Easter!

He is Risen. He is Risen indeed! Happy Easter!

Trigg showing a little brotherly love for Easter!

The whole family!

We went to Indianola on Saturday for an Easter brunch and egg hunt!  Garrett was finishing his lunch, so we played some games!

Grandpa found some trains and cars at a garage sale, ran them through the dishwasher and put them into Trigg's toolbox...they were a big hit!

Let the egg hunt begin.  Trigg had the green eggs and he also was in charge of finding Garrett's orange eggs.

Piper exploring the tree stump in search of her pink eggs.

Trigg found an orange egg by the pheasant...

and he stopped to say "Hello" to the pheasant as well!

Piper found another pink egg

Trigg snagged another green egg...

and another!

Mom and Garrett helping Trigg spot eggs and enjoying the sunny day.

"What's this in the grill?"...a green egg!

Well that is surprising!

After the egg hunt, we tested out the swing...it goes high!

For Sunday, we headed up to Ankeny for another Easter celebration.  Heather made "Bunny Buns"

Twisted twice, with ears and a tail.

Heather also made "Bunny Bait"

A perfect mixture of popcorn, pretzels, M&M's and white almond bark.

One tricky task of Easter...getting all the kiddo's to smile at the camera at the same time.  2 of the 5 on this one...

the other 3 on this one...with Trigg and Aaron saying "Cheese" with emphasis one "eeeeeeeese"

Egg hunt at Nana and Papa's house...Uncle Chad and Dad hid these eggs...notice the egg wedged in the peak of the roof and gutter, (mission accomplished!)

We had a great Easter and when you ask Trigg:
"What do we celebrate on Friday?"
"Jesus died on the cross for our sins."
"And what do we celebrate on Sunday?"
"The resurrection!"

Well said son, well said!

Kerri Photography - Life is Beautiful review

Kerri is in Heather's bible study and we were given a photo session with her as a baby gift when Garrett was born from our friends the Hammer's.  Seeing a sample of her work on her website, she takes great pictures and we were looking forward to working with her.  Prior to our photo session, Kerri touched base with Heather to talk through details, let us know what to expect, check on outfits and talk about location for the session.  She was very thorough in her preparation which made for a very smooth session!

 Kerri did a great job during our photo session together.  We ended up having it at our house, that way Trigg could play with his own toys and if we needed to change a diaper we could!  She did great working with the boys.  She explained to Trigg what we were doing and answered all his questions!

Kerri also did a great job of taking both "staged" photos and candid photos.  Garrett needed a diaper change, so we told Trigg he had 5 minutes if he wanted to play with his cars...Kerri followed him in and snapped a few pics of him in his element.

A few days after our session, we went over to her studio for a viewing.  She walked us through the process and then we got to look at all the photos.  Her studio is great, she has done a great job of using the space she has.  Trigg got a little bored looking at all the photos, so Kerri grabbed some chalk and showed Trigg that the pipes and some of the walls were painted with chalkboard paint and he could draw!

Once we had the preview, we picked out the photos that we thought were keepers.  It's hard to narrow it down.  The photos are more expensive than we expected, so we had to narrow down our selections in order to stay within our budget, but we ended up with a good selection of pictures that we are very pleased with.

Our pictures came wrapped up and handled with care!
All in all, we had a good experience working with Kerri.  She did a great job with Trigg.  Her process from start to finish was great.  She is easy to work with and we are very pleased with the results!

Brothers

Life with 2 little dudes is pretty awesome.  Garrett is quickly growing and changing everyday and Trigg is always up to something and his imagination is getting bigger and so are his stories!

Bath night is always fun...two clean, happy boys!

With boys...we love to wrestle and get into tickle fights!

We also love books!  Today's readers, tomorrow's leaders!

...and we are learning to share our stuff: clothes, toys, books and even our seats...

...except Trigg doesn't fit as well in Garrett's seat, but we make it work!

We are having fun with our two boys and I am sure there are lots more adventures to come!

DIY Photo Clipboard Frames

Heather found an idea on Pinterest to make picture clipboards and thought our stairway would be a great place to hang them.  Here is the inspiration for our project. Click here for the tutorial from LoveGrowsWild.

We started with a plain 1x12 board and i cut it into 13 inch lengths.  Sanded down the edges, applied a wood conditioner and then I used the dark stain, Kona, that we used on Trigg's bed project.

 Then we added the bulldog clips that Heather picked up at Hobby Lobby.

I used Minwax Paste Finishing Wax for these frames, it gave it a good finished look without having to use polyurethane.

The finished product hung up.

 A view from the bottom of the stairs.

Close up of the frames.

Another Pinterest success!

The Goings On of Trigg

What do you do when you are trapped inside during such a cold winter?  Find idea's on Pinterest!  Heather found this one to keep Trigg busy (for 15 minutes...which for a toddler is a really long time!)

Play-dough, skewer sticks and Cheerios = fun

We also picked up some finger paints!  I re-purposed on old t-shirt to make a paint t-shirt for Trigg.

He loves painting with his fingers!

We tried out a new haircut place a few weeks ago, its called Shear Madness in West Des Moines.

Trigg loved that he got to sit in Lighting McQueen

...and watch "Cars"...

...and he got a blue sucker!  They kept him entertained and he got a needed haircut...Win-Win!

We have also been going to SkyZone in Grimes!  It's an indoor trampoline park and they have Toddler Time from 11-Noon on Wednesday's and Thursday's.

Mom and Trigg having fun on the trampolines!

"I mustache you a question!"

Trigg has discovered pockets...and he likes to fill his pockets with stuff...usually cars!

With the arrival of spring, the dudes jumped on the bike and went from a ride around the neighborhood.

I took a long lunch last Thursday and took Trigg to SkyZone...

...it was awesome!

...and makes for a good afternoon nap!

Our little man is looking more and more like a little man!

Watching his favorite movie Cars!

Trigg does try to push boundaries at times.  He is in a new cooshie booster  but occasionally he just can't stay sitting and will stand up in his chair...as we are learning in our house, poor choices have consequences and if you want to stand while eating supper, you will lose your chair and you can stand at the table.  At first he thought it was fun but by the end of the meal he was ready to have his chair back.

That's some of the happenings at our house, we are ready for spring and warmer weather so we can get outside and play!