On March 18th, Wendell and I celebrated our 15th anniversary. Wendell spoiled me with 2 dozen roses and a great weekend trip to Salt Lake. We stayed in the tower of the Little America Hotel and ate at a restaurant so fancy the water came at $5.00 a bottle. I know I am very lucky and am grateful for the last 15 years. How are lives have changed, but for the better.
We started March 17th off with green shirts and green pancakes. Emily mixed a lot of dye into the batter so the pancakes were extra colorful.
Tyler wasn't quite sure about the green pancakes. He wanted the syrup green, but we couldn't quite pull that off.
Emily sure loved the green!
After school, the kids chose to have green pizza again for dinner. Megan was all to anxious to turn the cheese and pineapple green.
The dough was green, but didn't show up in the pictures very well. We need to work on getting the sauce green next year.
Our St. Patrick's Day dinner. Green plates, cups, salad, jell-o, breadsticks and pizza. I think we out did ourselves this year.
Emily tried building a trap for a leprachaun, but Tyler thought it was garbage and had it cleaned up before she ever caught anything. Good thing the treasure of M&M's didn't require a trap. We'll have to buy more green dye for next year---we used an entire bottle this year!
It doesn't seem like we have been that busy this past month, but apparently the blog was out last priority. We are back and will update the month of March. Emily reluctantly gives into my whims once in a while and let me try my hand at sewing. She did love picking out fabric at the store and then waited patiently while I made her a new skirt. (It is really hard to find skirts long enough in Emily's size.) She loves to twirl and it is now her favorite thing to wear---too bad it isn't warm enough to wear comfortably.
Emily was also the model for the new fad of headbands. I used the extra fabric for this cute matching hair accessory. Thanks to Mindy for the pattern and the idea. Now I just need to find time to make more of these headbands.
Besides new clothes, Emily most favorite thing in the whole world is any kind of animal. She constantly asks Wendell if he will get allergy shots so she can get a dog. He is not willing to give in so we have to find ways to fill her animal fetish in other ways. Luckily, the local farm stores are having baby animal days. Emily and her friend went a couple of times to this store and handled the bunnies, chicks, and any other animal they could hold. (By the way, the blue on Emily's face is her make-up. She dressed up for the animals.) 
Since we can only watch so many Olympic events in one day, we decided to head to the indoor pool on Saturday in preparation for warmer weather. Megan and her friend thought it was o.k. until they stepped out of the pool. There is something to be said for 90-degree weather and being wet.
The pool was packed. I guess everyone else in town is ready to shed their coats and bring out the swim wear. Tyler loves the slide, even if it was cold waiting in line.
Emily and Wendell spent a lot of time in the lazy river. It was a good diversion from the winter outside. Now bring on Spring!
Last week Megan was invited to her first New Beginnings for Young Women. Wow! How can she already be 12! She is getting so grown up. It is fun to watch her grow, but scary at the same time. I know she will have a great time with the other 10 Beehives going into Young Women's this year. That will be a buzzing class.
The program was very nice and got the girls excited to begin their new adventure. This picture was taken before we left for the church. On the invitation, it said please wear best dress. Well, Emily heard that and went running downstairs. She came up carrying my old prom dress and was so excited that Megan got to wear her "best dress." Apparently, best dress to a 6-year-old means formals. Emily told Megan to try it on and couldn't understand why I wouldn't let Megan leave the house in it. Later that night, Emily was looking at my other dresses and told me she should have picked a different one for Megan, then maybe she would have worn it to the church. I didn't want to tell Emily that Megan wouldn't be caught dead outside our house in dresses from the early 90's. I just can't wait to see what Emily wears to her New Beginnings.
This year the desserts for the Blue and Gold Banquet were made by the dads and scouts. This is proof that Wendell and Tyler did their cake without any help. I took the picture and then left to go to the church---partly because I didn't want to see what our house would look like after and then partly because they didn't want my help.
They made it to the church with their final product. I think they did a great job. In fact one Mom actually asked if I helped because it looked so good. I guess Wendell and Tyler have careers in cake decorating ahead of them. My favorite is that the cake wouldn't come out of the pan so they just worked around it. They started out making an ice cream cone and ended with this hot air balloon---definitely creative.
Here are some of the other creations from the scouts and Dads.
The Bear den was in charge of skits for the evening. Thank heavens for the internet. There are a ton of really easy ideas for wild scouts to do. Tyler even talked in the microphone and all the boys participated.
Tyler and the other scout in the picture got their bear badges last fall. Now the challenge is to get them awards at each pack meeting. This time they earned their Chess belt loops. When the cub master asked what they did to earn them, Tyler said, "We just played Chess." I guess it's as easy as that.
Our ward had its first ever uniform inspection. This is Tyler with all the offical gear on. It was funny to watch the scouts at the inspection and then as soon as it was done, shirts came untucked or off and kerchiefs were thrown to the side. Maybe that is why we don't do inspections very often.
The highlight of the night was a pinata after dinner. Emily was one of the first to hit and had to wear a blindfold. After 15 kids had hit and a dent hadn't been made, the older kids got to swing without the blindfold. Emily told me later that that wasn't fair. I guess going last sometimes does have its advantages.
Tyler took his swings at the pinata.
Megan really knows how to hit a pinata. It took a couple of adults to finally hit and get all the candy out. Our Webelos leader knows how to make a mean pinata. It was a fun night with Tyler. The girls even like going to this banquet every year.
Two weeks ago, yes I'm a little slow, Megan had another tumbling competition. She didn't want to do the double-mini, so it was really fast with just the floor. She tried a level 10 pass and did really well on that, but didn't do as well on her first pass. She was quite disappointed. It could be the fact that she fell on the playground at school the day before and had a bruise and scratches all over her legs. That would do it for me.
She did get 5th place which we thought was great!