting money, so Elizabeth gets to come along. It was a rainy/snowy, FREEZING Saturday so we headed to Wahoos for fish tacos, hoping it would remind us of our long-lost days in the Caribbean...

This cracked me up. Oh! The perils of dates taken with a 3 month old! Elizabeth had a MAJOR blow-out, complete with poop covering her from head to toe. Gross! Lucky Daddy got the honors of de-pooping her.

Ahhh, fresh as a daisy and not wanting to participate in this car selfie! Nursing in the car on the date, because that's what happens when the little poopster won't cooperate and just sleep through date night. Oh well. There's always next time!

So far, spring has not been very kind to us. We get a couple of gorgeous blue-skied, sunny days, and then either rain, or snow, or hail comes and we have to start all over again. Having officially experienced all four so far, spring is definitely my least favorite season here in Colorado. I thought these tulips were kind of pretty all covered in snow, but I'm ready for some summer heat!

We've been working on our backyard. Here is a BEFORE picture. I'll post more as we go along, but as I'm sure you're well aware, we are NOT yard people, unfortunately. This side was a muddy mess after all the snow this winter, and all the perennial plants were growing crazily, and so feeling adventurous one day we decided to take it on and try and tame it. We had a few landscapers come out and give us estimates on everything we had in mind, and --no joke-- one of them wanted $12,000!!! ((cough, cough, sputter, sputter)) to do it, so that sealed the deal for us. We are able-bodied and can certainly provide our own free labor, and can pretty much look up any how-to YouTube video we need!!! We'll see how our many projects progress through the summer... 

Lucy and Zach's school recently held a Fun Run to earn money for their school. After having been rescheduled once due to snow, you can see the new date was a gorgeous 75 degree day with lots of sun. I went right before school was ending to cheer them on and they were doing their last few laps. (You can see we still have very few buds on the trees. Not sure if that's normal, but like I said, loooong, yucky spring).

Here's Lucy with her class, running like a champ! Lucy ran over 5 miles! Impressive!

I finally caught up with Zach who was running with all of his first grade buddies, and they also ran about 5 miles. Great job Zach-O! They both slept so good that night, I should make them run laps before bed every night or something.

May 5th was Cinco de Mayo, Jon was working the late shift so it was just the kids and I, and I decided we needed a little Cafe Rio to celebrate Mexican independence. Ole'! 

Garden of the Gods

Finally! We had our first weekend with no work/travel/church obligations, NO SNOW, nice weather, and a long list of things to do and places to see. We headed about 40 minutes south down to Colorado Springs to check out the Garden of the Gods. In the 1800's this unique land was privately owned and operated by a local rancher. In the early 1900's upon his death he donated it to the city of Colorado Springs under the stipulation that it must always remain free to the public. My kind of guy!  

And what a gorgeous place it is! With a snow-capped Pike's Peak in the background, amazing red-rock formations galore, and plenty of easy scenic hikes, we were in for Mother Nature's treat. 

My little hikers eager to get started. I think the fact that this Colorado wonderland is free, combined with a sunny and 75 degree Saturday, made every red-blooded nature-loving Coloradan turn out in force. It was PACKED. Every parking lot was full, with about 10+ cars ready to pounce on the next available spot. We ended up parking here at the Visitor's Center and then walking about a mile in.  

Baby Elizabeth was a champ and napped in the front pack most of the afternoon. There were signs posted along the way to stay on the trail and watch out for rattle snakes! Every little movement in the grass had Leah and Zach totally freaked out-- and then we saw a couple completely off the trail taking engagement pictures and Zach was so worried for them! He kept asking, "Shouldn't we tell them about the signs we saw?" I think I feel a future FHE lesson coming together... 

Leah was sporting her black glitter high tops and kept calling them her "hiker girl" shoes. They must have been, because she pretty much walked the entire thing by herself!

The White Wall. With the sun full on, it just glowed amidst all the other red rock formations.

The "Kissing Camels." Can you see them? 

Lots of hikers and walkers and rock climbers to share the trail with. I hate how pictures never seem to do justice to the scenery! The colors were so vivid!

If you look closely you can see someone rock climbing about halfway up-- right on the middle of the rock. Jon was fascinated. I think we may have a new hobby to deal with living here in Colorado! 

Zach and Leah were inspired by all the rock climbers and decided to get in on the action. They had a blast checking out all these crazy rock formations.

The main trail is about 1.5 miles roundtrip and loops around the backside of the rock formations. It's totally flat and was just perfect for my kids to do. I'm sure we'll be back many more times!

On the opposite end of the park is Balanced Rock. Literally, this huge rock is sitting on top of a little tiny rock underneath-- maybe the size of a tennis ball. This picture doesn't do it justice-- but it looks like it could topple over at any second but has probably been like that for thousands of years!

On our hike back to the Visitor's Center we ran into a herd of about 8 deer. You can't even see them hiding in the brush in this picture they are so well camouflaged! We decided Heavenly Father was pretty amazing. 

After all that hiking we'd worked up a pretty good appetite. Jon had heard about this little hamburger joint from a patient who lives in Colorado Springs. Apparently it's a new hamburger franchise opened by the chef of In 'N Out burgers. 

YUM!! The burgers were amazing with the Chef's special sauce, and we'd been told we HAD to try the boysenberry milkshake, which was also very good. Such a fun way to spend a Saturday and much better than shoveling snow, ha ha! 

