"The first day of spring is one thing, and the first spring day is another. The difference between them is sometimes as great as a month." H. Van Dyke

I can't tell you how true this quote is for all us Missourians! Friday was a beautiful warm sunny day, 60 degrees, the grass was almost all the way green and I spent some nice time on the porch talking to Maria (who is back from her mission btw!!!! SO EXCITED about that! I talked to her for a long while and loved it! Can't wait to see her next month!). And then yesterday we woke up to this crap.



SOOOO not happy about it! Of course the first winter I come back to Missouri it is the winter with the most snow in yeeeaarrs! Grrrrrr! Of course I guess I should be used to this type of thing happening because every year in Utah it would snow, snow, snow, get warm and beautiful, and then dump one more snow before spring truly began. Luckily today it has already started to melt so I won't be angry too long. Next week is supposed to be a lot nicer!

One other unfortunate event from this snow storm though was that the power kept flickering off and on during the late afternoon hours and then finally went off for good after dinner. So good ol' dad got the generator going and we were set to go. Except then my sister Emily came over with all her kids and Mellisa with her kids (they didn't have a generator so came to our house cuz we had electricity). So we had a good long night with them over (they left around midnight). So that was exciting.

(Ephraim and Matteo)

(Evelyn playing with Grammy before we got the generator back on)

Today church was cancelled because of the weather so we spent the morning getting ready for the weekly family dinner (this week lunch) and also the twin's 3rd birthday celebration! We all made pizzas and stuff to go with that for their lunch cuz that's what they wanted. I made some yummy bread sticks using my new bread maker my Momma got me for my b-day, I love it! I also helped Monie decorate the boys' birthday cakes, I piped all the dots on the top. Turned out cute I think!

(Mmmmmm....breadsticks! I love me some breadsticks!)

(They're supposed to be basketballs, these boys love sports! And they're pretty darn good for three year olds!)

(Matteo blowing out his candles, he was a lot more into the cake and presents stuff than Abrahm was, Matteo is such a hyper lil' thing, especially when he gets a pinch of sugar...watch out!)

(Abrahm blowing out his candles, he had to blow them out like 10 times cuz he couldn't get it)

So the we ate our yummy lunch, watched the boys blow out their candles and open their presents, ate cake and ice cream and then sat around and talked and chased kids and consoled crying ones and put some down for naps and talked and ate some more and took pictures and talked and yeah...pretty much the usual family get together type stuff that we do every Sunday! I'm really gonna miss this when we leave again!

(Carmen and Evelyn)

(Santana)

(Kady)

(All the granddaughters! I Love Santana's face in this one!)

(Crazy girls!)

(Crazy girl.........)

(Matching hair! How cute!)

Let's see what else is there to catch up on....I hope you don't mind the length of this one cuz I'm doing all my catching up in one blog post instead of doing multiple, too lazy I guess to get different quotes and all that for each one, plus Evelyn is being cranky right now so it's a bit difficult to finish just this one. She needs a nap.

Ok so a week ago we had a Ward Italian Night with a spaghetti dinner and a presentation by my sister Annie and her family about Italy. Andy is full-blooded Italian and so he has a lot of fun stuff about Italy. I helped Annie make a Italian powerpoint for people to watch (did a pretty darn good job too on it!) and helped her make delightfully yummy Biscotti! It's Andy's grandma's recipe from Italy and it is awwweesommmme! I could eat those things all day, without the nuts in them of course but Annie is nice and made some without them.




Ok, hold on, Evelyn break, time for baby food!

And back! So she was either really really really hungry for baby food (she hasn't been eating much this past week cuz she had an icky cough) or she really really really liked squash cuz she just scarfed that thing down like nothin! Funny little girl. Other than being sick she's had a pretty good week! She's been rolling over a looooot more so I definitely have to keep an eye on her. She has been teething lately which isn't altogether too much fun but she's not too horrible yet. She's of course been chewing and slobbering on everything.

(Such a sweet picture!)

Two new things she's started to love to chew and suck on are her thumb and her big toe, both of which are pretty funny. She just learned a couple days ago to put her foot in her mouth and now she loves her feet even more than she used to. She's also learned to make BIG splashes in the bath with her hands. She only splashed with her feet before but now she's on to bigger and better things. I can't wait to take her swimming this summer cuz I know she's gonna love it!

(She's only sucked/chewed on her thumb a few times but she looks pretty darn cute doing it! And she certainly slurps and sucks on it...funny thing...)

(I LOOVVVE this picture! And the next, she's SO funny!



We've been keeping pretty busy lately, with chauffeuring kids around, going shopping and out to dinner with my friends, helping Grammy, scrapbooking, reading, playing, visiting other friends, and getting a round of shots for Evie. She only got one this time and was having a good time watching this new person and all of a sudden he poked her with the needle and she just stared at him and slooowly her face began to crumble and she began to cry for a second and then I picked her up and talked to her and we ended the visit with a nice big smile to the mean man. :) He said he doesn't get smiles too often which is probably very true. She's done real good so far with all her shots, hardly crying or anything. Thank goodness!

Other than that I can't think of anything else we've been doing, besides talking to Mark, which is always exciting! :) He has had his cell phone back these past two weeks so I get to talk to him everyday which has been soooo wonderful. His class is the senior class right now so they have a lot more privileges and it's a lot easier going cuz they're the ones in charge of the other classes. He's been doing pretty good, just anxious to be done and come home! I fly out on Wednesday and am SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO excited!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And that's all for now!