"And today is the day..."

"And today is the day you wore your lipstick..."

One liner from a neighborhood girl who's family (sisters and brother) have become my newest yardwork helpers. It never fails that within minutes of stepping outside to work in my yard, they appear out of nowhere insisting on helping. They grab whatever yard tool is lying closest to them and dig in.

I love my little helpers. I really have accomplished more in my yard in one week than I could've on my own in three. We've cleared a corner of my yard that was overgrown with raspberry vines, tiny trees, garbage and chopped firewood (amongst broken glass and nails) that the previous homeowners left for us. We've planted two rows of petunias, blue angel hostas, watered plants, mulched...the list goes on.

Then today the most amazing thing happened. As I was planting petunias with my oldest and middle babes, my usual helpers came skipping into my yard and slowly, one by one, the "park crowd" made their way over to my yard. At one point I had over 10 kids, most of them the normal troublemakers. They helped wet the newspaper I layed down prior to mulching and they watered for me (while getting each other wet, too). I paused at one point and looked around and felt like I might have realized in that moment part of the reason I'm in Marshalltown. You know...well, maybe you don't...but you know when you wonder why God has placed you somewhere and you seriously rack your brain and can't, for the life of you, understand why you ended up in a strange town you know nothing about and never EVER imagined yourself living in? Well...this might be a tiny bit of an answer for me...not the whole thing, but a taste I think.

Ah...tomorrow will be just as interesting. Things change from moment to moment here.

Mi Familia on Easter. I wanted some cute pics of us as a fam on our porch of all front porches and thought bright colors would be fitting. Looks like Mattea is the brightest of us all! Aren't we a handsome family?!
My Mommy and Daddy. Too bad I wasn't quick enough with the camera I could've caught my Dad walking around with his belly sticking out and a goofy look on his face. Such a joker. So cute that my mom insisted on the picture being taken by the pole, so the railing could hide her.
There are people that like "posey" pics. I am not one of them. This picture shows the true personality of each of my kids. Tate the joker, Gunnar the serious little big dude, and Mattea the emotional superstar. I love me my kids!
Me and my hubby. I'm so proud of him for making it through Easter absolutely exhausted from a week of major studying for his classes and dealing with his "special" employees. Doesn't he look nice in his icey blue linen?
The grandparents, great-grandparent, and all the grandkids...including Hugo. After all, he thinks he's one of them.

It was an amazing Easter. We colored eggs this morning, then I filled the Easter baskets (yes, a little late). The fam showed up around 11 and we had a special Easter egg hunt that included eggs filled with scrumptious candy and six extra special eggs each with an item inside representing Easter. Bread, a nail, a rock, a bandaid, a hershey's kiss, and an empty one. Can you think of what those stand for? The dog snuck up and snacked on the bread and Tate exclaimed, "He ate the Last Supper!!!" We all got a great belly laugh.

After lunch of BBQ chicken legs, green beans, corn bread and pie, the "girls" and Tate went to the pond at a gorgeous cemetery about a block from our house and we fed the ducks and geese with some leftover hamburger buns from last week. There were two human-sized swans there that were just larger than should be allowed for a water-fowl, but they fascinated the kids (and the adults).

It was a good day. Now we are snacking on some fish sticks (thanks to Mattea) and mac and cheese. As if I could fit anything else in my tummy after all the candy and pie!