daily life - May

Daily life according to my iPhone:

Trips to the grocery store. I think it's rather cute to have two little ones trailing behind me with their own carts - even if they take a detour every now and then.

And yes, Milayla is BACK in her winter hat. This was the end up April - we were FREEZING! Not cool.

 There was no shortage of laundry. But never any shortage of happy helpers either :)!

The kids love making salads for us to snack on in their kitchen. This particular spread was one that Milayla had put together for us and then she ducked out of the photo! Silly!

Lots of kitchen experiments to hide from chilly weather.

And some baking helpers. Atticus and Milayla have successfully made an almond flour quiche crust. I'll have them making the entire thing in no time. Ha! Perhaps they have a little ways to go on that one.

Artwork for Daddy's work.

The kid's artwork hanging up at Jason's work. They were all picture of the sky at different times of day. Big surprise that nearly every single one has a rocket or some other space-related item in it :). The top left even has Atticus' rendition of the International Space Station. Funny kids.

We headed to the land of tulips for another lovely temple trip to The Hague Temple. 

As lovely as it would be to attend a temple session with Jason, I do like the teaching opportunities that we have both had with the kids as a result of spending time with them on the temple grounds. Jason and I have had some really great chats about ways that we can build on those moments.

 Milayla is our little explorer and determined to go where no little girl has gone before. Thankfully, most places she manages to get into are pretty benign, but we really need to keep an eye on her as she learns about what is and isn't safe to climb.

I finally finished Milayla's birthday dress (just in time for her birthday! More on that coming soon!). It was quite the journey getting there but I think it turned out pretty well and perfect for Milayla. It really suits her. Not bad for the first dress that I have ever made - if I do say so myself.

We attempted a pizza and movie night with the kids. They were pretty excited about it and made it a good 30 minutes into the movie before they opted for books instead. Can't argue with that one - I would choose that too :). We all had a pretty good laugh about it.

They definitely enjoyed the pizza part though.

And for the parts of the movie that we did watch they really enjoyed it (The Muppets are quite loved  around here.).

Guess, we just need to pick shorter movies/shows. Oh well, not like we are big movie watchers around here anyhow. Life will go on and we'll enjoy reading plenty of books. We love books.

We also had fun helping out to clean our church building. The kids thought it was pretty awesome and are actually looking forward to the next time we do it (probably in part because we cleaned the church the morning of our pizza&movie night and they knew what was coming, but I'm going to stick with them being excited about cleaning. yes, they were definitely excited about cleaning ;).

I love that the vacuum is twice the size of Atticus and he absolutely doesn't care.

We had a nice surprise after we finished cleaning the church to find that a helicopter had landed in the parking lot outside and we got to check it out and see it take off.

 That yielded some big excitement. Just look how impressed Milayla is.

I'm only being a bit sarcastic about the kids' excitement over the helicopter because they really did enjoy watching it. I just think it's funny that I couldn't actually get a picture of them looking like they were...

I did manage to catch Milayla's excitement about getting to ride Daddy's shoulders though.

We also planned a last minute trip to Turkey to get us some SUN! Just check out this kids' waterpark. Awesome, right?

We actually ended up staying at a different hotel than in the picture, but they had similar slides (and a much nicer beach). I'll be posting pictures of that trip later.

Trips to the park are in full force (when it isn't raining). Which is great for our little climber. We have really been enjoying play dates in the park too. I love seeing the kids build their own little friendships.

 And rainy days are perfect for trips to the library. I love seeing the kids each so excited about getting to pick out new books. Good times.

And Milayla is becoming a little kitchen-helping-wiz! She loves to help out in the kitchen (and loves to taste test too). It has been a great way to get her to try new foods and textures that she won't always try when they are served during mealtime.

Atticus got a nice, short, big-boy haircut that he is pretty excited about. We love it too. I loved it so much I forgot to brush the hair off of his shoulders before snapping the very first picture of his new 'do'.   (Nothing quite like a little fur on the shoulders.) He sure is growing up!

We went on the hunt for the perfect birthday present for Milayla (and judging by her response on her birthday, I am pretty sure we nailed that one). I bet you can't guess what it was ;).

Atticus has completed his most difficult puzzle yet. At 57 pieces, this double-sided map puzzle gives Jason and I more of a challenge than it probably should, but Atticus completes it pretty effortlessly. On the first go around it took him quite a bit of dedication and he was so proud when he finished - all by himself.

And in a very sweet moment, and after a very busy weekend, Milayla fell asleep on our way home from stake conference in Hamburg with her uneaten lunch still clutched in her little fingers. So tired.

It's been a good month.