We Are Family: Easter Style

For Easter, the Easter Bunny brought the boys matching ties and shades. Pretty snazzy, huh? :) 

For Easter we went to a friend's house after church and stayed for about 5 hours! It was just so relaxing... Our kids actually all played so nicely and Andrew even took a nap there. It was a lovely day!

France: Day 2

April 6: Riquewhir

 William was in time-out here, I believe. ;) 

Our boys are early risers, regardless of when they fall asleep, so we were out of the hotel by 8 this morning. It was chilly, but we knew where a great park was for us to hang out at with the boys. 

 Andrew is growing up so much. It's hard for me to always recognize because he's just my baby! He's getting a lot more playful with his brothers, and a lot more reluctant to just hang out in the stroller when his brothers get to walk. The day before this I took Andrew out for a break from the restaurant and he ran immediately to where he'd been watching the big boys play, and did everything that they had been doing!! Spinning around posts, climbing on a little wall, jumping off a little bench. My sweet boy is a baby no more!

 Sorry. I just can't resist taking pictures of pretty blossoms. :)

 A funny old man hanging out in the park with us... JK Nathaniel... you're not old. :)

 I have probably 50 pictures of Cameron jumping off this wall. :) 

Every one makes me smile, but I thought I might spare you most of them. 

 Little boy. 

 Macaroon samples anyone? My boys adored them!

 I want to live in this house. 

 Daddy treated the boys to some delicious looking cookies! William mostly just licked the jelly part. I even was excited about the cookies and got one too...... They were no bueno. At. All. By the taste of it, it was evident that they are kept in the same display cooler as the stinky cheese. Blech. At least they looked pretty. :)

 Yay! I get one too! 

"William, you can pick out ONE treat on this trip... ONE.". 

And. This is what he picked. A post card of a 1912 postman. Oooh-k! 

 Cameron taste-testing the reindeer sausage and fancy goat cheeses with Daddy.

 Watch out boys! 

Don't worry, there was a metal grate coving it. It still got a lot of good reactions from passerby's. ;)

Next up was the Koenigsbourg castle. All three of my children fell asleep in the 1/2 hour car ride to the castle. I'd be D***ed to wake them up, so N offered to stay with the boys in the car and take a little snooze himself while I got to go check out the sights.  

This castle is... a beast. So high up (relatively speaking), and so, so big. Biggest I've seen yet. 

 And so inviting! 

 Not sure what this was about bc there seriously isn't enough room for a helicopter up there.. ;)

 You see? HUGE. 

My friend's son testing out the water containers. :) 

 So. Big. So cool. Wish I could have seen more. There were stairways everywhere that were roped off... so tempting! 

 When I returned to the car, our family threw in the towel and decide to head home... but of course then on the way home we saw a sign for some chateau that was only 15 minutes away... but it was 25 minutes away (liar gps!). The chateau thing was lame, so we headed back in the car... and saw a sign for a waterfall only 15 minutes away (again, 25 min). 

 I'm so glad we went. Somehow after all the man-made awesomeness we'd seen, it was so refreshing to be back in nature awesomeness. We didn't even get out the stroller, just let the boys roam. It was great!

 Andrew kept repeating over and over "wa-uh"! Yes, my baby. Water. Love you. Need to get you talking, but LOVE YOU. 

 Me & my babies. :)

Run away, my boy! 

France: day 1

April 6

A few weeks ago a friend mentioned to me that they had plans to go to France for a couple days.... I got a little gleam in my eye, asked Nathaniel, and boom-- we were packing for France. Have I mentioned how much I love living here? :)

:) Sounds like a fun town! We pulled off here for fuel!

 The kids were super enthused... 

 While N was in checking us into the hotel, the big boys got out of their booster seats to stretch a little. William wanted to try his hand with the camera (point and shoot- not my big camera). Cameron looks scared, but I think W did a good job! :)

 Happy! 

 The Statue of Liberty! Wait... I thought we were in France?  Maybe it was a prototype before they shipped off the big one to us? ;) 

 Somehow-- this building feels only 1/2 done to me. 

 I bought some faux antique keys.. so W decided to try to open some doors. :) 

 YUM!

 This guy was so awesome. 

I wonder how the HoCo HOA would feel if I made my roof look like this. I LOVE it.  

 Why are canals so charming? I love them. 

 Ah! This little French girl was so cute! Look how dainty!

If it weren't so socially/morally wrong, I would have just scooped her up and taken her home with me. 

Now, we move our visit to Kaysersberg. I love this city. Do you see that castle up there behind the house? 

 The never-ending fun of chasing pigeons! 

 Dinner time. My sweet girlfriend and I felt quite outnumbered at the table with our husbands and 5 sons (and no daughters) between us! The glasses at this restaurant were so cute! I should have taken a close up shot. I did find a place that sold them, but really.. I just don't need anything more to put in my house.

My boys were in *heaven* playing with their friends! 

 When the lights... go down... in the city... :) 

 :)

On the drive back to our hotel I made N pull over so I could snap a quick picture of the moon. It looked HUGE. I'm so glad I did because about 2 minutes later the clouds rolled in and hid it entirely.