March Randomness

Despite the fact that they are a mish mash, I kind of like these random posts.  I view them as an all you can eat buffet where you can sample a bit of everything.  Of course, since it was 78 degrees on Friday, I thought we were done sampling snow.  Apparently not.  While it didn't stick around, our roof and yard were once again covered in white today.

Granted, the snowfall in March was much heavier.


The kids thought the backyard was great fun with all its snowy obstacles.

Annika even tried sledding off our tree.

In mid-March, they finally finished the remodel of our beautiful old 4th and P chapel.  

It is so nice to walk down the street to church.

We made the first pilgrimage in snow pants.

Speaking of church, Brooklyn regularly steals my dresses.  

Occasionally Talia turns into quite the photo bomber when I'm trying to take a picture.  Go uke!

Whenever Jason can talk me into it, we invite friends from the neighborhood over for dessert and games after church.  The Maxfields joined us for a belated pi day party.  After eating chicken pot pie and apple pie, we conned our poor friends into playing pie face.  Good luck Justin!


Ha ha!  Got you Brooklyn.

As long as we are talking about messy faces, here's Eli practicing a silly skit about getting ready for school. 

And here he is with his friend Emery inside Ms. Moreno's Spanish classroom, making llamas during their unit on Peru.

A final picture of Eli dressed in traditional Bosnian clothing for an ambassador performance.

The shoes were especially fantastic.

Meanwhile, Daddy Jason was exceptionally busy coordinating a design competition in Atlanta, teaching a studio class at the University of Utah, and designing a mixed-use care facility in Clearfield, all in addition to his regular work as the executive director of ASSIST.  Despite all the pressure, he still manages to smile and make time for us.  Here he is atop Ensign peak with Joseph Kunkle, a former Rose fellow who kindly came and spoke to his studio students.

Jason in another happy place--playing Settlers with his munchkins.


On March 25th, Jason celebrated his 38th birthday.  Grandma Susie and Grandpa Charles were kind enough to come down and help us celebrate, even bringing two of Grandma Susie's amazing pies.

As soon as our church meetings were over, Jason hustled to open presents.  After shaking Callie and Adam's gift, he had a sneaky suspicion that it contained something he was going to love. 

Yup.  Happy, happy birthday, Peanut Butter!

Early afternoons are a favorite time of day.  After coming home from work/preschool, Annika and I have some quiet time together, sometimes inviting a friend to play.  Here she is with Benjamin, a cute little pal who lives around the corner.

Late afternoons are busier.  Most days we race all around town to piano lessons, orchestra, scouts, choir rehearsal, and now baseball.  Here's Eli coming up to bat during his first experience with machine pitch.

Occasionally we even find time for some other adventures around town.  Here we are at the City Blocks Lego exhibit at the Leonardo.

I really liked the Angel Moroni atop the Salt Lake Temple.

The Main Library...

...and the Cathedral of the Madeline, still under construction.

Of course, Annika prefers to build her own cottage-sized cathedrals.

In March we checked out a Community Exploration pass from the library that let us explore a few places that we go less frequently, like the Children's Museum.

We saw some of spring's earliest flowers at Red Butte Gardens.

While I don't have any pictures, we also loved the exhibition on Nature's Ultimate Machines at the Natural History Museum.  Of course, Annika was just as excited about the slug she found in our backyard.


Good thing Ruby took her to the zoo to see some more exotic animals.


The kids were thrilled to ride the carousel.

We even ran into Talia at the zoo, who happened to be visiting at the same time with her Activity Days girl friends.

All in all, March lived up to its reputation of madness, but in the best of ways.

Keep smiling!

Dinosaurs Old and New with NomiAnn and Papa Kay

Well, due to a delightfully unexpected surprise last week, I am now behind in blogging two great visits from Papa Kay.  (Nothing rounds out Family Home Evening better than the doorbell ringing with grandpa waiting on the front porch.)  His first visit was with NomiAnn in Mid-March over her spring break.  We met up at Liberty Park where Papa K naturally broke out the rocket balloons.

NomiAnn's looking pretty snazzy with her Central purple jacket and phone.  I'm pretty sure she's photographing the rocket balloon in its perch where it landed high in a tree.  Oops!

One day after Annika's preschool, we headed over to the Tracy Aviary for some avian fun with the closest living relatives of the dinosaurs.


The bird show is always a favorite...

...even if they do buzz your head in the small indoor space.  I definitely felt feathers!

Time to let loose in the owl forest.

 We let Sir Eli play hooky from school one day so that he and Papa Kay could construct his pinewood derby car.  He was so excited to work on this project with his grandpa.  As a mother, I was equally excited to delegate and have the car finished weeks ahead of time.

Other fun highlights of the trip: breakfast at Straw Market, lunch at the Blue Lemon, and dinner at Sawadee; plus visits to the Natural History and Church History Museums.

The most memorable part of our week together, however, was our trip out to Vernal to see Dinosaur National Monument.

It was pretty incredible to be hiking along and see giant dinosaur leg bones just sticking out of the rock.

Quite the vertebrae.

Inside the covered dinosaur quarry, the exposed rock face was littered with thousands of half-exposed bones from the dinosaur log jam that occurred in a riverbed millions of years ago.

Wow.

Because they are fragile, complete skulls like this camarasaurus are pretty rare.

 In case you are struggling to interpret what you are seeing...

...Talia made a diagram to help you out.

You probably didn't need quite as much explanation for this one.

As a breastfeeding mama, I was personally inspired by this photo from the early 1900s where a woman is comfortably feeding her child in the midst of all the action without any sense of impropriety.

 A view of the quarry from the outside.

Dinosaur National Monument boasts more than just old bones.  We enjoyed studying these more recent petroglyphs.

Ever photogenic Papa Kay.

Can you spot the petroglyph?

On closer inspection, the rock face was covered in lizards scampering around.

In your honor Aunt Callie, a flute player.

We also visited the homestead of Josie Morris, a fascinating rancher known for her wild and independent spirit.  Not only was she known for hanging with Butch Cassidy and his gang, but she married five times.  She divorced her first four husbands and the fifth died under mysterious circumstances.  Josie lived off the land in this homestead until 1963, when she broke her hip at the age of 90, passing away a few months later.

Perfect place for a picnic...

...and a hike.

 There's a happy grandpa.

Back in our Springhill Suites hotel room, we took a photo in honor of St. Patty's Day.

As a grand finale, we all snuggled in together to watch Jurassic Park--a fitting conclusion to our dinosaur discovery day.  Thanks NomiAnn and Papa Kay for the fantastic visit!  We love sharing so many adventures with you.