He's Six!

This is my William. He turned six yesterday. He is a wonderful kid. Really he is. He is full of it - no doubt, but that is what makes him so much fun. He is easy to be around. He has lots of friends and is always ready to play. Kids love to play with him because he is so easy going, and he will play anything. He has an indescribable quality - a twinkle in his eye - like he is in on a private joke. He rarely says to me (every parents' favorite phrase) "I'm bored". He is anything but boring. He is a fun loving prankster. Every morning he sneaks up the stairs and tries to scare me. Unfortunately, I told him that like all mothers, we have that extra set of eyes in the back of our heads, so he can't get away with anything. I wonder how much longer that will fly. . . He still give me kisses and hugs, when I come to his school class. I love him and hope he had a great day, because he deserves it.

This was how the day went:

• He got to stay home from school because it is kindergarten testing this week, so in the morning we let him open one gift.
  

This was his "big" present. Jesse is a sucker for birthdays. He really wants our kids to feel special on their day. Therefore, he can be talked into things for birthdays that normally he would not do. So we finally broke down and got a Wii. It really is fun. I wish I had video of Christian and William playing the sword fighting game. It was pretty hilarious.

• Next William wanted to go to Costa Vida for lunch and then we went to the skate park to enjoy the sunshine.



• Then we went shopping to get a few things for William's birthday party.
  


• After Christian got home from school we finished opening gifts
  

He got a new pee-wee football, and a baseball bag, including batting gloves and sweat bands. William really has an aptitude for sports. He is just inclined that way. It comes naturally. And he loves it. Watching he and Christian at their baseball games is so fun. They tap home plate before batting, they slide - surprisingly when they should, they spit. It's awesome. So a couple of weeks ago William hit a triple in his baseball game, and broke his wooden bat. He loved that bat. So uncle Jeremy stepped up and got him a brand new bat - "the Hammer". Perfect.

• After dinner we got ready for the baseball game. Which they won due to an awesome triple play - seriously. A triple play! - These kids are 6-8, I think that is pretty amazing.
  
  

• Then it was home for cake and ice cream. Once again I took a crazy pill and decorated a cake. I started this tradition with one kid. You know that blissful time where you have a ton of time, and doing these kind of "home-maky" things seems cool, and like it makes you a better mom. So, you spend like three hours making and decorating this cake that gets destroyed in 12 seconds. Now I have three kids, no time, and though admittedly I am better at it now, I can't get out of this tradition. My kids love it and I now own pretty much every character cake pan Wilton makes. So William wanted a pirate cake, and I obliged.
  
  
  

We talked Great Grandma and Grandpa Hess into coming over for some cake, and we got Grandpa to play bowling on the Wii. It was a good day. I hope you felt special William. Mommy loves you!

If you love them set them free

In the spirit of purchasing and "educational" toy for the boys, Jesse and I decided it would be fun to order one of those butterfly gardens from TV - I know you have all seen the commercials! The caterpillars arrived April 6th.

They come very self-contained in this little plastic cup. The brown layer at the bottom is their food.

They just about doubled in size every day.

Just before they are ready to make their chrysalises, they climb to the top of the cup, and hang in this "J" position.

Once all the caterpillars are in the chrysalis stage you can remove the paper lining from on top of the cup and attach it on the inside of this butterfly garden net.


And in about a week you get a beautiful butterfly!

Now this may look very sciencey and cool - and it is, but bottom line I had bugs on my kitchen counter. Now, though not diagnosed, I am borderline OCD when it comes to cleaning. I will give credit to my mother on this one. I will concede that I believe one of my sisters has a more severe case than I. (You know who you are!) Nevertheless, this was difficult for me to endure. You are supposed to be able to release them once they are butterflies, with one small caveat - it must be 55 degrees outside (low temp). Now thanks to our good buddy "global warming", it has been nowhere near that for the almost two weeks that these bad boys have been hatched. I was all for this project when they were caterpillars hermetically sealed in that little cup with a food source, but butterflies need to eat. They must eat sugar water. (I am secretly laughing right now thinking about a scene from Men in Black.) Now I am sure that you can guess who must feed them right? Me. Yes. Me. Now go back to the OCD thing and imagine that I have to put my hand in a bug infested net filled with poop and gross stuff to feed the butterflies with an eye dropper. Which leads to an amusing tale...

On May 11th I opened the net to feed the little buggers and two of them escaped. So now I have two fugitive butterflies flying around my house. Now a little background . . . We have this broken window in our kitchen. Only the inside pane is broken, so needless to say it has not been a top priority to fix. This little bugger crawled in between the two panes of glass and all the way to the end. Now I have a toddler crying that the butterfly is going to die in the window, so I am forced to perform a rescue mission. I stuck a kabob skewer back there and got him out eventually. And caught the other in a cup. I am now counting the hours before I can kick out these house guests.

And today is the day. It is finally warm enough, and since butterflies only live like three weeks, they needed to be set free.

We will miss you!

Pinewood Derby

Last Tuesday, this girl (who has three sisters and no brothers) got to have my first experience at the pinewood derby. Pretty much on a daily basis I learn about all things boy. Their seeming disinterest in dirt being on them; the way they are constantly on the move; the unquenchable lust for lightsabers of every color and variety; and their total lack of interest in hair brushing; the way they try to be so tough in front of friends but still want me to put a band-aid on it. This was just another lesson.

Jesse and Christian worked hard on crafting this old fashioned style car. Jesse added fishing weights to make the car reach the 5oz limit. The car was named the "Silver Bullet". Note: I am aware of the irony of this name for a car entered in a church sponsored event. The kids were each in four heats and their times were combined to determine the winner. Although Christian did not win, we had a great time. We now know more tips and tricks than we ever thought possible.

Christian best friend did take second place in his age group and we had fun rooting for him.

Merry Christmas?

Ahhh. Springtime in Utah. This is Easter. Not Christmas. Easter. The kids thought this was awesome. The parents not so much. Let me explain.

First I decided to get creative. Not always a good idea. I saw on another blog these really cute silk dyed eggs, and they looked easy enough. So I thought I would give it a try. As you can see, we picked some of Jesse's cool old ties he doesn't wear anymore to tie around the eggs. They looked cool, and I was excited to see how they would turn out, but alas - they were a huge embarrassing failure. Perhaps the lameness is not fully captured here because of my brilliant photography skills, but trust me. They did not work very well. But I will not be deterred. I'm stubborn like that. I will try again next year and again and again until I conquer the elusive perfectly dyed eggs.

We did regular old colored eggs too!!

In the morning the "Easter Bunny" left the kids a note:

So, Christian and William had to follow these pieces of yarn throughout the whole house in order to find their Easter Baskets.

There were a few items inside and the boys made quick work of finding all of it.

Now the plot thickens. This year, Easter fell on the same Sunday as LDS General Conference, which meant the boys would be home all day. So the aforementioned "Easter Bunny" needed to come the night before to hide all of his goodies - which he did diligently. However he forgot to watch the weather. The next morning we woke up to snow - covering all of the hidden treats, which were now not only hard to find, but getting wet. Really wet. I don't know all of the chemical properties that create the uber stickiness of wet sugar - but it is not pretty. Now combine sticky chocolate and jelly beans with Easter grass - pure awesomeness.

But that is what is so great about being a kid. It doesn't matter that you are eating half melted whoppers encrusted with three year old Easter grass that has been stored in the dusty basement. It is candy! It's delicious! So bring it on. . .

The Easter Bunny also left some butterfly nets and a note instructing the boys that some baby caterpillars would be arriving in the mail for them to care for. Right now they are still growing, but stay tuned for the post about them. . .