Rain and Holidays

 It rained yesterday. Beautiful, down-pouring awesomeness like I used to crave in Utah.  Growing up in a desert has made the sound of the storm magical.

Apparently, I am not the only one in my family who finds it so.  We had just finished up a grueling five and a half hours of choir and acting rehearsal and I had called it good for the evening.  We did a quick straighten-up while I put the finishing touches on dinner, we ate and then I declared the evening free.  

"Maybe we could watch a movie or something," I mentioned casually, to the delight of the kids.  

During dinner, the rain started coming down even harder, beckoning.  The older kids asked if the little ones needed a bath tonight.

"If so, can we do it outside in the rain? You know, just leave their clothes on but let the rain clean them off?" they queried.

Brilliant.

So that is what we did on our evening off...let the rain pour down.

Piper and Lily both commented yesterday about how it is like everything all of a sudden turned green.  The birds are out in choruses and everything feels alive. The sound of the distant freeway have receded even further, masked by the unfurling of all the leaves in our little woods.

I love to listen to the birds outside my window, particularly this morning when I lay there snuggling with my baby, trying to get her back to sleep in my favorite way possible...nestled up against my body. There is something equally magical about snuggling a sleeping baby so the combination of bird song, rain, and sleeping baby has really set a wonderful tone for my day :D.

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Lily has started a new tradition of reading off all the holidays for the day.  This week we have celebrated:

-"Minimize Food Waste Day"--leftovers for dinner!

-"Blueberry Pie Day"--particularly delicious.

-"National Kids and Pets Day"--every day, right??

-"National Pretzel Day"--another yummy one with homemade pretzels

-"National Tell a Story Day"

-"National Prime Rib Day"--sadly, missed celebrating this one

-"National Devil Dog Day"--won't mention how applicable this one was

-"National Great Poetry Reading Day"--every day!

-"National Zipper Day"--or as Liesl puts it, "beezer" ("Mommy, will you do my beezer?"

It's been a riot!  Maia was sad that we didn't celebrate "National Hug a Plumber Day" last Sunday until she realized that Quinn had done a lot of plumbing work, so we felt that qualified him.  Oh, and we forgot to get out the shrimp last night for "National Shrimp Scampi" day because we got so caught up in the rain and beauty of the evening.  I am great celebrating that one a day late ;). 

Sledding and Sass

  The kids just came in from an epic sledding adventure. Apparently on one run, they all tried to go on the same run and the three little ones fell off, Liesl happily dragging behind and the boys getting their breaths knocked out a bit.

After the trauma subsided, Liesl asked Lily to carry her up the hill (which serves as our driveway most of the time). “I can't carry you because you are too heavy with all of your snow clothes on, sorry!” Lily smilingly consoled her.

Lily continued up the hill. Shortly later, Piper (who was not privy to the above conversation) came trucking by with Liesl on her back.

“See, Lily...” Liesl called out as they passed. “Piper can carry me!”

Wow. Three and distinctly sassy.

Q-dawg's Trip with the Girls

So fun! Q-dawg took Liliputian and Pipalicious with his brother and some of his daughters on a trip to the Adirondacks for almost a week.

Liliputian will be your tour-guide/narrator for this adventure.  Grab a life vest and a paddle and enjoy! :D

Our way back from grabbing the eggs that we left in the van, that we are going to eat for breakfast.

My AMAZING father

we have a lot of beautiful scenery thankfully 

our dock were we putt all of our boats

a part of our beautiful campsite

AMAZING father and I are making sausage and eggs for breakfast

Zy's shoes tied to the tree(don't ask me why :D)

The tent that held the two men and the 3 little girls(not including Arella :D)

The little tent that held the dog, Arella and I

More Scenery

Suvi the Kayaker 

Piper her partner

Beautiful Scenery

Piper and Suvi

The WOnDeRFuL Zy

Our life jacket line

Inside the big messy tent

Our diet was marshmallows and hot chocolate

Tessa posing 

Arella and I have the privilege to wash the first dish's that were mouse poop infested :S 

Suvi steering Tessa paddling, and Piper sleeping. 

Arella's knot(if you could identify the knot please comment below)that she dragged all the way to camp

my AMAZING father's catch

Sadly I spent the most part of the trio fishing but I did catch two fish!

here are my fellow fishers

Piper the perfect 

Arella the fabulous photo-bomber

this is one of the fishes I caught

oh no he's blinding us

That's better

here is the WOnDeRFuL Zy in his air mattress

there are the little girls who say they are going to go to sleep but actually stay up laughing and talking :D 

there is my AMAZING father found his phone

There we are eating the perfect pancakes that WOnDeRFuL Zy made

there are the little fishers 

it sounds like paper-towel's rolling down the hill
(a little thing we tease Arella about :D)

the Hot chocolate warms up my hands

that morning had beautiful mist on the pond

There is the WOnDeRFuL Zy who is admiring the sunrise 

the bags that are in the tree are being hidden from the mice and other animals

There is the Magnificent Tessa 

there I am fishing again

There is my AMAZING father untangling my knot again

I caught him smiling :D

and there is my knot

here my shots of my AMAZING father

this is the little girls(not including Arella) playing games

My AMAZING father  studying the scriptures 

the beautiful scriptures

here are some pics of mist going off the water

there is the dog

this is the day we go hiking

there is my dad hiding the boats

perfect Piper making faces

there we are ready to hike

the three terrific trio

there we are

there is my AMAZING father's nose

here is the 0.9 mile hike

our first rest stop

our beautiful lunch break

there is magnificent Tessa 

Arella the look out

We got to the very tippy top of the hill!

little monkeys

here are the two travelers 

this is at the end

Arella in the princess seat(Kel)

There is the moon

there we are at the last day with our big bonfire

this is actually when we were leaving to the campsite 

there we are at Denny's

and the travelers traveled all the way home
and they lived happily ever after