Easter Sunday

The morning of Easter Sunday was beautiful.  All week during our scripture time, the kids and I have been going through the Easter week when Christ was alive.  We talked about all the main events leading up to his time in Gethsemane and his death and resurrection.  On Palm Sunday, we talked about Jesus riding on a donkey through the city gates.  Cooper's preschool talked about this story the very next day and Cooper was excited to already know the story.  We talked about the Last Supper, when Jesus washed His disciples feet, and when he cleansed the temple.  We talked about the Passover holiday that the Jews had celebrated that week and we even recreated a Passover meal with bitter herbs and food items that were similar to what they would have eaten on this holiday.  The kids love it because we always do this Passover meal on the floor on a blanket.  Each food represents something spiritual, usually concerning the ancient Isrealites.  It was fun to teach the kids a little bit about this.  They have watched a few episodes of "The Bible" with us, a recent show on TV and have been able to better understand some of the Bible stories.  So they had an idea already who the "Israelites" were.  As the week went on, we talked about the Garden of Gethsemane and how Jesus suffered there.  We made resurrection rolls with crescent rolls and marshmallows to help us all understand how Jesus' body was embalmed and placed in the tomb.  Then we talked about the glorious resurrection, using a glove to help them understand the body and the spirit.  It has been a wonderful week of learning and I think we all better understand the real meaning of Easter.  

Easter Fun

Easter is always a fun holiday.  It was Kaylee's first real time decorating eggs.  Instead of dying them, she painted them, and she loves to paint!  The boys dyed their eggs using a pinterest special, wire whisks.  Unfortunately, the eggs didn't ever really get eaten, but it was fun decorating anyways.  

The Routsong Family always does a big Easter Egg Hunt for all the grandkids.  The older teenager grandkids help fill eggs and then go hide them all over Grandma & Grandpa's property.  The little kids each get a color of egg to find.  This year, Kaylee had to find the pink ones, Jaxton had to find the yellow ones, and Cooper had to find the orange ones.  There were equal numbers of eggs in every color.  The kids had a blast searching, and then had a blast discovering what was inside.  Grandma always hides one big black egg with dollar bills inside.  Cooper was the lucky finder's keeper!!  He found that egg and found a $10 bill inside.  He was on top of the world!!  He was so proud of his find and was showing off his prize everywhere he went.  Uncle Mike offered to give him 2 green $1 bills in exchange for his one.  But Cooper knew enough math to understand that the 10 on his bill meant more than two that said $1 on each of them.  It was funny watching him contemplate this trade and then decide against it.  :-).  What a fun day with family!!  And a beautiful spring day! 

Cooper, Jaxton, Ryan, Ash, Kaylee, Christin, and Austin in the tree

Bella Dog

We have got ourselves a dog!!  Outrageous, right?  What are we supposed to do with a dog?  I have no idea! I've never owned a dog in my life.  Yet here we are, dog owners.  That sounds strange!!  Our cousins dog, Bella, is a beagle terrier mix.  She's a great dog, already potty trained and gentle as ever with kids and very obedient.  They were looking to find a new home for her, and the kids were interested.   So we took her for a week to see how things might go, and she's becoming a part of our little family.  The kids are actively taking part in taking care of her.  They divided up the jobs themselves and gave out assignments.  Cooper would take her potty when she needed to go outside, and he was willing to scoop her poop with the special pooper scooper too.  Wow, that's brave!  He also would be in charge of putting her in her kennel when we leave the house, and letting her out when we get home.  Jaxton would be in charge of filling her food and water bowls twice a day.  They put me in charge of giving her a bath.  The kids also have stepped it up in taking on an extra chore every day to help keep our house clean, keep the dog hair to a minimum and keep our house smelling nice.  So far so good.  

The dog's name is Bella.  Funny, because we have a baby girl cousin named Bella too.  Hmmm.  We have considered trying to change up her name a little, maybe to Bells or Belle, or something like that.  We will see.  :-)  But Bella loves to play catch.  Its her favorite game ever.  And the kids are thrilled that she can get so excited over a tennis ball or frisbee :-)

Kaylee is our girl, of course, so she is around just to take care of our new furry friend.  She gives Bella blankies to keep her warm, feeds her treats, and snuggles with her.  And Cooper lived up to his commitment to scoop poop.  He went outside in his underwear and rain boots to take Bella potty.  He was brave enough to scoop her poop up into a bag and throw it in the trash!!  If I have helpers like these, then this dog can stay!!  

A Budding Artist

Kaylee is a little artist.  She has developed a love for coloring and will spend a long time just working on coloring all over a piece of paper.  She does not scribble.  Rather, she carefully and particularly will make small circles and marks with full focus and attention.  In her mind, she is drawing actual objects, and often her circles and swirls do turn into an object shape and she is thrilled!  One time, her circles, lines, and swirls made a shape like a vacuum, so she showed me that she had made a vacuum!!  She can draw a circle and then she will put two big dots inside that circle for eyes!  I am just so impressed with her focus on drawing at such a young age.  If she focuses really close, she can sometimes recreate a heart shape.  Its a budding talent!

