welcome baby elsa!

i am so in love with my beautiful new niece!

elsa marie wren
born april 25th, 7 lbs 3 oz

isn't little elsa the cutest?!! i can't believe she has all that hair! and those ruddy cheeks and cute little lips - she's the prettiest little newborn! i'm so happy for lana and kris, little elsa sure is a doll and healthy as can be. i'm positive she and penny will be good friends. :)

happy easter!

this year we spent easter weekend in northern california with paul's brother's family - wes + tami and their kids, evan + makayla (and a little boy on the way). penny loved hangin' with her cousins and a good time was had by all...

on friday we went to the zoo:

makayla LOVED the deer, i think the feeling was mutual.
evan spider-monkeyed it up to the top of the cut-out board...there he is!
saturday morning we went on an easter egg hunt with some neighbor kids, it was so cute! afterwards, penny cared more about playing with the plastic eggs than the candy inside...we helped her out with the candy part.
then some easter egg dyeing saturday night...

evan showed me his egg...and then carted it around oh-so-nicely in his wagon.

i love this picture - while we were dyeing the eggs, we put some little heart stickers on penny's fingernails and she was OBSESSED with them. she kept saying "ooohh...pitty!"
penny enjoying her chocolate bunny on easter morning, haha.

the cute kiddos all dressed up on easter sunday.

it was a fun, full weekend and nice to visit with family! thanks for having us wes + tami!

see ya in two years, derek!

we had a really nice open house last night for derek before he entered the mtc this morning. my aunt margo hosted and we just sat around, ate good food, and chatted all night.

pointing to his mission on the map: brisbane, australia.

i'm so proud of my little bro. he's going to live in australia for two years and have this incredible missionary experience and i'm so excited for him. i'm gonna miss the little bugger but i'm so glad that he has chosen to do this. love you derek!

what, don't you videotape your kids snoring?

pennygirl had a bit of cold this week and it resulted in some awesome snoring.
that lip puffing in and out kills me! so cute.

better than nothing.

sorry my posts lately have been few and far between...nuthin much is going on! but here's some pics of penny outside in the fresh air between sessions of general conference two sundays ago.

*such a paul face.

i just thought she looked so funny in her pj's and "combat boots". one day when she looks back at this blog (after i've made it into one of those blog-turned-into-a-book things) she'll be like "sooo...did you ever dress me in anything than pj's?" and i'll be like "nope."

i really enjoyed general conference this year. growing up it was THE MARATHON OF LONG-WINDED SPEAKERS THAT NEVER ENDED but now i look forward to it every 6 months. their words really are modern day revelation and i like how each talk makes me think a little harder or differently about some particular topic. i like just setting aside normal routine for 2 days and just listening and being restful and feeling the spirit. i kind of feel rejuvinated, ya know?

i feel like i've been busy lately and i looked at the calendar this morning and i am so exited to say that i have NOTHING scheduled on the calendar for this week! it's completely blank! it makes me giddy. maybe i'll take penny on a walk today since i understand that it's supposed to be snowsville starting tomorrow through the rest of the week.

st. george

this weekend we went with paul's parents down to their condo in st. george for a little relaxin' time. it's kind of nice to get a change of scenery once in a while, ya know?

we went to a dinosaur footprint museum on saturday...

so they discovered these dinosaur foot prints about 10 years ago while the farmers who owned the land were working on leveling it. he flipped some stones over and found a bunch of imprints that are dinosaur tracks. pretty neat.

and then there was this area where they were hatching little velociraptors and i was all "wait a minute. what if they start reproducing on their own and take over the park?" and the scientist was like "no, it's okay all the dinosaurs are females."

and then we went on a really pretty hike sunday morning in snow canyon.

penny luuuved being up in her hiking throne. she jib-jabbered the whole time and was so excited to be out in NATURRRRE. me and paul have resolved to go on more hikes, it's really one of the most relaxing, peaceful, pretty outdoorsy things you can do. such a nice weekend!

another song...

sometimes sesame street teaches your child songs and then you don't even realize it until they're singing themselves to sleep for a nap and you're like "what?! did i teach her that?" the answer is no, sesame street did. i know, i'm the world's best mom.

(please ignore penny's major bedhead on the back of her noggin, that's what it looks like even after a short nap. i don't try to brush it back to normal too often because she gets all mad and screechy at me. curse you curly hair!)