Two words...

Easter dresses!

I decided that this year I would start the fine tradition of making Easter dresses for my girls. I have such fond memories of the marvelous dresses my mother created that I wanted to continue the fine tradition. Fortunately for me, my girls look adorable in whatever they are wearing! :0)

While I am trying to find "free" time to sew, everyone else is fairly status quo! Miles continues to be insanely busy at work...he has a trip scheduled for later this month, and the command is sending him to a class for the entire month of May. The nice thing about that class is that it is right here at Fort Meade...so NO COMMUTE! :-) Of course, all this "out of the office" time doesn't mean less work, but in actuality just means he has considerably less time to do everything else! This makes for lots of stress and late nights. However, he is still finding time to study for school, serve the YM of our ward, and be an awesome husband and father! We sure are grateful for our Daddy! :-)

Emma continues to be the enigma that is Emma. Emma's favorite thing in the whole world is to be "silly"! The other day I had both Maddie and Emma in bed with me, Emma turns to Maddie and says, "Tickle me Maddie". Of course Maddie complied! After laughing and laughing, Emma caught her breath and said, "Tickle me again, Maddie". On and on it went. To Emma what is important is that there is laughter, and she is the center of it! :-) It is alot of fun to have another family clown! As the weather has turned nice this last week, Emma has really enjoyed playing at the park...especially since she is now big enough to climb onto everything and slide down everything! She has named the park "Emma's park" and would live there if we'd let her!

Maddie on the other hand would live in the "new car" if we'd let her! Maddie LOVES the new van! She is extremely excited for ANY opportunity to ride in the van, and pitches a FIT when that ride comes to an end! Maddie had a sad week at school last week...one of her good "friends" Elijah left on Friday as his family is moving. Maddie spent most of the weekend walking around the house singing, "Elijah here today, Elijah here today, Everyone clap their hands Elijah here today." Fortunately her other good friend Alexis (Alex) is still in class...according to Maddie's teacher, Elijah, Maddie and Alex were the "Three Musketeers"...so we are mindful of this upheaval in our little girl's life. The last couple of days, for the first time since she started school she has started asking, "I stay home today? Emma go to school?" We have also noticed some tremendous improvements in her language skills in just this last week...additionally, Maddie has become our little helper in everything from taking out the trash, to loading the dishwasher, to pushing the shopping cart in the commissary! I could really get used to this! :-)

We really enjoyed Conference this weekend. Especially since we were graciously invited to Tom and Gabriela's house to watch it on their BIG, BIG, BIG screen TV with awesome surround sound...almost like being there! :-) The girls had a BLAST playing downstairs in the playroom, and Miles and I actually had the opportunity to sit and listen! SIGH! It was wonderful! :-)

OK...well, back to Easter dresses...after the dishes...

We love you!