March to April 2014

3/23/14: To the zoo! The weather finally started to warm up so we returned to one of our old haunts.
One of Owen's favorite times to have his picture taken is when he's eating. He also tends to put his hands up by his face like this when he's excitedly posing.

Looking at lions! Owen had trouble seeing them, but his big sister was happy to lift him up.

We could possibly track Cara's growth through the years with all the pictures we have of her on this caterpillar.

The kids sliding down on the flower.

We never did quite get a good family portrait...but these are fun.

This was a very cool new kids' section of the zoo that we saw for the first time. Cara climbed across this thing and then Owen, at a much, much slower pace, followed her. There was a big curly slide at the end that he refused to go down, however, and he had to be extracted by his mother.

Brushing goats! Why not?

4/13/14 was when we decided to have our first annual combined birthday party for Evelyn and Cara!
Here's one of the birthday girls, decorating cupcakes with Casie.

The weather was wonderful--almost too hot--so a lot of us went outside to enjoy it. Owen went all in.

The real unique and exciting part was the piñata that Evelyn bought and stuffed herself with goodies. Almost everyone got a turn whacking at the thing, as it proved more resilient than any of us expected. Here are all the kids lined up, waiting for their turns.

Grownups too!

The birthday girl takes a shot.

Near the end, Owen was given several turns, which turned rather giggly.

...and once it was finally down, things got a little out of control.

Blowing out candles! (Owen's head can be seen in the bottom left corner.)

Opening presents!

4/13/14: Earlier on the same day as the party, I had taken Owen for a visit to the Barnes and Noble, where we determinedly used every single Lego they had out on the play table. It just took me a while to get this photo off my phone.