Gale Munchkins

ok, i'm done posting for the day :) if you've visited during my updating afternoon, you may want to scroll through...i kept adding and etc. throughout the pm....

I am patiently waiting for April 2007 conference videos to be posted. (We missed conference because of a trip to Idaho ). They have entire sessions posted now, but not the individual talks. {I only exercise a 1/2 hour at a time}... I've been watching Education Week speakers to bide my time. Great talk on helping build self-worth in our children...love John Bytheway....I remember him from my 1st year at BYU when he sang the "Wilky" song...do any of you know it? I was somewhat surprised when his video began playing...he looked so much... older ... I guess it has been 17 years!! AHHH!!!

crazy...CRAZY...crazy!! http://puzzles.about.com/od/sudokupuzzles/a/ExpertSudoku_3.htm if you haven't tried it, maybe you shouldn't :S My sis-in-law, Allison , introduced me to this game a day before my parents came home. I'm hooked...

we've had a slow week. Grandma & Grandpa are working on settling into a routine. The girls love having their grandparents around. Grandma has been a bit sick...flu?? Not sure. She's achey (but has been for a few weeks before coming home), this past week~ congested, a few days ago~cough, yesterday~runny nose, today~sleeping most of the morning...Hope she feels better soon. We've been going through a few of the rooms, cleaning and dejunking more. Still waiting to dive into the upstairs storage room. Went through the girls' shoes yesterday...HELLO!! SHOES!! Reorganized the pantry, while my mom reorganized the kitchen. What a mess :P

My cousin Amy just received her mission call to the China, Hong Kong mission!! WHOO-HOO!!

We enjoyed coloring eggs after church and lunch. We hard-boiled 3 dozen eggs (still enjoying those egg salad sandwiches :S) and the girls tried their hand at being creative with their eggs. Mikenna really enjoyed herself. She insisted on putting the eggs into the dye all by herself (thus many cracked shells) and stirred & stirred & stirred. She loved her pretty eggs!

{leng leng!! stir stir stir...leng leng!!}

Kaylee was asked to give a talk in Primary (last time was a year ago)...so we reviewed an Easter lesson that we had for FHE~given by Stacy (more detailed account given by Allison ). Kaylee and I worked together wrote a simple outline of her talk. Kaylee did a super job!! {The egg must have been the "charmer" because the kids were so quiet, watching to see what Kaylee would do next.} Here it is in case your interested... For Family Home Evening we talked about Jesus Christ and his a-tone-ment. Jesus atoned and paid for our sins in the Garden of Geth-se-me-ne. (Show Pic) Jesus loves us and wants us to live with him and Heavenly Father again. His a-tone-ment paid for our sins. We make mistakes, like lying, or being mean to our sisters, or not choosing the right. This egg (show egg) is like our life, and these mistakes are like black marks (mark egg) on the egg. Every time we don’t choose the right, we get a black mark. We can’t live with Heavenly Father a...

Grandpa & Grandma Chan haven't slowed down since being home. They have tried diving right into the Pacific Time Zone~so far so good :) Our Easter day was nice a sunny with barely a breeze. The girls awoke early, eager to put on their dresses, and undo the curlers. If you click on the picture, you can see that Kiera's dress has a white dotted overlay, and Kassi's is a sparkle dot overlay. Mikenna's was a simple purple satin and Kaylee's has a striped overlay on her skirt.

Well...Grandma & Grandpa Chan are FINALLY home!! They arrived at mid-night Friday night...They were tired, but happy to see us (I think:) The girls were excited to welcome their grandparents home! Mikenna was slightly leary, but wide awake as well. Kiera whispered to me today, "I don't have to ask Heavenly Father to bless them to come home safely anymore!" (FYI: ever since they have been gone, in each and every prayer she has said, she has asked for their safe return.) They've been awake the entire day (well maybe a small catnap here and there), playing with all of their grandchildren too. Needless to say...they are now asleep...

The girls have been so excited for their Grandparents to come home...and now we are waiting, waiting, waiting....because of flight delays and then going through customs, Mom & Dad missed their connecting flight...and since the have SEVEN LARGE PIECES OF LUGGAGE --opted to stand-by on the next flight which doesn't get in until 11:45 pm....tired girls...Mikenna is still puttering around too...

The Easter dresses are DONE!!! DONE DONE DONE!!! Actually, it wasn't too bad to sew...I haven't been "pressed for time", in fact~despite not being the "absolute-perfectly what I'd pictured" dress, they are kind of cute :P However, I don't think I'd sew "fancy" dresses again...I will try to stick with cotton, easy to hide my mistakes, fabric. At least my girls love their dresses!!

We've had a busy Spring Break...typically I probally wouldn't plan anything to do and just "hang out" with the girls, but because Grandma & Grandpa are coming home...well...I wanted to make sure we got things done. So, most of our week has consisted of: chores & cleaning for a few hours in the morning, then something fun~go to the park or library, movie time/(sewing time for me~Easter dresses), pizza & movie night with school friends/cousins, bike rides, playing outside, gymnastics & open gym, and still some "down time"...we had a slight incident when the girls decided that maybe they could "trim" their own hair Monday, luckily they were caught! Other than that...we are practically ready for the missionaries to return !!

To start off the girls' Spring Break, we went with Mike's parents & brothers to Harrison, ID and stayed in a condo by a lake. (Harrison is just outside of Coeur D'Alene.) It was beautiful!! We went up on Friday after school...stopped off at a Costco outlet store (couldn't get Michael to leave/found a great deal on cute skirts for the girls.) Spent our time swimming, knocking dominoes over, walking on the docks, hiking (notice Mikenna's death grip on Mike's ears :), and just relaxing.