Texas

About a week after graduation we loaded in the van and headed down to Texas. Brennan had a couple of weeks between school and starting work and we had been wanting to take a trip. His mom and step dad just recently settled in Austin, Texas, and since neither one of us have ever been to Texas it seemed perfect. Lester had a work conference in Dallas so we met them there for the first two nights, so it was about a 13 hour drive. The kids were great! 

But it was a still a long time to be in the car and they were beyond happy to be free of their car seats. Tatum was bouncing off the walls and I worried she would never fall asleep. But Gramanaka read her some stories and she eventually calmed down. And she had her own bed which was awesome!

 Declan just hanging out and enjoying his freedom. :)

                                     
The next day was Friday, Lester's last day of his conference. The rest of us headed to the Perot Museum. It was 5 or 6 stories of children's museum and science museum kind of stuff. It was pretty neat! Even the outside of the building was cool:

 Tatum enjoying the water table.

 Our happy guy. Seriously, so happy. We are so lucky.

 Tatum with a new friend. Her "friend" looked up and smiled for the picture but Tatum wouldn't, of course.

 Checking her wingspan.

 That is a giant, real geode we are opening. It was pretty amazing.

 Love this picture of the boys.

They had this really cool sports exhibit where you could do lots of fun things but our favorite was the race. You could choose an animal or famous runner to race against. And then they run on the screen and you run next to them and they time you. Tatum chose the T Rex and then a cheetah I believe.

At the start line.

Tatum false starting. She doesn't really get the "on your mark, get set" sort of thing. She just wants to go.

Tatum was in hog heaven back at the hotel that afternoon. She was watching a cartoon and eating a treat in bed. Does life get any better than that? Not for a two year old.

On Saturday it was time to head down to Austin. On the way out of town we stopped by the Dallas temple to walk around the grounds. Tatum loved it and the weather was absolutely perfect.

 We dropped our stuff off at our new hotel and then went and saw Melanie and Lester's cute apartment. We hung out for a bit and then headed out to have dinner at the Oasis. This restaurant had an amazing view of Lake Travis and really good live music with a little area to dance. So we just hung out eating a few appetizers and enjoying the view and the music. It was a lot of fun.

So pretty.

Who are those people in the shadows? Yeah, I rock at taking photos.

Grampanaka and Declan were good friends and chatted up and hung out while the rest of danced/took video of others dancing.

 Here is Brennan teaching Tatum his signature move. :)

Hanging out in a space ship they had in front of the restaurant.

After Church on Sunday we had lunch at Melanie and Lester's  and then headed out to Mt. Bonnell for a "hike". Yeah, not exactly what we were expecting but still nice. There was a staircase for the entire time and it was really more like a brief walk. But the view of Austin was neat. And we were adventurous and took a different way down. :)

 Happy, always happy.

 After are non-hike we went took a drive down by Lake Austin and looked at the amazing houses. We stopped to let Tatum play at a playground that was sort of a part of a lakeside restaurant. It was neat to watch the boats come up beside the restaurant to get out and place orders. I had never seen anything like that before. You could see huge catfish and turtles in the water and Tatum loved that.

We decided to head back to their apartment and go swimming. Lester was the only smart enough to not even bother putting his suit on. The water was freezing! Tatum of course didn't care so Brennan was the lucky one who got to get in with her. The rest of us just put our legs in.

Headed down to the pool with grampanaka.

                                               

Declan just chillin'.

                                               

                                               

These two had a blast!

                                     

                                     

Warming up.

                                                

Monday was our last day in Austin and we made sure to make it count. We went to the Salt Lick, an amazing BBQ place. My mouth is watering just thinking about it. The only bummer was that it was pouring while we were there so we couldn't enjoy the grounds which looked amazing.

Look at all that meat!

                                     

Brennan thought he'd died and gone to heaven. :)

                                              

Tatum was not the happiest of campers so we entertained her by stacking butters.

                                              

                                              

And Declan was...you guessed it, HAPPY!

                           

After our delicious meal we headed to a graffiti gallery. Apparently construction started on some condos and then the funding fell through so it just stopped. People started doing graffiti there and now it is officially a gallery for graffiti. You can go multiple times and each time it will be different. Kind of fun. We probably would have explored more had it not been so wet and muddy that day. 

                                     

                                      

                                              

This dog with goggles was probably my favorite. 

                                     

The mud didn't stop Lester and Brennan from finding there way to the top.

                                     

While we waited for them at the bottom we entertained ourselves by making Tatum carry Declan on her shoulders.

                                               

And taking funny pictures with a couple way too into PDA in the background.

                                     

Up next was the capitol building. Pretty neat architecture.

 Love this girl.

An angel one minute, hysterical the next.

 And look at that squirrel. I was so excited that it was coming up close so Tatum would be able to see it. My excitement quickly disappeared. This guy was creepy! He kept coming closer and closer and circling us and acting all weird. He even chased me and Tatum. Brennan finally had to throw his flip flop at him to get him to run away.

Then we watched as these innocent foreigners sat down in his territory. They didn't stay for long. And as they walked away the guy told us the squirrel was "circling them aggressively". Creepy I tell ya.

 After our encounter with the crazy squirrel we decided to head inside the capitol building where Brennan, responding to a dare, acted much younger than his age and Tatum acted much older than hers.

 Tatum pretending to have a picnic at on one of the monuments outside.

Our Herky hunting and obsession has started to transfer over to other statues. She just loves all statues now...kinda weird. :)

That evening we head to a place called Top Golf. It was a neat driving range/restaurant. You could hit golf balls from right in front of your table and there were different targets and games to play. The kind of golf even I could enjoy! But...it turns out I can't even hit the ball. Yeah, that was embarrassing. But it was really fun way to spend our last evening, and the weather was so PERFECT.

