April Adventures 2018

Easter Conference

April started out so great with Easter and General Conference. I love when Conference is on Easter because the speakers tend to focus even more on the Atonement, and there is always a wonderful, peaceful feeling to the weekend. Hannah and Jake and Joe and Kym’s family came to visit us. 

It has become a tradition to have aebleskivers on Sunday morning of conference, so it was so fun to be able to have them together. Kym made dozens of skivers, and we still managed to eat them all. There is little in this world more scrumptious than a warm aebleskiver, dipped in melted butter and powdered sugar. Yum!

The kids and I colored Easter eggs, and then Hannah and Jake helped the Easter bunny hide them. It was a fun morning, followed by an amazing General Conference that I detailed more thoroughly in another post.

Spring Break

The fun weekend was only the start because the next week was Spring Break. Jonathon had to work the whole time, so we didn’t go anywhere, but we tried to do a few fun things. One afternoon, we decided to ride our bikes to Macey’s to get ice cream. Christian and Andrew had never ridden that far, so we weren’t sure how well they would do. The first mile was a bit challenging, and there was a little complaining, but once they got going, they did great! We made it the 3 miles to Macey’s where we stopped and got ice cream cones for everyone. Then we turned around and made it the whole way back.

Family Pictures

Several years ago, I saw some family pictures that my cousin had taken in an orchard when it was in bloom. Ever since then, I have wanted to get some of our family. Last year, I had everything set up, but the blossoms didn’t cooperate and were late, so I cancelled the photoshoot. This year, I was determined to make it happen. I hired the same photographer that took my cousin’s pictures. Her name is Alyssa Gerun, and she had access to the same beautiful orchard. I had to reserve our time slot several weeks in advance, so I fretted about if the blossoms would still be around by the time our chance came. Luckily, the day and the orchard were absolutely beautiful! The pictures had gorgeous lighting, and the blossoms were perfect. I have always shied away from professional family pictures because of the cost involved, but Alyssa was very affordable and did great work. For $70 we got about 50 stunning photos. I was so happy with them. Here are just a few:

Jordan River Temple Open House

Right after we got our family pictures taken, we had tickets to go to the Jordan River Temple Open House. We try to take our boys to as many temple open houses as we possibly can so they get lots of exposure to the temple and understand how important it is. 

The Jordan River Temple is particularly special because it is where my parents were married, and where I received my endowment before marrying Jonathon. We parked and walked to the bus pick up zone. It was windy and quite chilly by that point, so we were anxious to get on the bus. It drove us a little ways to another chapel where we watched a short video on temples. Then we got to walk over and tour the temple. The renovation was very beautiful, and the temple was peaceful and serene. I’m glad we had a chance to go. 

On the bus ride back to our car, a family sat down next to us. I asked where they were from, and they told me Caldwell, Idaho. When I inquired a little further, it came out that they were really from Notus, ID! We started talking about my dad and his family growing up there, and it turned out that they were in the same ward as my uncle Darell and aunt Gayle. It was a fun coincidence. I love how small the world can seem sometimes when you are a member of the church.