April Snow Showers, Bring May Flowers... I guess.

I can't believe we are halfway through April already. I guess what they say is true-- time flies when you're having fun... Or also when you're just super, super busy!

Look at this sweet little thing! Jon said it best when he observed that she just gets cuter by the day. She has huge blue eyes and these soft, squishy cheeks! She'll be 3 months old next week. I hate how fast these little babies grow up.

She had her 2 month check up right after we got back from Spring Break. That meant 3 shots (plus the rotavirus one which is oral)-- and she was not a happy camper. But the good news was we got to see her stats, which were awesome! She weighed 11 lbs. 1 oz., which from her 2 week check-up weight of 6 lbs. 15 oz., means she'd packed on some nice, healthy weight.  She really is a great eater.

We decided to get Miss Leah's hair trimmed even shorter, and she absolutely loves it. She actually likes going and getting it washed with nice, smelly shampoo at the salon, and she keeps asking if we like her "short cut." I think the shorter hair definitely fits her feisty personality.

Jon took her on a daddy-daughter date to get ice cream sundaes at McDonald's and she was so excited. She asked me the other day if her name was Leah, or Wee-Wees. I asked her what she thought it was, and she gave it a couple of seconds and said definitively, "Wee Wees!"  

Sweet sisters! It is so fun for Leah to have a little sister home during the days with us. She still has 2 more years before kindergarten (which is only half-day here), so they have 3 long years ahead of bonding time. Elizabeth has become Leah's little doll, and to all of our very pleasant surprise, she has 

never once been jealous or mean to the baby, at least that I can think of. She is super protective of her when Lucy and Zach get home and tells them it's "her baby."

Isn't she just so cute?? She is a hit wherever we go.

Being attacked cuddled by Zachy. Man, he loves this baby! I have to constantly tell him hands-off the baby because she gets mauled by all three siblings so often. I guess that's just the plight of the fourth child.

I've been doing little DIY projects to spruce up the house a bit. We tore down the old sliding blinds that were there-- they were old and brown and ugly, and replaced them with some curtains from IKEA. I LOVE how it completely changes the room! This isn't a great picture, but my favorite time of day is late afternoon when the sun is on that side of the house and the whole room just glows.

While Jon was gone in Chicago for his last implant course, I decided to paint the piano. I've wanted to ever since we bought it four years ago off of Craigslist. I figured if I messed up or hated the color we were only out $100 or so. We nicknamed it the "Battleship" because it's this cool old antique, enormous, dinged up monstrosity.

So, pretty much I spent all afternoon/evening on Saturday painting. It wasn't that hard actually-- in fact, the hardest part was just picking the color! Between shifts of baby duty, entertaining kids, feeding kids, and bedtime, I got it done. I LOVE it. It totally lightens up the room! It's amazing how much light that big, dark piano absorbed. Jon was completely surprised when he came home Sunday night because I hadn't said a word-- but he likes it too.

I started back up teaching since having the baby, and it's been going really well. They added a Friday morning class for me at 11 a.m., which (let's be honest) is kind of a crappy time, but I figure it's a start. I recently helped launch Body Pump 97 and it was so much fun to team teach! 

The three instructors I teach with and sub for. The one in the middle is Australian and also hilarious. It's certainly not First Health, which I still really miss. The group exercise programs here are so small! But it's better than nothing, and I'm just glad I even have an opportunity to teach/workout so soon post-baby.

Well, on to the April Snow Showers part! We had been enjoying fabulous sunny weather since getting back from Boise-- but as most CO natives knew, it was too good to be true. Old Man Winter dies a slow, painful death up in these parts. We woke up Saturday morning to a huge blizzard.

This was once of four times Jon had to go out and shovel, just to keep up with it. Overall the Rockies got 4 feet of snow, and in Parker we got 2 feet. It was wet, heavy spring snow-- and was not kind to the trees and bushes. There are dead branches everywhere from all that extra weight! And to think, summer should be just around the corner. The ironic part (besides it being APRIL 16th!!!), was that this was our first free weekend since January. Between Jon working, Jon traveling to Chicago, Spring Break, and hosting various visitors, we have not had one weekend as a family to go do something fun together. You can imagine how excited we all were for Saturday!

We'd originally planned to drive down to Colorado Springs and see the Garden of the Gods, but due to the weather, that definitely was no longer an option! We settled on the Wildlife Experience in Parker. It was close, it was open, and the kids like it. 

We even got tickets to the IMAX 3D movie "Prehistoric Planet" and had the entire theatre entirely to ourselves! The museum was also completely empty, so we had free-range of everything. Being from North Carolina, we wondered where are all of these hearty Coloradans hiding?? 

Elizabeth had fallen asleep in the car, so we stopped at the brand-new Freddy's by Target and got takeout for dinner. Not bad for a Plan B on a very snowy April weekend!

Sunday morning-- we woke to find our backyard COVERED in snow. It was up past Jon's knees when he went out to knock the snow off the trees. We live in Narnia for sure! At least church was reduced to just Sacrament meeting. 

I had to show off this cute baby in her Sunday best though!

My view of bored kids during FHE, ha, ha. I think that secretly they really do like it...

Baby smiles and laughs are the BEST! Here's hoping Spring is really, truly here and Mr. Sunshine makes quick work of all that snow! Rumor has it that all this spring snow will make the wildflowers up in the mountains incredible this summer. And with all these showers we should definitely be getting some beautiful May flowers!