Fiesta!!

Today was Fiesta day at Jack's preschool complete with a candy-filled pinata (made by the kids) which induced so much excitement you'd think they'd never seen candy before!  I suppose the free-for-all nature of gathering pinata candy created such sheer joy.  The twins were major party-poopers, however, with one or both of them crying at any given time.  Oh well, the rest of us still had a good time and Jack even discovered a new food - taquitos! :)

Ole!!

Botanical Gardens

Last week my friend Sharon and I hauled our children over to the Norfolk Botanical Gardens for a fun morning of exploring their children's garden.  Sharon shares my love of a good adventure and is so patient with me and all my kids...let's just say we don't move very quickly nor do we ever arrive anywhere on time.  Our little corner of Virginia is in full spring bloom right now (which was clearly evident by the literal blanket of pollen we woke up to not long ago) and the botanical gardens were spectacular to say the least.  Full of ponds and meandering paths it was a pleasant walk back to the children's garden complete with a sighting of a real live bald eagle and nest!  And the children's garden did not disappoint!!  Filled with all kinds of areas to explore it proved to be fantastic for both the older and younger set!  Normally, the highlight of the park is a large area filled with fountains of shooting water just waiting to be played in but the fountains were off for repairs the day we visited.  Thankfully there were many other areas to uncover and Jack is still asking for a return trip!  They offer summer camps too which just may be a great option for my little nature lover.

Welcome to the Norfolk Botanical Gardens!

Entrance to the children's garden. Isn't it charming?

This is the area where the fountains are....obviously not working on this day.

One of many paths just waiting to be explored.

Jack manning the tree house.

I let the twins out of captivity and, as expected, they proceeded to head in opposite directions! Here is Matthew climbing the rope ladder - he made it to the top with no assistance!

We had just a fantastic day!

This is pollen....I've never in my life seen anything like the layer of pollen that covered everything in sight for about two straight days.  I haven't stopped blowing my nose for about two weeks now.

Playhouse

Right after Jay came home we bought a new playhouse for the kids and they LOVE it!  Since it's kind of a production for us to pack up and go other places to play, it helps to have lots of fun stuff in our own backyard to keep us entertained!  In all honesty, we probably could have just bought a door and set that up and the twins would have been just as happy.  Their favorite part is going in and out and opening and closing the door....over and over again!! Actually, Nathan tends to leave the door open which irritates Matthew (my OCD door closer...shades of a toddler Jack) because Matty likes to have the door CLOSED, thank you very much. :)

Homecoming - Part II

Okay so most of you know by now that the Easter bunny brought us the most wonderful present this year.....JAY!!!!  YAY!!!  The ship pulled back into Norfolk on Saturday, just in time to have a fantastic Easter spent as a family.  Sorry for the delay in posting pics but we've been busy re-acclimating ourselves to life as a whole family again!  Thankfully this time around the twins were not as reluctant to welcome Jay home again so our transition was fairly seamless.  It has been WONDERFUL to have him home and I'm finally not waking up just as exhausted as when I fall into bed.  :)