The Royal Wedding

I am fascinated with the Royal family, as is the rest of the world. I have been ever since I was a little girl and remember Princess Diana and Prince Charles getting married. I remember finding out they had had baby number 2 and named him Harry; I thought it was the most horrible name ever. Now of course the name is much more common in the States, and I even wanted to name my own child Harrison, (not caring if he got called Harry, but "Harry Manwaring" sounds like a sentence so we opted for Carter).

Anyway, I've been anticipating the wedding of William and Kate and set the DVR to record the event. I watched it early the next morning, with my own "Princess Kate" by my side. I was trying to fast forwarding through the long walk up the isle and the speeches, and Kate said to me, "Mom! Quit skipping the movie!" I said, "I'm just trying to get to the good parts." She said, "These ARE the good parts!" Kate sat and watched the ENTIRE wedding, glued to the t.v. She is a true romantic and LOVES a good fairy tale story, especially if it includes a prince and a princess, and even more so when the princess is named Kate.

My friend, Cherie, posted the BEST Royal Wedding Recap, and I hope she doesn't mind that I copied her pictures and some of her words right off her blog. Thanks Cherie!

"Once upon a time there was a beautiful girl who dreamed of becoming a princess.

The handsome Prince Charming fell in love with the beautiful girl.

There was an evil step mother, (I'm sure she's really not evil, but it makes the story fun.)

and two ugly stepsisters. (Okay, not really William's sisters, but cousins. And those hideous hats qualified them for the ugly stepsisters role.)

And of course there was the Queen.

The soon to be Princess Kate, kept the dress a secret.

The crowds cheered as Kate and her beautiful sister, Pippa, revealed the best kept secret in the world. It was simple, elegant, and modest which suited the lovely Kate most beautifully.

The wedding party began the long walk down the isle of Westminster Abbey.

They walked,


and walked,

and walked, until Kate met her handsome Prince William at the alter in the very front.

The choirs sang, the church bells rang, and the vows were exchanged.

And then, the newly married royal couple, began that long walk to exit the Abbey.

The wedding party followed behind.

Until the new Duke and Duchess of Cambridge made it outside,

where they boarded a carriage to ride to the palace.

They waved to people,

escorted by guards on horses.

They looked so in love and very happy.

Upon arriving at the palace, the handsome couple walked onto the balcony and greeted the people.

Thousands and thousands of people. (Not to mention all of us at home watching from our "tellies".)

The crowd begged for a kiss and were surprised with not one, but TWO kisses. (This was my Kate's FAVORITE part.)

And the prince and princess drove away to live happily ever after."

Yep, I might be a sap, but that wedding was regal, elegant, and "loads of fun" to pretend to be part of!

It's Bunny Love

It's been all about the bunnies around here the last few days. We are having so much fun with them.

I didn't get the bunnies just so they could be locked in a hutch in the backyard. I fully intend for them to be loved and hauled around and played with on a regular basis. However, Idaho hasn't decided that Spring is here to stay yet. So that means rain, wind, snow, sleet, and hail are a regular occurrence, thus....too cold to play outside with the bunnies. So we got out the old Thanksgiving plastic table cloth to protect the carpets from you know whats, and let the bunnies come inside for short amounts of time.

All the bunnies seem to be doing well and are visibly growing each day, except for sweet little Clover. She's just not growing like the others. She seems healthy, but we decided to supplement her with a little kitten formula. She LOVES it and Alyssa LOVES to feed her. It really is quite adorable. If we don't notice a visible change in the next day or two, we may have to take Clover back to live with her mom for a few more days.

Easter Weekend

We had a great Easter weekend. The sun came out to play and so did our bicycles. We removed Kate's training wheels (something that probably should have happened last year, but oh well.) and away she went. No problems whatsoever!

I love this picture of Carter helping her. So sweet.

Easter Morning we woke to a fabulous surprise. Four little bunnies; one for each kid so we don't fight. (We tried our best to get all females, but rabbits are difficult to sex. Everyone pray that we don't get babies in the next few weeks.)

The kids were SOOOOO excited. They've been begging for a bunny for 2 years now. So we decided to break down and let them have some. They were hilarious when they figured out we got more than one bunny. And they were out of control when they figured out they EACH got a bunny! It was so fun.

Alyssa and Cookie or it might be Clover, she's kind of been trying out both names.

Kate and Thumper. She called it Thin Mint for a little while, but is pretty insistent on Thumper, so Thumper it is.

Halle and Fluffer Nutter. Oh Halle is SO in love!