Dawson is Six Months!!

Dawson is 6 months old!! I can hardly believe how time flies!!  He has grown into such a cute, sweet boy.  My heart melts every time I see his cute face, and his smile just melts my heart.  He can say DaDaDaDa now, which Nate is very proud of :-).  He can roll every which way he wants to get anywhere he wants to go.  He can sit up really strong and he loves to sit surrounded by toys.  He has blue eyes and whispy blond hair and looks so much like his big brother Cooper.  We call him "Mini Cooper."  

Dawson just began sitting up in the highchairs at restaurants.  This photo was taken in his first restaurant high chair!!  Oh is he proud!  He also can sit up inside a grocery cart with the buckle around his waist.  It gives mom a lot more space to put groceries now!!  

This is Dawson's first attempt at eating solid food.  He got to have baby rice cereal.  He wasn't sure exactly what to do with it when it got inside his little mouth, so he just spit it all out.  He seemed interested in eating and curious about the spoon and the white stuff and the strange taste, but he just couldn't figure out what he was supposed to do with it.  Cute boy!!  I think we have this very same exact photo with each of our kids in the very same high chair eating their first bowl of baby cereal!

These two kiddos are good buddies.  They will grow up doing all kinds of things together.  The big boys are often occupied doing big boy things, and these little ones are usually always together.  They will grow up side by side and I hope they will have a great friendship.  

Now, everyone thinks that Dawson looks just like Cooper.  His baby pictures are identical to Cooper as a baby.  BUT, we were at Grandma Routsong's house one day, and she had this photo sitting on a shelf.  Guess who is in that photo?  That is Baby Jaxton!!  And Dawson was wearing the very same sweater this particular day.  There DEFinitely is a resemblance between Baby Jaxton & Baby Dawson!  Apparently, all our kids just kinda all look alike!!  

Citadel Soccer

Jaxton did a soccer league called Citadel Soccer.  This was a unique league because it was purely instructional and the coaches were professional soccer players themselves.  All the other leagues around here are volunteer parent coaches.  These coaches were actually from Brazil and were teaching Futsal (or indoor soccer) during the winter.  So the kids learned all kinds of neat drills and tricks with their feet for offense in soccer.  They played little scrimmages amongst the team to practice their skills for defense.  It really strengthened Jaxton's soccer skills and was super fun to watch him learn.  He's less afraid of getting into the action and getting that ball away from other players.  Jaxton gained lots of skills that he will be able to use in springtime league soccer.  Great job Jaxton!!

Upward Basketball

Cooper was on an Upward Basketball Team this winter season.  He absolutely loved it!  He embraced the sport wholeheartedly, and loved every minute of it.  Cooper has some great qualities that allow him to make and reach his goals.  He is determined to succeed if it is something special to him and nothing will stop him!  This is the attitude he took with him onto the basketball court.  

He already was an expert dribbler.  Being on the team helped him learn how to pass, block, run hard, and how to tell the difference between offense and defense.  His team name was The Rattlers and he had some great coaches.  

Cooper's strength is definitely defense.  They help the kids by giving one boy from each opposing team a color.  Then, the kids with the matching color are to block one another at appropriate times during the game.  Cooper went above and beyond just "blocking" his opponent.  He would not let him go anywhere.  He followed that boy around the court with his arms outstretched around and around.  Even during offense, Cooper often would continue to block his opponent till his coach would remind him to stop blocking and put his arms out for a pass from his teammate.  He was not tall enough to ever make a basket for his team, but he could prevent the other team from passing and making baskets simply by blocking the opposing team's best players.  It was awesome!

The team was great because it really taught the kids how to play a team sport.  They practiced on Thursday nights and often would practice passing the ball to a teammate who then would make the point.  Of course this helps little boys realize that they don't have to make the basket themselves, but  by passing to one another they could work together to make points.  The Upward League is a Christian based league.  During half time the kids would have a little meeting with the coaches on a gospel subject, like loving one another and trying to be like Jesus.  While this was taking place, there would be a Christian speaker that would speak to all the adults and families on the bleachers.  Often they were stories of conversion and talks about how Christ has influenced and changed their lives in some way or another.  It was very uplifting.  It was really neat to see other Christian people, not of the LDS faith, but of other Christian denominations, to share their stories about how they felt the spirit and were led to do certain things in their lives.  It made me more grateful for the Savior, that He has influence over everyone around us.  It was very neat to see.

It was a great basketball season.  We will definitely be doing it again next winter.  Cooper had a blast!!

