Easter Time!

Happy Easter! It was a good holiday and I felt like the kids really understood the reason we celebrate Easter. We had a few FHE lessons on the subject and they both impressed us with how much they had learned and remembered. It was really fun to have Grammy and Papa Vern, Darcy and her family and Debbie here from out of town. It was also a special treat to have Wendy and her family here from San Diego on a Mitchell year! It's really nice how both sides get along and are nice to include everyone. There were tons of people (especially kids) that made Easter even more special and memorable.  

 Zeyta and Gabe's first Easter! So fun they got to experience it together!

 Chloe made this egg in school. I was so proud of her for being a little missionary even when she's only 6 years old!

Dying Easter eggs - a lot of the kids ended up with colored "gloves" after coloring their eggs

Chloe used the tongs pretty good!

 Blain prefers the one color egg look

Zeyta didn't actually dye eggs this year but she liked feeling them all in the cartons!

Avenlea had a little attitude when it came to finding eggs, but eventually warmed up to the whole idea. She had done the same thing at the egg hunt the day before. Nate took all 4 kids to the Heber egg hunt by himself because I had to work a day shift. He said it was crazy and hectic and seemed like every kid in Heber was there. He had his arms full of babies so no pictures but I saw the bags of loot they scored and they all said they had fun!

 Craft time with Aunt Molly

Zeyta shaking her easter eggs from the Easter Bunny on Easter morning

Blain with his basket - the kids did a good job finding their baskets and loved all the nice things the Bunny brought them!

Chloe's Spring Performance: Chloe and the other dual immersion kids did a big spring performance with songs, poems, and a little dancing. She did really good and I could even hear her when they were reciting the poem and she knew all the words! What a cutie. We also had her last parent teacher conference and Mrs. Jimenez was praising her and said she has learned so much this year and helps the other kids who aren't catching on as fast. 2 months til summer break!

Chloe's Class 

Milk, Cream, Cheese, Butter..... We are kept eternally busy with all the lovely milk Bella is producing. It's overwhelming actually but Nate and I are trying our very best to keep up with the 2-3 gallons a day we are bringing in. We milk every night then skim cream from the milk from the previous day, wash jars and milk pail, and then decide how we will use the milk and cream. I've now made Mozzarella twice, butter 3 times, ricotta twice, Ice cream once, sweetened condensed milk, and have been adding buttermilk, cheese, etc. to anything that I can.

 Me with my first ball of mozzarella! Both times have turned out a little dry so I'll continue to try different techniques until I find one that works well and gives me results I'm happy with

 It's so fun to have all this awesome dairy but I  think it really is too much for our young family right now. It would be great to find a way to share it while getting something in return for our time and effort. As of right now we give some to the chickens if we run out of room in the fridge or accidentally freeze it, and I'm trying to make cheese when I can but it's eating it all up that is hard! We still have ricotta and  mozzarella from last week that we haven't used up yet and the fridge space is crying out for more cheese making! I make a gallon of yogurt a week so that uses up some of the extra and the kids eat it up no problem! I should just make more lasagna because that uses up a whole block of mozz and ricotta! And with the Italian sausage it's delicious!

 Making ricotta cheese from the leftover whey after making mozzarella. Waste not!

 Eating yummy buttermilk waffles!

Giant bowl of butter waiting to be put into molds and frozen! I think I'm going to culture some buttermilk and freeze it too so I don't feel so pressured to use it all at once!

Starts: The sprouts are getting so big! I want to get the broccoli in the ground soon and put the peas in too. The weather has been kind of cold and miserable lately so I'm gonna wait for a nice day to get it done!

 Broccoli all potted up!

The sweet potatoes finally getting some length to the little slips

Sweet Avenlea with the daffodils yesterday (the first day they opened all the way!)

 Silly babies! they are on top of daddy if you couldn't see him ;)

Bounce House with Grammy: Grammy got to stay an extra day after Easter so she decided to take all the kids to a bounce house in Orem. It was so much fun! There was stuff for all the different ages and it was a blast watching them enjoy themselves so much!

Blain and Chloe climbing together at the top!

Zeyta and Gabe!

In the Balloon enclosure - they had fans going so the balloons moved all over the place!

 Avenlea and James in the foam pit - they had a lot of fun playing together and following eachother around, jumping and laughing

 Chloe made it to the top!!

 Blain on the BIG slide! I was so proud of him and Chloe for going on everything! They weren't afraid and had tons of fun playing with their cousins

Mommy muffin morning: Today I went with Chloe to school for muffins with mom. We brought her chapter book Wizard of OZ and read a chapter before heading out to the book fair for a buy one get one deal! It was a fun morning with yummy muffins and chocolate milk and of course cutie Chloe

Enjoying our muffins together

 Chloe with her two new books that she should be able to read by herself soon!