Hot Wheels Race and Baseball with Grandpa Hatch- Spring Break Day 2

Tuesday was Bradley's big Hot Wheels Race at the park.  He made invitations and pulled together a fun little event for the kids in the neighborhood.  I was proud of him.  I decided I needed to back off though and let him do it himself.  He worked on things all morning, making the perfect bracket and trying to find the fastest cars in his collection.  Even bought some treats for awards.  He went all out :).  I think the kids had fun.  I brought my camera and finally got some pictures of my kids just playing around.  I do need to find my cable though before I can upload anything... sigh.
That afternoon was our baseball game with Grandpa Hatch!  He agreed to meet us at Rocket Park and play baseball.  It was a lot of fun.  It was fun for me for the kids to see how good my Dad is :).  I always idolized him when it came to baseball.  We had a great time!  Everyone got along pretty well and there were very few hiccups.  No injuries- wow!  We didn't have mitts.  That was the only bad thing.  We couldn't find one of our two, so we only brought Luke's.  We even stopped at the D I to see if there were any there, but nothin.  Kind of a bummer, and I think it made things more difficult, but not too bad :).  We went to my Dads and had pizza and watched a movie after.  Lots of fun with Grandpa Hatch.  My favorite line of the day came from Luke.  I said, we're going to play baseball with Grandpa- it will be fun because Grandpa is so good at baseball and Luke, with no hesitation whatsoever says, "Not as good as me!"  Made me laugh.  Confidence is key.  3-31-15

I think this was when Erika took over the camera

COWBOY BRADLEY

These pictures are terrible, but you get the idea.

Luckily Bradley was feeling well enough to go to school on Thursday.  He had spent a couple days on the couch, feverish and achy.  He spent the whole time worrying about all the things he was going to miss and his big county report/project that was due while he was sick.  It weighed pretty heavily.  I kept trying to tell him his teacher would understand.  These kids take their schooling very seriously!  I'm so glad.  It really is a blessing.  What would I do if I had a bunch of me's to raise.  He worked really hard all Wednesday night on his "float" of Daggett County.  He had such a great idea to do Flaming Gorge Reservoir.  I helped him make some clay to form the mountains, and then that was it- he did the rest.  He worked SO HARD!!  It was so impressive to see how much effort and time he was putting into it.  I felt horrible when the dumb clay I had provided him with started to crumble and wasn't really holding up once it started to dry.  We were able to save it for the most part and then figured out that we could put it in the oven for a bit and dry it out completely.  Worked pretty good.  He had painted it and put so much into it- it was worth the trouble.  He turned in a very nice project.  Unfortunately it fell apart by the end of the day.  But anyway- the thing he was most excited for and anxious to get better for was his program!  My kids love the school programs and being in front of everyone... it's cute... it's the Hatch in them :).  I love them too!  I love seeing my kids in their element and spotlight.  He was the cutest cowboy up there!  Confirmed by Emily even :).  He was part of the square dancing scene.  He worked on some dances for quite a while.  His partner was Cassidy Gray in our ward.  They all looked so cute and did so well.  I love watching the video I got of him :).  I will post pictures as soon as I find my cable.  He sang his little heart out even though I could tell he was still recovering from his bug.  I'm glad he got to participate though.  It was so much fun. We even got Grandpa Hatch and Grandma Hatch out to support him!  We hit Wendy's for frostys after.  3-25-15

Happy St. Patty's Day!

I've said this before, but I love St. Patrick's Day!  I love the low effortness of this holiday and how easy it is to make it fun, but also the fact that it is not one of those month-long holidays that I have to decorate for or plan way in advance.  I know this makes me sound lazy, but that's probably true :).  So anyway.  I do regret to inform you all that I failed to buy Lucky Charms at the store yesterday... that was a disappointment.  To only Noah and I, but a disappointment nonetheless.  It's okay though, we made up for it with GREEN pancakes!  Some in the shape of shanrocks!  We go all out here.  You'd think I'd done something amazing though because my kids thought it was great.  With the exception of Luke who decided to call them moldy and made them less than appetizing to the rest.  I drew little shamrocks on their sandwiches in their lunches as well, with our food markers.  Kind of a lame attempt, but I hadn't gotten the candy for the rainbows like I'd wanted to either.  But see, this is the beauty of this holiday- it doesn't matter what you do- it's just fun to do something different.

