Lately

I've been trying so hard to keep up on Picture Tuesdays and I've gotten behind on what the rest of us are doing around here.  It's easy to be distracted with two such darling babies around.  I mean, seriously.  Look at these two little darlings.

 The weekend of Easter was quite different this year with our Sabbath being on a Friday and Glenn and Tate being at work and school on Easter Sunday.  The Easter bunny visited our house on Friday morning this year.  It felt pretty normal actually because it was our Sunday.  The Easter Bunny did a little scavenger hunt for the boys with clues hidden in eggs around the house.  Tate remembered that last year when we were at Auntie Aubry's house for Easter the Easter Bunny hid their baskets.  So we had to keep that good stuff going!  We were also really lucky to find Easter Bunny poop at the store the night before (another tradition of ours which comes from Glenn's momma.  Don't worry, they're raisinettes.) It was fun.  Mainly because Tate was thrilled to read the clues and figure them out all by himself.  Finn was happy just to follow him around and couldn't have cared less about the clues and the hunt.

 The boys found their baskets in Taryn and Kenna's crib this year and they were so happy with their contents.  Both boys got new place mats.  For some reason they're really attached to their place mats and having their own spot at the counter.  Then Tate got these really cool little robot bugs called "hexbugs".  They've provided a lot of entertainment for these two.

 Finny got this little basketball piggy bank.  Tate has his own piggy bank and loves having a place to put all the coins that he collects here but Finn didn't have one of his own.  He spent all day carrying it around and filling it with coins and then dumping them out again.

Unfortunately that evening Finn was holding his bank in one hand and his cup in the other and trying to open the fridge to put his cup away and his little bank slipped out of his hands and broke on the tile floor.  It took him a minute to process what happened.  It was so sad.  He just stared at it for a minute and then started wailing and sobbing.  He felt so badly that he had broken his special new toy and it was one of the more heartbreaking moments I've had with little Finn.  He probably cried for half an hour and kept saying, "I can never get a new piggy bank because I will just make another mistake.  I always make mistakes!"  Poor little man just felt so bad.  That night we had a little FHE and watched some church videos about our Savior and talked about how his Atonement made it so that we can be forgiven when we make mistakes and Finny said, "Like when I broke my piggy bank!"  It was so sweet.  Luckily, Auntie Mallo is going to bring little man a new piggy bank when she meets us in London next week so all will be well.  And we'll just have to institute a new rule that the piggy bank stays on the dresser and doesn't get carried around the house.  Maybe that way we can keep it intact.

On Saturday of Easter weekend we were invited to dinner at a traditional Saudi restaurant with the Frosts and Larsons.  It was a bit of a circus with all of our kids in this little room sitting on cushions on the floor and eating food that was way too foreign for my picky little Tate but I think overall it went pretty well.  The Frosts go there every year to celebrate Easter with a traditional Middle Eastern meal.  I think it's a pretty cool tradition to eat a meal sort of as Christ would have.  A very cool experience.  The food was not great but the experience was really cool.

Glenn decided he needed to try the fish.  And then I got to look at this charming face throughout the meal.  Yumm. 

 On Easter Sunday Glenn and Tate went off to work and school as usual.  After school I had hidden Easter Eggs all over the house and Tate and Finn got to gather them up after we picked Tate up from the bus.  Then later we dyed some Easter Eggs together.  Luckily I had a kit that I had packed away somewhere in our shipment.  I'll have to get some on our repat for next year!  It was a fun and simple way to keep the Easter weekend going!

This past Saturday we spent the morning at Ras Tanura with the Hendersons.  Glenn took the boys to Ras Tanura one Saturday right after we arrived but I had a migraine that day and couldn't make it so it was really fun to go together!  We really needed to take advantage of the beach before the weather gets too hot to leave the house!  Which I hear will be any day now!  We camped out in this great little pavilion and the girls slept for a while.  Once they woke up we stripped them down to their onesies so they wouldn't be too hot.  It was a really warm day.  

Glenn and I took turns sitting with the babies and playing with the boys.

 It was a beautiful day and we had fun playing in the sand and wading in the water.

 Until we found these little friends all over in the water.  The lifeguard assured us that they don't sting. They don't even have stingers, just big mushroom bodies and stumps underneath.  But they are quite large and I couldn't handle going swimming with them bumping into me.  No thank you.

 This is Tate with his buddy Zack, so proud of the two jellies that they caught in their bucket.

 Finn and April playing in the sand.

 Doesn't this look like an awful way to spend the day at the beach?  SO HOT!

Since Ras Tanura is another Aramco compound abayas are not required, but of course, they're always required if you're Saudi.  No matter where you go.  I was sweating bullets in my swimming suit.  I can't imagine wearing an abaya and not being able to swim. 

We played on the beach for a while and then we loaded up and walked over to the little swimming pool that is just off the beach.  We met up with some friends we made on our weekend in Bahrain.  They have a set of darling adopted twins and the mom is the drama teacher at the middle school there in Ras Tanura so we had a great time catching up and she told me stories about what it's like teaching drama and directing middle school shows in Saudi Arabia!  I really enjoyed it.  The kids cooled off in the pool for a bit and then we had a little lunch at the snack bar and headed home.  What a fun day.  And we did it.  With four kids!  Success.

Finny is still in soccer once a week and last week Tate started group tennis lessons.  It is SO fun to watch!  He's only had two lessons so far but he's getting much better every time.  His teacher, Mr. Jamal, is really great and so patient.  He has four kids in his class including a darling set of twin girls from London.  We've had fun sitting with their parents and talking about parenting twins and getting advice on places to visit on our trip next week.  

Here he is, so excited that he just got what his teacher calls a "big fish".  That means he hit it over the net.  If you hit it REALLY high over the net it's called a shark.  The first week of lessons ended with Tate hitting the ball a few times.  But at his second lesson he was hitting it over the net the majority of the time and he was just thrilled with his progress.  It was really fun to watch him progress and be proud of himself.

Finny has fun watching Tate play tennis and cheering for him when he hits the ball over the net.  I mean, look at that darling face!

He's been a real doll lately.  It's so nice to have week of sweet Finny in between week of "terrible threes" Finny. 

Can't wait for our next adventure in London!  The boys kept asking when we're going and we finally just made a little London paper chain and the boys are taking turns ripping off links every day.  Last night we had a little FHE lesson on obedience, stressing the importance of obeying Mom and Dad so we can keep you safe in the big city!  Glenn showed a video about a boy who didn't obey his Mom and wore flip flops instead of shoes and ended up getting stung by a scorpion.  So now Finn thinks that if he disobeys he'll "get stunged by a scorpion".  Well, whatever works, I suppose!  As long as it gets him to obey!