Pre-School Graduation

Yes, our little Darion just graduated from pre-school. He is growing up way too fast. We are so proud of both Darion and Joel and the boys they are becoming.

His teachers threw a huge party at a local park. All of the kids and their families were invited to attend. Darion and Joel had a blast.

They played on the playground,

blew giant bubbles,

and played with their friends. Darion is going to miss going to school with friends like Minh,

and Jesse,

And all of his other friends at school. (Yes, that is Joel singing all of the graduation songs with Darion's class. He just randomly went up there and sang with them and we couldn't get him to come back.)

But Darion has officially graduated from pre-school and now has kindergarten to look forward to. He'll have no trouble making friends.

Thank you, teacher Stormi!

Thank you teacher Fatemeh!

We love you Darion! We are SO proud of you!

Head Start Field Trip

Darion's class went on a field trip to Skinner's Butte Park. The sun was out, the weather was warm, and it was fun! Joel and I were lucky enough to go with them. It was wonderful! And both kids took a REALLY long nap when we got home.

Darion: The Ant Queen

Darion came outside the other day with a canning jar. He decided to catch some small ants to keep as pets. I tried to explain to him that they wouldn't live without a queen telling them what to do. The next thing we knew, Darion was trying to tell them that he would be their new queen and that they should listen to him. He even put some cracker crumbs in their jar so they could have something to eat. We woke up the next day and we had this conversation:

Darion: "Mom, can I write a message to my ants in the car?"

Me: "Sure! Your aunts would probably love to hear from you!"

Darion: "How do you spell 'This is your new queen?'"

That's when I realized he didn't mean "aunts" he meant "ants!" I helped him spell the words and he taped them to the jar facing the inside so the ants could read them. A few hours later the ants were all shriveled up and dead.

Easter

Every year on Easter I promise myself that I won't buy Easter Grass the next year. I made the same promise last year, and broke it again this year.

The kids woke up on Easter and found their baskets. Darion was most excited about the "string" (Easter Grass) in his basket. He said, "Now I can build my hot air balloon! Next year when I get some more string I'll build the basket and we can go for a ride in it!" I would have let you know when it was finished so you could take it for a spin, but unfortunately there was Easter Grass all over the whole house AGAIN this year. It all ended up getting tossed into the recycling. So even if he could have built a hot air balloon out of Easter Grass, and I wouldn't be surprised if he could, now he can't! Now I'm left promising myself not to buy Easter Grass again next year!

Here are some pictures of our awesome Easter Eggs:

Joel's

Rusten's (he is the master)

Darion's

Karen's

Darion's Photo Shoot

This is what happened when Darion got ahold of my laptop. He left me with some surprises. The pictures speak for themselves.

Oregon Zoo

We all had the day of on Monday for Martin Luther King day. The Oregon Zoo was having a free day so we decided that we would venture up to Portland to spend the day. The weather was great (sunny and fifty degrees) so we didn't care that it was so crowded that there was no parking and we had to take a shuttle to get us there. The kids loved riding the school bus shuttle. We met our friend Trista and her kids there. She recently moved to Portland and her husband was in school that day. It was fun to see her and the boys loved seeing their friend Karston. We had a lot of fun!

Our self-portrait on the bus. (Joel was obviously not happy about getting his picture taken)

Darion, Joel, and Karston

Darion

Joel

The Great Northwest. (We're so lucky to live up here- it's GORGEOUS)

My little primates

BFFs