Carter and Nacho. Nacho is the most active and curious of the bunch. Carter says, "I got the squirt one." But he still adores her.

It was so cute to see Kate and Thumper under the umbrella.

The Umbrellas became a bunny pen for most of the afternoon.

It was beautiful weekend and a wonderful way to celebrate new life and remember our Saviour's Resurrection.

Judy

In preschool a few weeks ago, Kate learned about traffic laws. Ever since, she's been fascinated with anything about the law.
"Mom, is it iwegal to drop toys in the street?"
"Mom, is it iwegal to smoke?"
"Mom, is it iwegal to say the abc's wrong?"
"What happens when you go to jail?"
So we've been talking about what is illegal, what is just naughty, what is an accident, what is not keeping a commandment, etc. It's a lot for a little one to take in. It makes explaining black or white seem impossible.

We have a neighbor kid who has had his fair share of troubles and has been in and out of the juvenile detention center a few times. He fascinates and terrifies my children and they always have questions about him.

Today we were talking about jail (for the umpteenth time) and I told her "jail is like time out for grown ups". So she asked me if the neighbor kid had been in jail. I told her that he isn't a grown up yet so he went to a special place for teenagers that have done naughty things. She said, "Oh....he went to Judy." (Apparently she's heard the term "juvy" around here before.) Then she said, "But Mom, do the naughty kids REALLY have to go to Judy's house?" (Judy is our piano teacher. LOL!)

This then lead to the discussion of what and where "juvy" really is. I explained that our Uncle Blake works with kids who've been to juvy and how he helps them try to get better. So than she concludes our conversation with this, "Oh.....so I won't be scared if I go to juvy because Uncle Blake is really nice." LOLLL!!! Glad we got that cleared up.

Amelia is here!

Is there anything better than a brand new baby in the spring?! Okay, really is there anything better than a brand new baby period? Welcome to our newest niece, sweet little Amelia (Mia). (Thanks for picture Becky.) Congratulations to Justin and Amber!!! What a little cutie she is! This adorable, tiny peanut (6lbs 6oz) is the STRONGEST, wiggliest, most alert baby I've seen. While I was holding her, she would hear her mom or dad talk and turn her head to find them. It was so adorable. I swear, she can practically sit up already. I think she'll certainly be able to hold her own as child number 5 in her family!

Spring Break

This is what spring break looks like in Idaho Falls. Grey, snowy, and dreary. But we managed to find some bright spots and have some fun. Natalie and Cameron made a visit. We all got a kick out of Cameron showing us his muscles. My girls still think/want Cameron to be a tiny baby and insisted on packing him around. He didn't love it so much. He thinks he's a big kid now. Uncle Bryon got what he deserved.... from the Blue Monster, created by the GIANT blue jaw breaker Uncle Bryon gave her. We drove Aunt Natalie back to Ogden where she was helping her mom recover from heart surgery, and decided to pay a visit to the Ogden Treehouse Museum. We milked a cow. Rode a stallion. Warmed ourselves by the Indian fire. Played a good game of GIANT chess. Were the stars of our very own play. And we all took a turn being President for the day. We played hard over Spring Break. So hard, that we fell sound asleep with all our treasures from the day still in hand. AND... the Weinermobile came to town. I saw it with my very own eyes too. :)

Girl Scout Cookie Time

It's been cookie time around this house. Girl Scout cookie time. In order to get a cookie participation badge, Halle needed to sell 30 boxes of cookies. In an effort to get her well on her goal way, I bought 10 boxes myself and then "Manwaring Web" bought 12 more. (Yah....I've tasted every single flavor and I'm avoiding my scale like the plague.) I needn't have worried because she sold over 100 boxes. I personally have eaten so many cookies, that I'm actually sick of them. Never in a million years would I have thought I could say that about girl scout cookies.

After door to door (or rather family and friends) pre-sales, it was time to sit out front of the grocery stores and give people guilt trips as they walked on by. It was a blustery day this day, and a few of the letters on our signs had blown away. Oh well, people still got the point. The girls were pretty excited in the beginning. They had a little chant that they'd yell at every passerby, "Girl Scout Cookies, Get you Girl Scout Cookies! You know you want some!" It was quite hilarious.

By the end of our 3 hour block, the poor girls were frozen. People bought cookies just because they felt bad for our sorry little lot of girl scouts. I snapped this picture out of the blue. There was no posing going on what so ever. Is that not the saddest little group of cookie girls you ever saw? LOL! Right after we got our table cleaned up to go home, a serious snow and wind storm hit.

Can I just say....I'm glad cookie time is over. And can Spring get here yet?