We headed back home the next morning. It was a 16 hour drive home, but once again the kids were really good. It was a great trip! Thanks for having us Melanie and Lester!

graduation

About a month ago Brennan graduated!! Our entire married life he has been a full time student and he is finally finished! Unfortunately, he will be busy studying for and taking the CPA exam over the next few months so we aren't exactly feeling the freedom yet, but soon. 

Brennan's mom and dad were both able to make it into town for the festivities and we appreciate them making the effort to be there. And Tatum was in heaven having two grandmas around to spoil her. :)

 My mom got this cake for Brennan but unfortunately graduation took so dang long that no one felt like eating any by the time we got home. But we all ate it the next day so it wasn't wasted.

 Why is it so hard to take a decent picture? It just never works out the way I envision it. My parents got Brennan a frame for his degree with a place for a picture too and I totally imagined this great shot of him in his cap and gown and the three of us in our black and gold, but we couldn't get anything decent. And we had about 10 cameras aimed at us. (Slight exaggeration but it was a lot.)

 Brennan with his classmate, Zack.

 Brennan and his dad.

 These two have been great supporters and cheerleaders for Brennan over the last 5 years. We definitely wouldn't have made it without them. Thanks mom and dad!

Congratulations Brennan! We are so proud of you and all you accomplished.

He has been working full time for two and half weeks now and seems to be enjoying it. It has been strange not having him around as much but we are all adjusting.

Easter

We had a wonderful Easter season filled with lots of festivities, including about a bazillion egg hunts. :) It all began last Saturday with an egg hunt at Hy-Vee. It was crowded and over quickly, but the Easter bunny was there and Tatum loved that. 

We went from that hunt right to another one. This one was probably the funnest for Tatum. We decided to take her to the older kids half because it wasn't as crowded and that ended up being a good choice. (And no, we didn't do it so we could get more candy. Brennan is the only one who likes candy around here anyway. Not true, Tatum likes it too but we limit that, obviously.) But the lack of a crowd allowed Tatum to take her time, which is the only thing she knows how to do. After it started we looked over at the younger side and there was no moving room. There were more kids in that age group and then they are young enough that in a crowd like that they have to be accompanied by an adult. Very congested.

Waiting for the hunt to start.

As you can see she wasn't in much of a hurry, she's a bit of a people watcher. :)

I love this photo.

A rare photo of all four of us.

 After a birthday party at the park we headed to the local garden center for kids day. Tatum got to plant a couple flowers and color pictures and check out some animals.

Planting a flower with daddy.

She loved all the animals.

The baby goats were definitely my favorite. So cute!

She really wanted to hold the baby chicks.

Next on our list of Easter fun was playing Don't Eat the Peep! This was Tatum's first experience with Don't Eat Pete (or some version of it) and she loved it. It involves m&ms, how could she not? I am loving her outfit in this next photo. She insisted, we weren't leaving the house, so I decided to not fight that battle haha.

Next up was the Saturday before Easter. There was an Easter egg hunt at the Church, most of Tatum's eggs had stickers in them. She loved that and so did I! We went straight from that hunt to one in Mt. Vernon with my parents. The Easter bunny was at this one too and he terrified Tatum for some reason. So much so that she basically refused to look for eggs. Grandma finally convinced her to get some. We then headed to Grandma and Papa's house to dye some eggs with shaving cream.

This was a Pinterest idea. It certainly has potential but definitely needs some tweaking.

Tatum was a little weird about getting her hands dirty. We obviously need to play in the dirt a little more. 

Luckily Grandma had some popsicle sticks so Tatum could basically paint the eggs and keep her hands squeaky clean.

We headed home that afternoon to do our traditional kool-aid egg dying.

So Declan hung out in the bumbo while we dyed, as you can see. At one point he had his binky and he took it out of his mouth and threw it...

right into the red kool-aid cup. Nice shot, kid!

That entire evening Brennan was busy making these lovely little cupcakes for Easter dessert. This is only half of them and they weren't finished at this point. He still had to dip them in melted chocolate. They were a lot of work and required dirtying almost every dish in our house, but they were delicious!

Easter morning started out rough. Tatum was tired and emotional. Exhibit A:

Declan, however, was happy and super excited to get his puffs. And seeing his basket finally convinced Tatum to go find her basket.

This year was my first year "hosting" Easter, or any major holiday for that matter. I say "hosting" because my mom still made a lot of the food but I did make the ham and the turkey, so that counts for something right? We had my mom and dad, the Eskelsens, and the Leighs over and it was a lot of fun with a lot of yummy food. My mom did an egg hunt for the grandkids/mostly Tatum since the other kids are getting too old/cool for that. :)

Out to hunt for eggs, yet again.

 Kelbie helping Tatum out.

Me and mom and dad on the observation deck.

Tatum's best bud.

 Tatum was really excited about Declan's puffs. I hadn't decided if I was going to start giving them to him but she was insistent. He did great and loved them! And Tatum loved feeding them to him.

 Check out this handsome man all ready for Church. 

We finished off Easter by going to the Lamb of God oratorio that Brennan performed in (he even had a solo). He did great as did the rest of the choir and it was the perfect way to end the day. We went the week before, but this time my dad was so generous and pretty much took care of both kids himself the whole time so I felt like I was able to listen a lot more and it was very powerful. Amid all those egg hunts and egg dying and candy eating we did remember why were celebrating. We love our Savior, Jesus Christ, and we are so grateful to Him for the ultimate sacrifice that He made for us. And we know that He lives! And because He lives we will live again, death is not the end, and I can be with the people I love forever!

We hope you all had a great Easter!