So the kids got all ready for school.  Charity wore my army shirt- green- check.  Kelly was torn between wanting to wear green and wanting to look good in her class picture.  She settled on a really cute salmon colored shirt and jeans with some shamrock earrings and green necklace- green- check.  Bradley put on several different shirts, not realizing he had a completely green shirt hanging up in the laundry room doorway.  So he settled on that one- green- check.  Luke spent most of the morning trying NOT to wear green, but then begged me to help him draw with green marker on his finger.  He's in the trick'em stage of wearing green.  I talked him into green nail polish though :) so it would for sure last all day, that was fun- green- check.  Noah had to hurry back upstairs when he saw the green pancakes and put on his green shorts before anyone saw!  He was all into the St. Patty's Day spirit! Green- check.  Erika panicked as well, not sure if she had any green, but we of course found her army pants and green shirt- green- check.  Jack's wearing a shirt that's too small for him, but green- check.  And off to school they went!  

Once the big kids were gone, we painted Erika's fingernails green, and Jack's toenails- he insisted, and I settled on the toes, then once they were dry he was crying to get it off.  Nothing a pair of socks didn't fix, but one of those... ugh. moments.  He's a funny kid.  Then we used my cookie press to make some Leprechaun cookies.  They didn't really work because I failed to soften the butter all the way (I think) and the dough was too thick.  They tasted great though!  Just took forever to press out.  Unfortunately there is not a trace of evidence of those cookies since Buddy did away with it all while we were at swimming lessons!  Stinker.  

I made a fruit and veggie rainbow after-school-snack for the kids.  I used radishes instead of strawberries for two reasons- one, I thought it would be a cute way to introduce them and maybe get some interest since they were in our produce basket and I have no real desire to use them for anything else.  And two, the strawberries are now WAY OVER PRICED after having gotten so many for so cheap for so long there.  More than a dollar a pound is just pushing for me now!  Sad.

I worked pretty hard, I mean! "Lucky the Leprechaun" worked pretty hard on a treasure hunt for the kids.  Nate surprised them with the first clue while picking them up from school on his bike.  They all had to count the telephone poles on the way home so that they would know how many steps to take out into the backyard to find the next clue :).  There were a series of math problems and secret codes to figure out this year, then the wild goose chase using the house numbers on some of our neighbors' homes, rather than the chores and services, I'm not sure which was worse.  It took them a very long time to complete the whole treasure hunt.  They seemed okay with it, but once again I was left feeling like I didn't quite deliver.  Better start thinking now for next year.  Maybe I'll make them dig a hole in the ground a mile deep to uncover the gold.  That sounds fun doesn't it??  I'm just not the perfect picture of "fun" anymore.  Better luck next year.  The gold wrapped candy sure is yummy though :).  And so worth it.

Jack, Erika and I played with chalk on the driveway and took LOTS of pictures, just for fun...

He was "eating" everything we drew

I love these two little friends

I've missed taking our St. Patrick's day "green picture" for the last like three years.  I wasn't about to let that happen again, but as I'm looking at it, you can hardly tell that it's a St. Patrick's day picture.  Kinda funny.  Not that that matters- just not as green as it used to be.  I took about a million and ONLY posted these ones, so be glad :).  

Favorite line of the day:
Noah was telling me that his friend at school doesn't believe in leprechauns.  He said that his friend's mom told him that it was just the parents giving out the treats or gold.  To this Noah said, "Yeah.  Like parents would just go and buy tons of candy and chocolate and just give it to their kids!!  HA HA!"  I loved it :).  And consequently, I've done little to nothing with the whole believing in Leprechauns.  It's simply the pot of gold... convincing enough apparently.