April Fun

I love when the first monarchs come visit our milkweed and lay their eggs!  The first ones to hatch this year were a pretty hungry group.

They grew big and fat in no time at all.

In just 48 hours, they decimated our plants out front and devoured every last leaf in our yard.  I always love to bring them inside to make their chrysalises so we can enjoy the butterflies emerging and this time we had so many that I was able to send several to Alex's class as well.

A week or so later, we had some beautiful friends to enjoy before we let them loose.

 

The kids took advantage of a really beautiful spring and invented all kinds of new ways to play outside.  Ripstick skiing, anyone?

We had a sweet little visitor - a white winged dove that wasn't quite able to fly out of the yard.  We set it safely on the chair and it joined us for dinner.

Casey was quite enamored with our guest but he wisely stayed safely on top of the chair until the big bad dog went inside.  Later, the little guy walked out of the yard into the front and we hope he found a safe place to hide until he was strong enough to fly.

We loved celebrating Grandma's birthday with her!

George Ranch Field Trip

I got to join Alex's class on a field trip to George Ranch in Richmond.  It was the first time that chaperones were required to ride the bus and I wasn't too excited about squeezing in with a bunch of overexcited 8-year olds, but it was pretty entertaining.  Alex and Marco were great little seatmates.

 

First stop was watching the cattle roping and meeting the resident longhorn.

Excited little faces ready to go explore the ranch!

Alex was happy to find a caterpillar friend to take with him.

The kids were dying to see an alligator and thank goodness a little one finally made his presence known in the creek.

Alex and his buddy Alex

The kids enjoyed learning about life on the ranch a few hundred years ago and it's pretty impressive that it is still in business as a farm and cattle ranch.

Easter Weekend with Friends

We were so thrilled to have Scott and Lou Anne join us for Easter weekend.  The first order of business for the two photographers was of course to take lots of pictures.

 

Mr. Scott was so patient and helpful and taught Ben all kinds of new things about his camera and photography in general.

A trip to the park gave Ben some adorable little subjects to capture.

 
On Saturday, we hid hundreds of Easter eggs in the yard for all the kids on the street.

Alex organizes this every year because this kids loves holidays so much!

Who's ready to hunt eggs??

And they're off!

It took the adults the better part of an hour to hide so many eggs and the kids found every last one in less than 10 minutes.

There were even a few confetti eggs in the bunch!

The Armstrongs joined us in celebrating Miss Lou Anne's birthday.

After dinner, we taught the Dulaneys how to play Exploding Kittens and the kids showed him no mercy - they even brought out the cone of shame!  Scott will probably never play again!

The Dulaneys had an early flight out on Easter morning so we said our goodbyes and the kids checked out their baskets.

Easter Sunday is one of my favorite services of the year celebrating our risen Savior and this one was no exception...

...we were all given streamers when we walked in and at the end of the service we "threw off our grave clothes" in a pretty exciting fashion.  It made for a really memorable celebration.

One of the bonuses of having a real photographer come visit is that we get gorgeous photos after the trip.  I have to share some of Scott's beautiful photos:

The whole reason for bringing the big photography equipment - a real group shot of our dear friends.  It's been nearly 10 years since we all met in Singapore!  Three of these kids weren't even part of the gang yet.

We love these people so dearly!

Baseball Season

One of my favorite days of the year - opening day at the baseball park!  Both boys were starting season 6 and couldn't wait to get out there and play.  Ben was on the same Yankees team from last year and Alex was a Phillie with a completely new team.

I always have to get my front porch picture!

 Sportsfest day is always fun and the cake walk is a Kirkham favorite.  Ben gave it a good try...

...but Alex was the big winner.  Thank goodness only one of them won because I don't know what we would have done with a second cookie cake.  (Well, I do know...we would have eaten it, too!)

 

Alex's hitting improved a lot over the season.  He was still a consistent hitter and got on base most of the time but really learned to use his hips to swing the bat and had some great hits over the season.

Ben hit a pop fly his very first at-bat of the season, and then struggled to hit the ball the rest of the season.  A second year of kid-pitch produced some pretty great little pitchers that made it tough to get hits but Ben never quit trying.

 

It's always fun to see their best buddies out at the ballpark...Jack and Ben.

Drew and Alex

Ben mostly played outfield and some third base.  Not a lot of action in his direction this year because there weren't many balls hit into play!

Alex played some outfield and infield and even caught a few times.

So proud of the game when he earned his game ball!  He caught a few pop ups and had his best hit of the season.

The Phillies finished fourth in the regular season but didn't last long in the playoffs.  The Yankees finished in fifth place and also had a quick run in the playoffs, which was okay because May is always so busy that we're a little happy to wrap up the season!

We couldn't have asked for better weather for nearly the entire season.  No bitterly cold games and lots of gorgeous days.  The princess even joined us for a few games.