Spring is in the air!

I love this picture of the kids. It is so hard to get them all still for a second, facing the same general direction, not to talk about smiling even!

Another sunny day in Oatmeal! The kids love the piano at Grandma's house. Pretty sure there is the same exact picture and pose of Ophelia somewhere in the archives:

Funny kiddoes! They figured out that they can reach each other in the car and hold hands like this:

On our way back from Oatmeal, the kids are all tuckered out:

This was spring break went by really quickly. The kids got sick, so we mainly stayed close to home. This is in our adopted backyard, behind our fence. A wonderful field to go fly a kite:

I didn't take any picture of a little trip that we made to Fort Worth over spring break. We stayed there for two nights with some friends, because PJ happened to have an ESL conference in Dallas. I don't have very many happy memories of the trip because it was pretty rough. A seemingly short three hour trip turned into a torture both on the way there and back. The kids were really fussy, Ophelia being uber-dramatic and Emerson hating being in his carseat for that long. Benadryl, Tylenol, Advil is all sugar water packed with Red 40, I was convinced! Nothing helped to ease the tension. We were to tense and stressed the whole time there, that on our horrible trip back we pretty much had a breakdown... By "we" I mean PJ and I! Not so fun. When we slept at our friends' homes, it was a disaster...we pretty much didn't sleep those night. Sleeping in the same room with our kids is something I hope not to do again for a while. I realize that sleeping was horrible because the kids were sick. But it didn't help that they couldn't fall asleep at night being all excited and Ophelia waking Emerson while he was just first asleep. Plus Emerson would wake up at 5 or 5:30am! Aaahhh! We were so happy to be back home, everyone in their own room, in their own bed. We all slept amazing!

I did enjoy seeing old Fort Worth friends a lot! We also made a trip to the FW zoo and despite the cold front moving in on us while we were there, the kids had a great time.

My attempt no.2 at gardening. Check out our little baby scare crow:

11/1/2013 update on the garden: I've come to the conclusion that I have a brown thumb...both of them. We grew caterpillars, ant mounts, and mushrooms in our spring garden. The 5 strawberries, 10 baby tomatoes, and 7 sweet pea pods are not worth the hours of work and loads of money that I spent on the garden! I have suspicions that the garden gets too covered by shade, thus we had no harvest this year. Too bad it takes so long to learn from your mistakes and start over the whole garden again!!!

Here is Ophelia, the bead lady:

Our friends, the Allens, invited us to go camping with them on lake Georgetown. We went camping our Kinzler-style: come hangout and enjoy all the camping fun and adventures and leave home after the sunset to sleep in our own comfy beds.

Ophelia said she was making "the German face" on this picture:

We joke about that because all the German pictures we have have totally stoic faces, no emotion at all. I think O did a great job of that! Emerson checking out the Allen tent:

Enjoying the warm March sunshine:

On the banks of lake Georgetown:

Mmmm! Hot dogs:

While Ophelia was enjoying her hot dog, our poor little baby was eating rocks...and loving it too!

Roasting marshmallows:

I'm telling you that's the best way to camp! We loved spending time with the Allens and do all the camping activities and then go home, take baths, showers, and sleep in our soft, comfy beds!

My parents 30th (!!!!) wedding anniversary is coming up. Here is what I made for them:

My parents are planning a trip to the Maldives for their anniversary. Now they get to wear matching shirts there!