memorial day & graduation

on memorial day, grant talked us into braving the holiday traffic and taking him to some new bike trails. traffic wasn't too bad until we were south of the city:

eventually the cars thinned out and we made it to:

grant re-assembled his bike:

and after checking the air with his valentine's pump: 

he was ready to go:

the girls spent their time playing on the playground:

i sat in the shade reading (rhett butler's people [i don't recommend it. if you're curious, i'll save you from an overlong explanation and tell you that the first and third reviews cover the bulk of my objections.]) and listening to my music.

lucy hammed it up for the camera:

a lot:

and played with sticks:

hazel quickly decided it was too hot and came to sit by me in the shade:

i was feeling kind and shared my tunes with her: 

once she cooled down, she took a couple pictures:

by then grant had finished his ride and we packed up:

check out that beard. hubba-hubba!

at home again, we gave the girls a bath and an impromptu haircut. i trimmed about an inch off of lucy's (she wanted it really short but i didn't have the heart to chop all of that hard earned hair off) hazel again requested to have her hair cut up to her eyes and again we compromised with her chin. i tried to do an a-line and it turned out pretty cute: 

here we're at the park having our preschool co-op graduation. hazel gave me that smile and then did this: 

she was not feeling well.

lucy felt fine and had a good time playing:

we had a little ceremony where each child received a certificate and m&ms. i tried in vain to get hazel to stand by the others but she was not having it so here are three of the four students:

hazel kind of cooperated with this one:

it was incredibly hot so after the girls picked at their lunches:

we headed back to our air conditioned cave to hibernate through the summer.

easter

our easter celebrations began last wednesday (the 4th) at the whale park:

the kids played:

while the adults hid eggs:

and then my camera died, so we back went home to hibernate.

ha! i wish. my camera really did die but we stayed and i took some high-quality pictures with my magnificent dumb phone. 

ready to go:

all done:

and enjoying the spoils:

luckily for the kids i hadn't procrastinated getting their loot this year so not having a car didn't make a difference on the easter front: 

lucy got a kick out of the "carrots that walk" and likes coloring in the batman book "because it has two-face". both girls enjoyed the m&m's and thought the movie was too scary. all in all, a success.

hazel was sick so grant stayed home with her while lucy and i headed out to the first hour of church, which was full of beautiful easter music. once home again, i made hot cross buns. then we all took a nap (well except grant who read). after our naps, grant and i hid some eggs for the final extravaganza:

it didn't take the girls too long to find them all (the one grant hid in the chain and the one i hid in the cat's plaything took the longest). 

and finally, after dinner we dug into the hot cross buns (i used half all-purpose and half whole wheat flours 'cause that's what i had; and i added cardamom to the cinnamon and sugar; oh and no raisins were added; and instead of an egg white in the icing, i used meringue powder. and they were tasty):

hope everyone had a great easter too!

friends @ the zoo

when a friend invited us to go to the zoo, we went of course:

hazel and lucy tend to have more fun when they have their buddies to run around with. and i actually allow them to wait for and watch the sea lion show:

it was really hot outside. the kids were grateful to spy the misting-fans:

by the red pandas we found some more friends:

and in the natural encounters exhibit, the kids were silly:

and adventurous:

until they got stuck:

they enjoyed the tiger massage chairs:

and the animal skulls (left to right: zebra, grizzly bear, and tiger):

hazel played hide-and-seek:

and lucy hitched a ride in the stroller:

i gave hazel the camera for a little while and she took this great picture of william drumming (as well as a few butt shots that i'll spare you from):

i asked hazel if she was having a good time and she said:

the kids played on a small playground for a bit:

before we visited the reptile house:

 and ended on a cool note:

heh heh heh! see what i did there??