Easter Outfits

Jack's face makes me laugh in this picture.

 In all the craziness being on vacation for Easter I forgot to get pictures of the boys in their Easter outfits. They wore these on Easter Sunday while we were in Arizona (minus the vest, because it was 85 degrees) and then they also wore them the following Sunday in our ward. I made their ties (my first try). I think I will need to keep perfecting that art but I'm sure I will be making many more of those. I can't resist dressing them alike when I can because I love the big brother/little brother combo. I just think it is so cute! Shad just rolls his eyes, but I'm glad he lets me do it occasionally.

Jack was being quite the little sinker pretty much all day last Sunday so we are lucky we got even one relatively good shot before church. Some of them really crack me up!

"Yeah"

In the past month or so Jack has become a pretty agreeable baby. Whenever we ask a question (whether it is pointed at him or not) he answers "yeah." I was trying to figure out where he got it, and then Shad pointed out that I say "yeah" ALL of the time. He did go through a phase for a day or 2 last week where he said "na ah" to everything but then he went back to "yeah." I have been wanting to get it on video for a while and today he was being especially agreeable at lunch so here ya go:

Jack also has a serious fetish with shoes. Today his footwear of choice was Haken's dragon slippers. They look like duck feet when he walks. We love our silly Jack-Jack.

Another Anderson Vacation

An Anderson family vacation wouldn't be complete if something crazy didn't happen to us. We have been through just about everything while on vacation: ER visits, loosing everything valuable that we brought, and now car issues. I'm surprised we keep wanting to go places, honestly. I think the desire to see family must be greater than our desire to stay out of trouble.

In the end our "quick stop" in Mesquite, NV for one night on our way to Phoenix turned into 2 nights and 1 & 1/2 days due to some major issues with the brakes on our car (which I won't even go into right now) and the fact that parts had to be brought in from Las Vegas. Who knew that Mesquite is a pit with very little resources? Although, being stuck in the middle of a reservation in the desert would have been much worse. We just had to keep thinking that we could have died going through the canyon without brakes, so really it wasn't so bad being stranded for a while. The biggest downer was that we only had 2 days instead of 3 to spend with our family in Arizona that we were actually going to see. 

Although it wasn't ideal, I don't think the kids even knew the difference. Haken was happy as a clam with his cousin Sydney who drove down with us. We drove Shad's brother Brent and his 2 girls down with us, packing our van to the max. We made the most of our stay (or as much as we could around Mesquite without a car) playing at the pool, hanging out in the hotel room, finding a yummy place to have dinner, and doing a LOT of walking (probably close to 10 miles I would say).

Here are a few highlights of our trip. I really wasn't great at taking pictures during this trip but here are a few:

We had to get a picture by this rock because we thought it was funny that it says "...your future is here" right in front of an abandoned hotel/casino. I guess the economy has really hit Mesquite hard.

Swimming at the hotel pool...while it was snowing in Utah

Hanging out in our room. Jack's binki became his best friend on the trip.
We did a LOT of driving and he really was a trooper.

Riding in the stroller with cousin Eve to
the ward pancake breakfast and egg hunt.

Riding bikes with cousin Eli

My brother and sister in law 's family who we came down here to see.
Shad did a mini photo shoot at the Mesa temple for them before the pageant that night.
Aren't they the cutest little family? Baby Lily is only about 3 weeks old. It was fun to hold
a tiny baby again and be reminded of how not ready I am for mine to come.

Waiting for the Mesa temple pageant to start. That was a late night.

Haken with his cousins Eli and Abi. He sure loves his cousins!

We made the most of our time in Arizona. We did some golfing, shopping, watched the temple pageant, had a baby blessing for Lily, ate yummy food, and had an Easter egg hunt (with very melty chocolate). It was nice to see family we hadn't seen in a long time. Looking back I think all the events that happened were still worth the two days that we got to spend with them. Even the 12 hour marathon drive home wasn't so bad. Hopefully next time our vacation won't turn into such an event!

Shad's latest indeavour

Over Conference weekend Shad painted a new painting he is pretty excited about. He also started a new blog to document the project he is working on. Here is the painting he worked on this weekend:

Here is a link to his new blog that tells the story behind it: http://shadanderson.wordpress.com

Baby Goats

On Friday, after kindergarten roundup, I went to pick up Jack from my friend Shauna's house. She was taking her boys to go see some baby animals at a nearby farm. She asked if Haken would like to come with them. Of course Haken was excited to go with them, especially with his friend Kason! I took Jack home to take a nap and Haken went with them. They ended up only having the baby goats there (the pigs and cows were at another farm) but that was enough for Haken to get excited. Here are a few pictures of Haken with the goats that Shauna took for me. Thanks Shauna!

I can tell Haken is a little unsure of feeding the goat.

Giving the goat some of attitude. 

Later that day we also went to Mcdonalds with them and then Kason came home with us to play for a while. On the way home from Mcdonalds we stopped at IFA to see the baby chicks, ducks, and bunnies they had for sale there. I wish I would have had my camera to get a picture of Jack peeking into the bunny pen. He was just tall enough to see them on his tip toes and couldn't stop pointing and talking about them. We also stopped at our friend's house to see their baby lambs, but they weren't home. This is such a fun time around here with baby animals popping up everywhere. I love Spring!

Kindergarten Roundup

Last Friday was Kindergarten Roundup for Haken. He actually didn't seem too nervous for the testing like I thought he would be. The hardest part about preparing for Kindergarten has been the shots and since we got through that (with a lot of kicking, screaming, and tears) everything else has seemed super easy for him. We went to the new school in Garland to do the testing. They tested for hearing, sight, speech, proper immunizations, and assessment. He passed all with flying colors. 

This is the paper they gave me with the results of his assessment. He knew everything they asked him and even more. One of the assessors called him a "smarty pants" because she asked him just to point to the first word in the book to see if he knew where to start and instead he actually READ the word. I think he is already ahead of where he needs to be which is great! Having a head start is never a bad thing. His preschool teacher Mrs. Francom has been so great in preparing him for kindergarten. Haken can't wait for school to start in the Fall.

Easter Bunny early

The Easter Bunny came a week early this year because we are going to be in Arizona visiting family over Easter break next weekend. This weekend was also General Conference weekend which made it fun because the boys got to play with their new stuff the whole day.

Jack's first experience with bubbles. He wasn't quite sure what to think about them at first.

We also dyed Easter eggs in between conference sessions on Sunday

I love this picture! Like father...like son.

Perfectionist Haken

Jack during our egg dying. I wasn't brave enough to let him help this year.

Haken was sad that I was going to use the Easter eggs to make potato salad that night so he wanted to take a picture of the eggs. I told him to pick two of his favorites and hold them up. After taking a picture of the first two he insisted on taking another picture with his "other favorite" eggs...and another. I think he had a hard time deciding which ones were his favorite.

This face is so Haken. I can never get a real smile out of him.

 It was a fun early Easter. We can't wait until we get to have an Easter egg hunt with all of the cousins in Arizona next weekend!