Blue Bell in the Mail

When I was in high school, my Dad had this friend who would drive down to Amarillo, TX to get this special ice cream that was only sold in the South.

I thought it was pretty crazy, personally.

Then, when we moved to Mississippi a few years ago, we discovered Blue Bell ice cream.

It was delicious.

My parents came to visit (frequently), and it turns out that this was the special ice cream that my dad's friend would drive to Texas for!  We were pretty special, living in Mississippi...

I have to admit, I developed a fondness for the stuff.  Especially The Great Divide, Dutch Chocolate and Old Fashioned Vanilla - the good stuff.  So I was kind of disappointed when we moved to Virginia, and couldn't find it.  Apparently Virginia isn't "South" enough to carry Blue Bell...

I think I got over it...mostly...but then a few months ago my Dad called and said he had really exciting news.

Can you believe it?  A grocery store in Colorado was going to start carrying BLUE BELL ICE CREAM!

Then, seriously, everyone in my family who still live in Colorado (so my parents and sister) started TEXTING me pictures of this ice cream when they'd buy it.

Whoo hoo!  Yea...them?

Fast forward to my birthday, in May...

My parents told me that they had just mailed a box to me for my birthday, and it was going to arrive on a specific day.  Each day for the next 2 or 3 days they'd call me to remind me about this box, and that I should open it right away, and not wait till my birthday.

I think my response was usually, "yeah, sure, whatever, Mom and Dad..."

Well, when UPS came by with that box I dutifully opened it up, right away, and found this:

What the heck?!?  Did my parents send me fish, or meat or something?

(Which would be totally out of character for our family.)

So I tore through all the plastic wrapping, and opened the cooler...

and still couldn't figure out what the heck they had sent me, or why was it dripping.

When I suspected it was chocolately (when I first saw it I thought it might be blood, going back to the fish/meat thing.  And, YUCK!), I wondered why they'd send me chocolate milk...

So once I pulled the gross (but non-bloody) brown paper sacks out, I saw a sad sight:  

Melted ice cream.  A full gallon of it.

Darn it.

I called my mom for the scoop (ha, ha, pun intended), but I felt so bad telling her that it was all melted.

They had really wanted to send me Blue Bell ice cream for my birthday.  My mom spent a whole afternoon gathering up supplies, researching how best to send something frozen in the mail, figuring out the restrictions on dry ice (the butcher at the grocery store had assured my mom that they sent meat on 8 lbs of dry ice all the time, without the meat, or the ice melting).  My parents were pretty excited about the whole thing.

It would have been awesome, had it worked out.

But I felt pretty loved anyway.

My parents are the bestest.

Fridays

I love, love, love Fridays!

Lillian goes to preschool Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday for four hours, but it takes us 20 minutes to get to her preschool.  So by the time I buckle three little kids in the car, drive to her school, get the kids out of the car, take her into class, put the two little kids back in the car, drive home and take them out of the car it takes a whole hour. 

Then, 3 hours later we have to do it again.

So despite the long time she's at school, I really don't have time to do much when I have to factor in the eating and sleep schedules of a 4 month old baby.

So I LOVE Fridays.  Generally we have nothing to do and nowhere to go.

Perfect!

And I get to spend time with Lillian.

Lately she's taken an interest in baking and is always asking if we can make bread or cookies.

I'm usually on board with this.

Friday night is also our stay-at-home movie night with all the kids, so Lillian and I thought it would be fun to make some Muddy Buddies.

They are just so tempting, all spread out on the counter.

I tried to appease Lillian (and myself) with a banana,

but then relented and let her have some Muddy Buddies.

We needed some quality control, right?

Next we made some Smore's Cookie Bars.

Oh my!

These call for Marshmallow Creme, which I can eat straight out of a jar with a spoon!

Add in the chocolate bars, and a surprisingly good graham cracker cookie layer and it was a heavenly treat!

Mmm...delicious marshmallow creme!  It's really a good thing we had friends to help us eat these that night.

Now during this baking extravaganza, Mason was peacefully playing.

And making a HUGE mess.

She got into our game cabinet and pretty much tossed every piece to every game we own all over the family room.

But very quietly.  I had no idea she had been doing this.  In the room next to me, where I could see her if I turned my head slightly, no less.

But at least since it was Friday, and I had nowhere to go, we got that cleaned up nice and quickly.



So apparently Mason has mastered these toddler-proof locks, and I should keep a better eye on her.

Cherry Blossom Extravaganza!






This is what the Cherry Blossoms are supposed to look like.  We've had such a cool spring this year that the trees were barely blooming on the first day of the festival, thus no pictures of our own. 



Our last day with the Stones was jam-packed with tons of things to do.

It was the first day of the Cherry Blossom Festival in DC, so we planned to ride the metro downtown and go to the National Building Museum, and the back to the monuments to walk around and see the blossoms.  After that we stopped in Alexandria, rode the Trolley up King Street and met up with some more Tucson friends for dinner before heading home.

Whew!

A big part of the Festival for kids was held in the National Building Museum.  Schools and businesses set up booths where kids could learn about Japanese culture and make some crafts.

No surprise, it was packed!

And extremely warm.  I suppose it's a good thing that Colten is still stroller-bound, so that everyone has a place to dump their coats!  I don't think he minds, though.

After we crafted our hearts out, we hopped back on the metro, bound for the National Mall and the Washington Monument.

The kids did super with all the walking they did!

We had such a beautiful day, but a little chilly.  I suppose we can be grateful for the exercise to get our blood moving.

From the Washington Monument you can see a lot of the main DC sights; the White House, Capital building, Lincoln Memorial, Jefferson Memorial and across the river to Arlington.