Preschool Highlights

Cooper has thoroughly enjoyed preschool this year in Mrs. Kruse's class.  She is an absolutely wonderful teacher!!  He has learned so much this year.  He is beginning to read, and can do simple math.  He is coming out of his shy shell and is spunky and excited to learn.  His favorite little friend in school is Hunter.  Here are some fun highlights about preschool this school year:

At Thanksgivingtime, Cooper's class put on a Thanksgiving performance of songs and rhymes on stage for all the parents at their Thanksgiving Feast.  Cooper was not one bit frightened this time around.  He stood up on stage proud as ever with his head high, and he sung those songs!  It was an honor to join him for that Thanksgiving feast!

On Cooper's snack day, the kids were learning about dinosaurs.  Soooo, we searched pinterest for a fun dinosaur snack to go along with the theme.  We found one!  It was made out of a watermelon, carved to look like a T-Rex's jaw with spiky teeth.  That was a lot of fun!

Cooper's school has "Daddy's Night" which they kids and dads seemed to have loved!!!!  They got to go together all by themselves, and they had an enjoyable time together. I'm grateful that Nate can work around his work schedule so he could do this with Cooper!!

Cooper's Valentine Party at school was a fun event that I got to help out with!  I helped to make a healthy valentines snack of heart shaped ham and cheese sandwiches.  We let the kids cut a heart out of the cheese by themselves to add to their ham and cheese sandwiches.  I cut carrots into heart shapes, and we had pretzels that were kind of heart shaped as well.  They made candy necklaces, played Valentine's Bingo, and read a Curious George Valentine's story.  Cooper got to write out valentines for each of the kids in his class.  

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Kindergarten Valentine's Party

Jaxton's Kindergarten class had their Valentine's Day party.  I got to be involved in planning and organizing it.  It was super fun!!  The kids did lots of fun activities.  And we had lots of moms to help out.  It's always fun to get to know other moms of kids in Jaxton's class.  We broke the kids up into 4 stations and they rotated around the room.  The kids put together I "heart" You Keychains to give to a parent or friend for Valentine's Day.  

There was a story corner where a mom read a Valentine's story about Splat the Cat.  At this station, the kids secretly put together a big giant heart valentine for their teacher Mrs. Hensch.  They each got to sign a little heart and glue it on the big valentine.  At the end, we presented Mrs. Hensch her Valentine and she was very grateful!

At the snack station, the kids had cup cakes in ice cream cones, which they loved!!  They also got to write down an estimate for how many conversation hearts they guessed were in the conversation heart jar.  

Well, believe it or not, guess who won that contest at the end of the party?  Jaxton did!!  He guessed 419 and there were 5 hundred and something, so he was the closest guesser!!  

The kids got to play Valentine's Bingo at another station with conversation hearts.  I think they really enjoyed this one!

It was a great party!  I had a ton of fun planning it, the kids had a ton of fun enjoying it, and all us moms had a ton of fun spending time together!!

Cooper's Birthday Party

Cooper couldn't decide which superhero he wanted for his birthday party theme.  So, we settled on doing a Superhero Party that encompassed all of them!  We gathered up all the superhero costumes we could find and came up with: Iron Man, Batman, Black Spiderman, Blue Spiderman, Thor, Wolverine Man, and Captain Rex (who is not really a superhero, but according to Cooper, still fell in the same category).  He was excited to have all his friends dress up into a costume for his party.  

The most exciting part was to dress up.  The kids all put on a costume and instantly began acting very powerful, running around the house.  It was fun!  Even Kaylee decided to wear the Batman costume!  She was just "one of the boys!"  I warned them all that there was a villain that had been sneaking around, and that they needed to be on alert if they saw him.  Meanwhile, we played some fun superhero games.  First, they tested their superhero senses by feeling in a bag without using their eyes to figure out what was inside the bag.  After that, the villain did appear!  He threw black balloon "bombs" from the upstairs banister.  The superheros had to stop those bombs before they could blow up the city!  So they stomped on those balloons like mad!  Next, the villain threw out some kryptonite (crumpled foil painted green).  This substance hurts superhero powers, so the only way they could get rid of it was by picking it up with spatulas, tongs, and other big kitchen utensils.  This they performed very well.  I don't think one little boy (or girl) actually touched the kryptonite rocks!  

Next, the kids had cake.  Cooper and I found this cake on Pinterest and this is the one he had to have!  I am up for making unique cakes, so I thought I'd give it a whirl.  And it turned out great!!  

While the kids were finishing up their cake, all of a sudden, the villain appeared!  He had a nerf gun, pantyhose over his face to conceal his identity, and was angry and mad!  The kids picked up the rolls of toilet paper and began tying the villain up to stop him!  Finally he was confined to a chair and the squad of superheros had succeeded!  

Lastly, we opened presents and played for the last few minutes before parents came to pick up their superhero kids.  It was a lot of fun!  Happy Birthday Coop!!