Alison's Senior Pictures

Just a few of my favorite of my beautiful girl.  I can't even believe that it's time to post these.

Easter!

Easter started on Saturday, when Ben and I started making Varinky.  I realized that it's been so long since we've made it that no one remembered what it was.  I stopped making them because they seem so simple, yet are super hard to get right.

Last time we made them: 2009

Sunday morning, we went to church and it just worked out that everyone coordinated pretty well.

After lunch, the kids found their baskets.

Then, Ben, Colin and I went to the beach.   They surfed, I rested :)

Then, it was time for our feast!  The varinky turned out great and I was pleasantly surprised by the polish sausage I found at Frasier Farms.

I have no idea how my grandma made so many of these for our whole entire giant family!  She was talented, that's for sure.

 

Eli's 15th birthday

Presents!  I tried to be fun and bought party favors of smelly play dough...they smelled terrible, but it gave us a good laugh.

Some traditions stay strong and we went to Chick-Fil-A for lunch.

Then we went to see the Minecraft movie.

And stopped by Dave and Busters on the way home.

Ben got a free appetizer, so we all split some fries.

We stopped by home for a bit and then went out for sushi.

It was a great day celebrating our favorite Eli!

 

School Lately

 Eli is in Biology this year and we've started dissections.  First up, a good old fashion worm.

We also went to the tide pools to try and find a starfish.  We only found crabs, but still had a fun time exploring.

Eli and Alison are also doing Home Ec this year.  This week they planned a meal, bought the groceries and cooked the meal.  

Life lately

Colin is signed up for surf and jr. lifeguard camp this summer, but has to pass a pretty hard swim test first.  So, we've been in the pool as much as possible, including some private swim lessons.   He's doing great and I'm so thankful to have the Y right up the street from us.  Between swimming, basketball and guitar, Colin is staying plenty busy!

I'm in the tail end of the season of driving Alison to and from work.  It's been great to have little excuses to go out for a little bit afterwards.  One day we went to our favorite thrift store and coffee shop next door. 

Then we went hunting for sea glass in Carlsbad.

Ben held down the fort one weekend, and I went up to Idyllwild with some women from church for a retreat.  We went for a hike in the afternoon and I got some time with my new friend, Tiffany.  She's a fellow runner, which is crazy hard to find.