Spring Time

 Celebrating Easter is still very important to Sydney.  She wants the full experience:  coloring eggs, finding candy, having an Easter basket.  She is determined to get the full childhood experience with the holidays. We also had a visit from Emma and Brox over their Spring Break.  It was fun to be with them and get to know them better.

 I had to sneak a picture of Jackson out back working in the yard in the heat.  I gave him a job to dig out a blue tarp that has been buried back in this corner since we moved into the house.  He hates to do jobs that he finds meaningless, and this one surely qualified.  Every 15 min. he would come inside and say "I can't get it out, it's too hard."  And then I would turn him back around and take him back out and show him how to dig it out again.  The process repeated several times until after an hour or so he finally got the tarp out of the hardened dirt.  He felt proud of himself when he finally got it out. 
 Teaching the kids to work and finish a job is one of the hardest tasks I have as a parent; almost as hard as digging up a tarp that's been under the ground for who knows how long.

 Jackson's new favorite thing to do is play poker on Sunday night.  He takes it very seriously (even donning sunglasses and a hat to throw us off) and he gets really angry when Sydney constantly beats him with ridiculously lucky hands.  He is determined to take her down. 

 McKell took these photos with her Freshman roommates from Heritage Halls.  They turned out so pretty.  I'm happy for her that she got to meet some new people and learn how to be on her own.  It's really rewarding to see your kids progress and move on to adulthood. 

 Jackson finished up his volleyball season.  They only had two losses.  He has really learned to love volleyball and we have too! I even know what a libero is now. I love Jackson's confidence to wear his church shoes while he refs a game in his shorts.  He really doesn't care what anyone thinks.  

We had to say goodbye to Grandma and Grandpa.  They are back up in Utah for awhile.  We sure miss them!

Paige ran for Women's Studies Honors President at BYU and she won! She also got to meet up with Mitt Romney for about 5 seconds.  HaHa

 Having all of the kids home for a week was fun!  Doesn't happen very often anymore.  The girls went to Taylor Swift together.  It was Sydney's first concert and she loved it!!!

And then Paige chopped off her hair and became a woman!! :) 

 And Mike finally got his first Mac!  Happiness all around!