I'll plant my tulips next to yours

The title is the punch line of a cute joke my sister-in-law Cami told me. It starts like this: "When I plant a garden ... insert punch line." I thought it was pretty cute.

I thought these pics were pretty cute too, of the little ones at the tulip gardens. We visited two this year, and each had a windmill, that's fun. The gardens in Woodburn were gargantuan and had wheat fields which makes for great hide-and-go-seek if you're 2 1/2, although not quite as fun when the seeker happens to be me and the hider happens to be Kate who didn't really inform me we were playing hide-and-go-seek. Anyway, we hit one of the few gorgeous days in the month of April to travel down to Woodburn with my sister Robyn, sis-in-law Maile, and her friend Jen. I love when we get to do fun things like this that make all the gray and rainy days seem worth it!

I love this shot, i think it should be a world-peace promotion poster. What says love and peace more than a little girl in a field of tulips?

Abode a la mode

We have new digs! Living in this new house is like topping each day with a little scoop of ice cream. My days are generally good; great husband, great kids, health, job, car, etc. But this place just adds a little more pleasure to the moments. I'll list my favorite things: Jacuzzi tub. Two kitchens. Central vaccuum. A backyard. Cul de sac. Nice neighbors that don't do drugs or beat each other up, a huge step up. In fact, one of our neighbors actually offered to pay her daughter to come and be a mother's helper to me, free help, wow! Our own walls. One set of stairs. A/C. I could probably just bold that whole list and I could probably just keep going, but suffice it to say, I'm very, very happy to be here.

Before you go thinking that we could actually afford such a pleasurable house, I'll tell you that we are so blessed to be the lucky ones to rent this place from a lovely couple while they serve a mission for our church. I hope they extend their mission. Three times. We will be very sad to go! But living here will give us something to shoot for in the future!

Here's my favorite room:

As you can see, the kids love it too.

I'll post more pics soon, but not every room is totally settled yet. Come visit us anytime, we have a guest room waiting for you!