Early Easter/Aunt Mamie's Birthday

Uncle Jacob and Aunt Brooke came to visit us the weekend before Easter to celebrate Jamie's birthday and have an early Easter with us. Unfortunately the day we planned the Easter egg hunt for the kids, it rained. We improvised and had an indoor egg hunt. The kids had just as much fun! Tanner in action diving for an egg underneath the coffee table... The kids with their loot... After church service, we celebrated Aunt Mamie's 32nd birthday! Here's the birthday girl with her scrumptious cake!

Hanging with the cousins

We had the priviledge of watching our nieces and baby nephew a few weeks ago. Ryder is 3 months old and is the cutest baby ever! He is such a sweet little guy... Tanner just loves babies! He wanted to kiss baby Ryder all the time... The boys had so much fun playing with their cousins... And Uncle Matt had a good game of Guess Who? going... Right before bed, Tanner got some last snuggles in with Ryder... Matt and I managed to get all 5 kids fast asleep. Such a fun night hanging with our family!

Beach Day!!

Jamie, Nana, and I had planned a fun beach day with the kids last Friday. To our surprise, Matt took the day off on Friday, after spending the week in South Carolina, and joined us for some beach fun. Cute Hannie playing in the ocean... Matt entertained the kids by jumping waves and throwing them into the air. His arms had to have been tired after playing this with all 3 of them several times in a row! The boys had a blast boogie boarding with Daddy and riding the waves!Tanner was cracking us up in the water. He is such a little water baby! He would lift up his swim shirt so that the water would splash him in the belly! Digging in the sand never gets old. Nana helped build sandcastles... Then it was time for a lunch break... And more playing in the sand... What a fun beach day!!

Our buddy Buster

Carson and Tanner have a special bond with Grandma and Grandpa's dog Buster. Buster is the first thing they ask about when Grandma comes over to our house, and they love it when Grandma brings him over. Recently Matt's parents asked us to watch Buster for the weekend while they went away, and the boys had a blast! Tanner especially loves to walk Buster... Unfortunately, soon after these pictures were taken after a visit to the park, Buster ran away from our backyard. We looked all over the neighborhood for him and couldn't find him. The boys were devastated, and rode with us, yelling out the car windows for their buddy. Thankfully, the next morning, Grandpa found him walking down the street a few streets over from where we live. The boys were so happy to hear Buster had been found! The other night I went to Matt's parents house to pick something up, and they immediately wanted Buster to visit them in the car... We love our buddy Buster!

Playground hoppers

The boys and I have thoroughly been enjoying the weather lately. This week the high will be in the 90's, so I'm glad I have had them outside so much in the past few weeks. Unfortunately our park trips will be a little less with the heat! We love playground hopping! We are always finding new parks to explore. This week we visited a park in Winter Garden. There were bike/walking trails, so I took the boys bikes for some biking fun! The slides at this playground were so high! Carson insisted on wearing his bike helmet to go down this one. My little safety boy! Tanner climbed the rock wall, and showed off his big boy skills. I can't believe he is big enough to do this on his own! And there's no way of stopping him from sliding or playing on anything big brother plays on. This kid has no fear!!

Love our fun times at the park!

Fun in the sun!

We had a great day playing with our friends at the beach last week! The weather has been beautiful, perfect beach weather. Jamie and I loaded up my van like we were going to be gone for a month. We met our friends Peyton, Joey, Chandler, and Landon in New Smyrna. The kids dug right into the sand! It was high tide when we got there, which made for a nice shallow area for the kids to play in the water. Carson actually was interested in the water for a little while, he would much rather dig in the sand though. Tanner and Hannah were water buddies!
And all 3 loved jumping the waves! What a fun beach day with our kiddos! We can't wait to go back again this week for more fun in the sun!

Mmmm...pancakes!

I made homemade whole wheat mini pancakes with the kids one morning, and they loved it! Hannah and Carson were in charge of measuring the ingredients, sifting the flour, and stirring. They couldn't WAIT until they were done on the griddle! They couldn't believe that I could make mini pancakes just like the box! :)
We added some bananas to a few of them, and they were giddy with excitement (well...Hannah was REALLY giddy with excitement) and scarfed down a whole batch! While I was cleaning up the mess we made in the kitchen, and the kids were eating, I could hear Carson telling me that Tanner was drinking the syrup. What mom leaves the syrup on the dining room table? Not me! Or so I thought. When I walked in to clean them up, there sat Tanner with the syrup bottle...oops!

Florida Beaches 5K

Our last activity of our fun weekend was the Florida Beaches 5K. Matt had his eye on this 5K for our first race because it was at the beautiful Ft. Desoto Park near St. Petersburg on the beach. We have been running 3+ miles almost every night for weeks, and felt like we were ready to give it a go! We got up at 4:45am to drive about an hour to the race. The boys stayed at Tim and Sharon's while we went. It was pitch dark outside, and we couldn't believe ALL of the people that were there for the half marathon and 5K! I just have to brag about my incredibly supportive hubby for a minute. Running a 5K has been on my "to do" list for awhile now. He has pushed me to run and has been so supportive running with the boys and I, and I was SO excited that he was running with me on Sunday! Running has become something we enjoy doing together, which I thought would never happen, and I am just so grateful that he wanted to do this. On a funnier note, these racers are hardcore people. The runners who were running the half-marathon were running in the parking lot before the run even started! And they were jump roping too...in the pitch dark...and poor Matt got smacked in the face with one right before the race started! :) All of the runners ready to go... The sun started to come up right when our race started! Matt and I positioned ourselves in the middle of the pack thinking we were probably average at this. The course was beautiful, and we even ran alongside the beach with the sun rising at one point. There's something about being surrounded by hundreds of other runners to keep you on your toes. Not to mention your competitive side tends to come out just a bit! Matt made sure we passed certain people and kept up with others. He was an awesome running partner. We actually finished with a better time than we normally do. We finished at 29 minutes and 45 seconds, and in the top 25%! We were exhausted, especially after sprinting to the finish line!
Here is a view of the ocean at Ft. Desoto... My "reward" for all of that training was a yummy homemade chocolate peanut butter pie from the best Amish restaurant in Sarasota!!! We are looking forward to our next 5K in the near future and might even sign up for a half marathon within the year...we will see! A couple of weeks after our race, I received this medal in the mail! I guess I finished 3rd female in my age range. Pretty neat!

Sarasota

After Thomas the train, we drove 20 mins south to Sarasota and had a fun weekend staying with Matt's sister Sharon, Tim, and Sarah and Michael. Matt's mom came along for the fun too. The boys took a great nap once we arrived and were refreshed when they woke up. We went to our favorite mexican restaurant in Sarasota, Two Senoritas for dinner...delicious!!! After dinner we went to the beach for some sun and fun. Tanner was our little water baby! He wanted to run in the water and jump in the waves, he definitely would have taken a nice dip if we wouldn't have kept a close eye on him. Grandma and I had fun jumping the waves with him. Marie and Sharon enjoying the nice ocean breeze... Carson loved digging and building in the sand with Sarah and Michael. They built a big wall and had fun rebuilding it everytime the waves knocked parts of it down. We enjoyed playing while watching the beautiful sunset... After our great time at the beach, and much needed showers, the kids had storytime together before bed. I love these special moments with their cousins!