After gathering our energy, and escaping the wind at the Washington Monument we set up for the Lincoln Memorial.  It's probably about a mile walk in between the two, and very pretty.  Unfortunately the reflection pool is under construction, otherwise it would have looked a lot better.

All the kids (minus Colten) lined up on the steps:  Seth, Jonas, Ashton, Cayden, Mason, Lillian and Maren, with Tina off to the side.

After seeing Lincoln, we headed back up to the metro stop.  On the way the kiddos needed a little break, so the stopped to climb all over this tree.

We took the metro back to Alexandria so we could meet up with another family from Tucson (I'm always amazed at how all the Tuscon people Andy grew up with stay in touch after so many years!)

We got off the metro with our hoard of kids, and then boarded the free trolley that takes you all the way up King Street.  I spent the ride looking out the windows and thinking about how much fun I could have shopping there!

We met up with another John and his family for a big pizza dinner.  Between all of us we had 12 kids.  YIKES!  They all did so well, all day.

After dinner, and saying goodbye to John's family we hopped back on the Trolley,

back to metro and then home.  It was a truly packed, busy and fun day.

We sure enjoyed our visit with the Stones.

We LOVE when ANYONE comes to visit us!

Playing Tourguide

At the end of March Andy's good friends, the Stone Family, came to visit us.

Andy's been friends with Jon since they were teeny, tiny little teenagers in Tucson, AZ together - almost 20 years ago - and has known Jon's wife, Tina, even longer.  I heard about the pair when Andy and I started dating, and met the two when Andy and I got engaged, and then Jon was the best man at our wedding.

I was always impressed that Andy and Jon stayed such good friends, despite Andy's family moving up the Colorado when he was in high school.

We've never lived in the same place as they, but have been able to visit a little; mostly while we were still in Colorado.  Ever since we got back from Hawaii, and the Stones moved to Illinois 4 years ago, we've been trying to set up a visit, but life (and lack of any real plans) always got in the way.

We were delighted, though, when they contacted us about driving East for their Spring Break to see DC.

They've got three kids, right about the same ages as our older three, and they all hit it off immediately.

Sadly, Cayden and Ashton were in school still, so we did our adventuring without them.

We first headed up the the Smithsonian and saw the American History Museum, Museum of Natural History and the Air and Space Museum.

We've been to those many times, but it's always fun to go again with friends.

And they're free.  YEA!

At the American History Museum we got to see cool things like 3CPO and Dorothy's ruby slippers.

All the museums include some hands-on kid areas.

You just have to be careful, because you could get lost in them, and find that you've spent hours of your day there, without seeing anything else!

(This has never happened to us...)

My favorite part of the American History Museum was seeing the original Star Spangled Banner, which inspired Francis Scott Key to compose The Star Spangled Banner.

It was just amazing to me to see how big it it.  It is so threadbare, and pieces had been cut out of it as keepsakes 200 years ago, but it is the real thing.  The kids each seemed in awe, though the didn't really get the significance.

After lunch I had to head home to get Cayden and Ashton from school, but Andy took Jon and Tina to see the other museums.

 

 They enjoyed the dinosaurs at the Natural History Museum,

and the mineral and gemstones.

They did a quick run-through at the Air and Space Museum before heading home and getting stuck in traffic.

Seriously, you can't have the true DC experience without getting stuck for hours in traffic.

Field Trip with First Grade

In March I got to go on a Field Trip with Ashton's class to Mount Vernon.

She was SO excited for me to come.

I had a hard time finding someone who could stay with Lillian, Mason and Colten so that I could spend the whole day with Ashton, but she's wanted me to go on a field trip with her class all year, and I hadn't gotten picked yet.  (Usually there are so many parents who sign up to go that the teachers have to hold a lottery to choose which parents can come.)

I always wanted my mom to be able to come on field trips with me too, so I'm glad that it all worked out and I could go with her.

The teacher divided the class, and each parent was responsible for six kids, and we were able to go where ever we wanted.  Our group was pretty good, but they were all so excited, and there were so many other school groups there, that they kept me on my toes, making sure I had them all with me!

We've been to Mount Vernon a few times recently, but this time they had some special events going on that made it fun to go again.

The kids got to place carnations by George and Martha's tombs.

They got to participate in some colonial events, and see how things were done on the farms at that time.

All the volunteers were dressed their parts, and even spoke using colonial language. 

It made it a little hard for the kids to understand everything, and I did my best to interpret!

Despite everything going on, I think all the kids enjoyed running around and playing near the river the best.  They seemed to think it would be fun to swim there. 

I'm glad they didn't try.

We had a great time, and I had fun hanging out with the First Graders!

But now Cayden's asking me to go on a field trip with his class, too...

(I'm glad they want me.)

Blessing Day

 We blessed Colten at church today.

It was a rainy, drizzly day, but wonderful for our family.

I love the pictures with all my kiddos.  They love each other, and get along so well.

I'm really glad that they're all close in age, and hope that they're great friends as they grow older.

Each of them have brought such blessings to us.

Colten was a sweetie on his big day.

The men said that he just looked up at them and smiled during his blessing.

Andy gave him a really nice blessing, and I wish that we could record them so I could actually pay attention and remember everything that was said.  It's just a little tough with the other kids climbing all over me.

But that's OK, because they were just excited for their little brother too.

Colten's blue eyes just kill me.

I look at him and wonder how I could possibly love him more, but it just keeps on growing.

It's a good thing our Heavenly Father has given us such an unlimited capacity for love!

Our first picture of all seven of us!

The Augers and the Bensons both came to our ward today to stand with Andy, as well as our Bishopric, Chris Near and Trent Hale.  Even though we're so far away from our families, again I'm so grateful to have such good friends who become our family here.