new jersey

last friday the 2nd, we embarked on a trip to new jersey to spend the week with my sister and her family. we left at 1 pm and drove straight through the night (joel did most of the driving) arriving in nj at noon the following day. so it was about a 22 hour trip. but the kids did really well, which made being in the car that long somewhat bearable. we had such a wonderful week. the weather was beautiful, mostly in the mid 80's. since we were there over easter we were able to hear my brother-in-law preach a great message at the church he pastors. we then went over to his parents house for a delicious easter dinner and the ever popular easter egg hunt.

the rest of the week was spent hanging out at my sister and brother-in-law's house and getting a lot of quality time with them and their four kids. we ventured to the park a few times and joel took the 3 older kids and lauren to a movie. my sister and i got out a few times by ourselves which is always a lot of fun. we did take a day trip down to cape may which is in south jersey. we went to the local zoo there and then hit the beach. it is absolutely beautiful. lots of old victorian houses and cute shops. it is a really neat town.

lauren had so much fun with her cousins. she and elle played non-stop. dress up, barbies, kick ball, polly pockets, sidewalk chalk. even though elle is almost 3 years older she is very patient with lauren. lauren even got to go to elle's ballet class with her. it was very cute! and micah, toby and remi are the sweetest boys. they are so good with the little ones and are just very enjoyable to be around.

unfortunately the week went by way too fast. we are home now, but missing our wonderful family. thankfully they will be making the trek out here this july. we'll be counting down the days. we love you guys!

easter

cape may

ballet class

the girls

moa

this past weekend we were planning on going to an indoor water park about 3 hours outside of minneapolis. however, joel, caught a cold which then turned into a horrible sinus infection. so we had to cancel our trip. we were really looking forward to doing something fun this weekend and were disappointed by the change in plans. so to make up for not doing the waterpark, we ended up taking lauren to nickelodeon universe at the mall of america. she loves rides and had a great time going on as many as she could. joel and i had to accompany her on a few which was "fun". we all really had a lot of fun, and joel and i were thrilled that her favorite rides were a huge inflatable pineapple that kids jump around in and a bench like thing that goes up in the air and then slowly drops down. she must have gone on both of those rides about 5 -10 times each and she was able to do it her herself, no adult required (yay!).

gramps' birthday

this weekend was my dad's, aka gramps, birthday. to celebrate we went out to eat with my parents, brothers and sister-in-law. joel and i then went out for a quick date before going to my parent's house for cake and ice cream. we had a nice time with the fam and celebrating my wonderful dad's special day!

jer and missy

me and pres

ryan and gramps

my dad reading a poem cody wrote for him.

baby ry

wow, the time has flown! ryan will be 8 months on march 7th. he is the sweetest little guy. he's not in a huge hurry to grow up, and in fact has just decided he's ready to try and sit up by himself. he rolls here and there, but other than that he's not too mobile. but no worries here, it will happen when he's ready. what he is very good at is eating. this boy LOVES food. he scarfs down his baby food as fast as he can (orange veggies are his favorite if you couldn't tell from the color of his nose) and then he wants whatever we are having. the other night we were eating papa john's pizza, and he was chewing on some crust. joel and i didn't notice that lauren had ever so thoughtfully dipped ryan's crust in the garlic sauce that comes with the pizza and gave back to ryan. it didn't seem to bother him a bit! he gets lots of attention from his big sister, and if he could speak would maybe say a little too much! :)