St. Patricks Day

 Thursday, two days before St. Patrick's Day, Ashton had his field trip to our local Albertsons Grocery Store.  He wore green because St. Patty's would be on a weekend and he really wanted to wear green to school.  Ashton did this field trip last year and really liked it.  They get to sample food from every department and the store workers talked about the different kinds of nutrition we should be eating.  What kid doesn't enjoy being given food every 20 steps or so!?

 Lainey got to tag along too!

At the end, they were each given a water bottle and a sack with a few snacks in it like a banana.

The next day, Friday, the kids had the day off of school so Brielle invited friends over for a
St. Patrick's Day party.  Really, it was supposed to just be a play date where the girls might wear green and mess around setting up traps for leprechauns.  But I kept seeing cute cheap St. Patrick's things in stores like green nail polish and green decor/food.  So it was fancy for just a play date.  Still, most of their time was spent hunting leprechauns outside :)

They took a minute to perform a song they're singing in Tavaci (children's choir) 

from Phineas and Ferb.

They frosted some cookies for dessert.

I had to throw in a pot of gold treasure hunt.  It was a pretty lazy game on my part.  Todd hit the bowl of Rolos, I told them to find it.  No clues.  But they still enjoyed it :)

We painted nails green.

 And then they made leprechaun traps and hid outside waiting to witness any mischief!

On St. Patrick's Day, the kids made a leprechaun house and decorated it so enticing that any leprechaun would have to go inside.  They hid it in the pantry like last year, and again, some leprechauns made a mess in the snacks.  The kids took the Barbie house bath tub and filled it with water and glitter and a leprechaun took a glitter bath and left a glitter outline of themselves on a paper towel.  We made a stop at the school for the High School's band fundraiser dinner.  That evening, the kids decided to tell me (at 9:00) that they set a bowl of milk out before bed for a leprechaun to turn green.... I don't have any food coloring!  So my friend, Christie saved the day and loaned me some at a late hour.  All in all it was a fun day.

Field Trips

 Ashton's pre-school went on a fun field trip this past week.  Idaho Pizza Company here in town does these for the little kids to learn how to make pizza. The kids watch the demonstration, then wash their hands, and dive in to make their own personal sized pizza.

I don't remember going on such fun little field trips.  This was fun AND yummy!

They had some extra materials, so they let Lainey make one too!

Random pic of Lainey this week- dressed to fit her personality :)

I went on a "field trip" this week too.  I must get together with my friends at least once a month, usually more for a baby shower, a birthday lunch, shopping, girls night at one of our houses, church activities, and different things.  Not including the CrossFit workouts several of them come to 3 times a week.  Being a blogger, I want pictures to post, but ALWAYS forget my camera!  So, even though this is a terrible picture- most of the ladies are blurry, JaNeil left before I remembered to take it, and Lisa is hiding because she is pretty much 9 months pregnant right now :) ... still, I had to post it.  I finally remembered my camera and it's the best I can get!  And for the record, Lisa looks fantastic!

This was my friend, Sarah's birthday lunch at Tacos Mi Ranchitos in their new dining room.  I love my time spent with these ladies.  One of the biggest reasons Fruitland is an absolute treasure is the friends we have who live here.  There are so many good women here- many not in this picture.  I am blessed to know them.   

Winter or Spring?

I was thinking today, I try not to do that.  But I think Groundhog Day is a cruel holiday!  It just rubs it in that Spring is nowhere near, and makes us start thinking about Spring in the first place, when we would have otherwise just focused on valentines and leprechauns.  At least in this part of the world, Spring is still quite far away, and like everyone else, this time of year is less pleasant for me than others seasons.  I just want the elements to get a move on with it!

I did, however, want to hang on to winter a little longer than usual this time.  The reason being that we never got any real snow!  I had my first brown Christmas this winter.  The one day they say it did snow here for, like an hour, I was in Boise shopping and missed it all.  In Boise, it only rained.  So I decided to hurt no one but myself by leaving Christmas up until it actually did snow.  I know, it was risky.  And cranky. 

Well, a couple of days before March hit, I ran into a friend in the parking lot of a store in Nampa who said to wait right there because she actually happened to have something for me in her car.  She came back with a zip-lock bag full of white powder and said she didn't have time to explain but an e-mail would be waiting for me at home explaining everything.  Hmmmmm.  (She cracks me up because this mysteriousness was just something she would do.)  I discreetly tucked my "mystery bag" of white... powdery... substance... into my car and headed home.

As it turned out, the powder was "Insta- Snow".  They use it on film sets and it makes a great activity for kids.  I was over-joyed!  She explained in her e-mail that Todd had told her I didn't want to take down Christmas 'till it snowed- and she recognized that this may just not happen this year.  So she brought snow to me.  :)  I thought it was the coolest thing ever.  So did my kids.  

They LOVED LOVED LOVED it. 

 Everyone singing, "Snow!"

The first picture shows a Tablespoon of snow powder in the glass jar.  

With the right amount of water added, the powder absorbs and expands 

and overflows out of the jar into a jolly pile of snow.

It's crazy that only one little Tbsp. of that stuff can turn into this much Insta-Snow!

  

So I took Winter decorations down, finally.  Part of me probably just dreaded the effort.  This is definitely a bigger house to decorate than the one we lived in before.  There, all I had to put decorations on was the piano and the Christmas tree!  Here, we have loads of shelves.  As well as a few side table tops.  Part of me worried I'd never remember where to put my regular decorations!  I've decided to take pictures of how I like things arranged so I can look off of them each season.  I like to decorate, but I take way too long making decisions of where to put things.  So if the decision is already made and displayed in a picture, maybe I won't procrastinate changing out seasonal decor so long next year.

Here's the Spring decor! 

And here's what happened outside the very next day.  Figures :) 

A bit of a contrasting look with snow in the background.

Getting ready to play in the snow.