The Girls and some Music

Girls are so much fun. Don't get me wrong... I love my boys more than anything in the world, but I won't deny that I have so much fun when I can play with sissy's oldest daughter. This particular day, "The Girls" (aka- Bear, SG and her beautiful daughter) thought it would be fun to set up the Alien Bees (aka lighting) and have a photo session.
The girls jumped up and down to Linkin Park, while SG and I had fun shooting them.

Most of the time I spend with these girls are in the dojo. I have seen them kick butt at jiu jitsu for countless hours. (As a side note: Today I watched my 6 year old niece make an 8 year old boy tap...twice.) But, it is great to know that out of their gis, these girls can jump around, dance, and have a great time just being young girls with beautifully playful personalities.
Needless to say, no dance party would be complete without Mr. "Party Crasher/ Are you dancing without me?/ I want to play too!"

My birthday Surprise

I have an awesome husband.

For my birthday, he surprised me with an overnight stay in a villa in Carlsbad. My boys and I enjoyed playing cards and running around outside the villa in a small grassy area over looking a canyon. They even let me take pictures, which is a rare treat for me. (For some reason, all of my boys tend to be "camera shy" Lucky me!)



There was even a delicious slice of cheesecake waiting for us when we got there.


After playing, we had a lovely dinner at BJ's near the outlets.

Doesn't get better than that.

Excellent Jiu Jitsu!

We still continue to be committed to our dojo. Three or four days a week, the boys go to school, do their homework, and work very hard to be good at their sport.





April = another stripe! Go boys! Mom's so proud!
It's stuff like this that makes all the time we spend driving around and being consistent that makes it all worth while. Great job!

Easter Eggs and Cash

A tradition with our family is that on Easter we split our time between both grand parents' homes. For Easter brunch, the kids have great time hunting for plastic eggs in the backyard. Because the babies were old enough this year to (somewhat) understand the concept, we had to give them a slight advantage by allowing them to start the hunt first. Unfortunately, the piece that we hadn't considered is that - because the eggs are filled with cash, not chocolate - the babies had very little interest in looking for the hidden treasures. (They are YEARS from understanding the concept of money... but they know candy!) The result? The big kids totally scoring in the money department.
Grandma and Grandpa are very generous, as some of the eggs have coins, but most of the eggs are filled with paper money.


The babies in turn play we with just about everything else the could get their hands on in the backyard...except the eggs.







I'm willing to bet that there will be a day that the little kids will be able to hold their own in an egg hunt. But for now, I guess they'll just stick to playing with brooms, watering canisters, and the hose.