A Fun Family Easter Celebration

To start out I want to wish everybody a Happy Easter from the Allen Family.  We have settled into our new house here in Ogden, Utah, and life is pretty good.  

Our Easter Celebrations this year were much bigger than they were last year, since we had more family to share them with.  Grandma Royer, Grandpa Royer and Aunt Mary all came up to stay with us a couple of days early since Grandpa had a mission reunion to attend, so we had several days of fun as well.  They were joined Friday evening by my brother, Danny, his wife, Aleena, their kids, Memphis and Kayzee, and my sister Emily.  So we had a whole house full of fun as we spread throughout the house to find places for everyone to sleep - which we managed quite successfully in my opinion. The biggest part of our Easter weekend took place on Saturday, April 4th.  Everyone that stayed at our house on Friday traveled up to Grandma & Grandpa Christensen's house in Brigham City and met up with my brother, Teddy, his wife, Brit, and their son, Glen. We then proceeded to watch General Conference, with lunch and Easter festivities sandwiched between the two sessions.  The pictures that I took are mostly from the fun we had in the middle of the day.

No Royer/Christensen family gathering is complete without some sort of feast.  This time we had pulled chicken sandwiches with all the trimmings.  It was a beautiful day, so we enjoyed our first picnic lunch of the year.

The next big event of the day was an Easter Egg hunt.  The kids (of all ages) enjoyed looking for the Easter Eggs and had no trouble finding them in short order.

River was just content to play with her Easter basket and the couple of eggs that were designated "hers."

It was fun having cousin Glen to play with too.  He and River are only about a month-and-a-half apart in age and they were both content to play with the eggs, while the bigger kids were more excited about the candy.

After the Easter Egg hunt, we had a piñata for the kids.  Uncle Teddy controlled the movement, and each of the bigger kids had a chance to break it before Owen managed to pop the top off and free the candy from its cupcake prison.

The rest of the day was spent enjoying our time together, celebrating several family birthdays (Aunt Mary - March 28, Aunt Aleena - April 2, Grandma Royer - April 10, and Uncle Teddy - April 24), playing with cousins, and watching conference.  

When it was all done, we went our separate ways, but the memories that we made will continue to strengthen our family ties and increase our appreciation for our Savior.  His Easter sacrifice and resurrection have made it possible for our time with our families to be able to continue forever, not just for this weekend.

On the Move

River has discovered the joys of mobility. The other day I discovered her trying to escape up the stairs.  Of course I had to take pictures to document the event (after making sure that she was safe, of course).

She also loves exploring both inside and outside.  As long as she can keep wiggling, she keeps smiling.

Cinderella

MayLynn's favorite Disney Princess is Cinderella. So when the new Cinderella movie came out we decided to take the kids to the movie. Owen seemed glad that he got to the movie (although he seemed to think that it was a little bit too girly :) and River was wiggly and I had to walk the isle with her, but MayLynn was very, VERY happy.

After the movie was over, we got a picture of our little princess with the movie poster and I got a few pictures of my family as we left the movie theater.  One of my favorite moments of the night was when MayLynn insisted on taking Owen's arm as we were leaving.  A few passers by thought that it was cute that MayLynn had dressed up and commented so. MayLynn's response was classic. She said, "I am Cinderella and this is the Prince, Owen." I love my little princess!

MayLynn's 3rd Birthday

This little cutie turned 3 this week.  Since her favorite thing right now is pretending to be a princess, she got to be a princess for her birthday.  She dressed up in her Cinderella dress for a couple of days, we made her a princess birthday cake, and she even got a princess balloon.

On Saturday we had family come for her birthday party.  Aunt Emily came up from Snow College, Uncle Danny, Aunt Aleena, and cousins Memphis and Kayzee came up from Lehi, and Aunt Laurie, Uncle John, Cousin Emma, and Grandma Allen came up from Kaysville to help us celebrate MayLynn.

And to top it all off, they helped us spoil our little girl and help her feel like she is a special princess.

New Bed

Bryce and I have been married for a little over 10 years now, and we finally decided that since we were getting a new bed, that we would upgrade to a King sized bed.  We found a bed that we both agreed on, ordered it, and then went shopping for new bedding to go with a new bed.  Now the bed has arrived and here it is - all pretty, soft, and bringing smiles to our family already.

p.s. We ended up changing mattresses a couple months later since the spring bed didn't seem to get along with my back - so now we have a memory foam bed, and it seems to be working better for both of us.