Author: mrsbarnes

Today we were looking for an outing to keep us out of the house. Our Disneyland passes were blocked today, I was also sad to find that every Saturday until September is blocked!

I  located The Monarch Program http://www.monarchprogram.org/  It is a fabulous place!! When we arrived we were greeted by the butterfly lady who walked us through the education behind butterflies. She showed the girls the different types of butterflies they will be seeing. She explained the migration patterns of the Monarchs as well as showed them live caterpillars. She then showed  a video walking us through the life cycle of a butterfly. After the video she took us out to the butterfly house. It was amazing to see all the butterflies flying around. We were able to hold butterflies (sitting on watermelons). We arrived about 30 minutes prior to their closing time and the lady said that the butterflies tend to settle down when it is cloudy, so there weren’t as many fluttering around as usual. Still there were plenty for us to see. Olivia kept saying, “I’m so happy.” We will definitely be making more trips down to the butterfly house!

After our butterfly adventure we were looking for something else. I remembered that Carlsbad had a great flower garden I’ve always wanted to see. So we stopped at The Flower Fields. http://www.theflowerfields.com

I was a beautiful sight! (A bit over priced in my opinion) This is a great place for photos, unfortunately the girls were not very cooperative. Their favorite activity was the Sweet Pea maze. They had so much fun running around in the maze. Adrian and I were done, so we gently showed them the way out. It was a nice place to visit but I don’t think it will be on my “return with the kids” list.  Maybe when they are old enough to sit still for a photo.

 

                

After two unsuccessful trips to the snow, we thought this winter would have been a “dry” one.  Then finally, during my spring break, the snow arrived. We knew of the incoming storm so my mom and I packed the girls into the truck and headed up early on a Friday. We arrived in town as the snow storm began! It was perfect because the girls were able to see the snow falling from the sky, this would be a first for Olivia. The girls had so much fun playing in the snow, it was well worth the amount of packing that accompanied this trip. Adrian, my dad, Sam and his friend drove up the next morning. The initial plan was for them to drive up on Friday night, but with the storm everyone agreed that it would be best to wait. Adrian was very excited to drive his car in the snow 🙂

The sun was bright and shinny on Saturday. The girls played outside most of the time, we even built a snow man. Our little snow family ended up melting by the end of the day on Saturday. On Sunday as we were driving home it was amazing to see how much of the mass amounts of snow had melted away. I’m glad we made it up in time!

         

  

I wonder if I was ever as excited about Easter as Jillian was this year? We had many “Easter Bunny” sightings in the week leading up to Easter. (A wild bunny has decided to make our backyard his home. ) She had also received many baskets, eggs, and candy from Auntie Angie 🙂 which got her a little more excited each day. We decorated our eggs on Monday and continued to eat them on a daily basis. Although in the beginning, Jillian assumed they were only for Easter and refused to let my mom feed them to her. haha. On Saturday we visited Adrian’s Grandmother and the girls had a lot of fun.

On Easter Sunday we woke up to find the Easter Bunny had filled their baskets. Olivia was super excited about the sun glasses and Jillian loved the little kitten dolls. The Easter Bunny brought a lot of bath toys so the girls were excited to take a bath immediately. While they were bathing the Easter Bunny worked on hiding the eggs 🙂 haha. They had a blast searching for eggs, although Adrian had to carry Olivia’s basket the whole time haha. Jillian was really nice about making sure that Olivia was able to find some eggs as well. I regretted filling some eggs with Jellybeans since Olivia would shove them in her mouth the instant she found them.

After our egg hunt we traveled to Fullerton to visit Adrian’s cousins and spend some time at the park. Adrian’s parents made it as well and the girls were thrilled! The girls had fun, but I could tell Olivia needed a nap so we decided to travel home…. unfortunately she did not fall asleep in the car… haha I think it was all the sugar ; )

At home that night we ate dinner, played with the plastic eggs, and ate dessert. The girls then played on the trampoline, which I’m glad about, getting their energy (sugar) out. haha. Even with the running around and jumping, the girls still had a hard time falling asleep, too much excitement all weekend long.

Today (the day after) Jillian continuously asks when the next Easter will be 🙂 haha I keep telling her how great the next holiday is… Mother’s Day 😉

(I could only find one set of bunny ears in the morning, therefore Olivia is the Easter Moose.)

Jillian has been very excited about Easter this year! I decided to try out this idea of decorating eggs with Kool-Aid. If I were decorating these by myself and had 10 minutes of time per egg it would have worked. For impatient toddlers, Kool-Aid did not work! I ended up having to add food coloring to the water to get the desired colors. After the eggs were dried I pulled out an old egg decorating kit that allowed the girls to paint directly on the egg. This held their attention for about 5 minutes and then they were done. I think I had more fun with my eggs than they did with theirs.

 

After the CUE conference in Palm Springs I have become a believer in iPads. I have finally figured out how to use them in the classroom. Adrian (and my dad) purchased The New iPad for me!!! I have to admit I have gone a bit app crazy. I’m hoping it slows down soon. Right now my apps are a mixture of personal and classroom apps, most of them being for the girls.

Our favorite apps are the Toca Boca ones. I’ll post a link later 🙂 the apps include playing house, doctor, helicopter pilot, chef, hair stylist, butterfly painter and being the host of a birthday party or tea party. http://tocaboca.com/
The one downside of some of these apps is the ability to take a picture of their work. My camera roll was completely full of butterflies and hair styles. I have finally managed to clean out the 32 photos, however I did save one because we thought it was worth hanging onto.

Here is “butterfly pattern” by Jillian

Our other favorite app is Draw and Tell. This is a fabulous app for my little storyteller. The girls can draw with a variety of tools, add stickers, and record their voice while moving the stickers around. Duck and Moose educational apps