Day 5- Monday was a stay at home day. Emma wasn't feeling great, there was lots of snow on the ground, and we were all quite content to just be home creating and relaxing.
We got a delivery and the kids pounced on the boxes. They created a dog mansion for Laney and made a movie about it!
Day 6- Tuesday was our next big outing. Originally I told all of the kids that they could plan a day trip adventure, but they almost all landed on the same fun idea- breakfast at Chick-fil-a and a day of running, jumping, and climbing and Urban Air.
Check and check!
Day 7- Wednesday was friend day! Karlee and Mason and Jack came over, along with Henry, a new friend from church. We weren't quite sure who he would most enjoy playing with, and it turned out he had fun with all of us! Emma and Henry made everyone pretzels, the boys had an epic laser tag war, and everyone enjoyed being outside on the zipline on this warmest day of the break.
Day 8- Thursday was shaped by Emma's trip to the doctor to figure out what was going on with her ears. We had about 45 minutes to kill before meeting Daddy for lunch, so we went to the 'dead mall'. Noah could not figure out why there were so few stores of interest in this mall, but it was perfect for walking around while it was raining/snowing outside.
Ha- we were way too excited about this little Easter display.
Then off to lunch we went! I had wanted to go to the Brazilian churrasco for my family birthday meal, and it was delicious! It didn't send us all shooting back to Brazil like I hoped it would, but the limonade and pao de queijo and rice and beans and steaks were all fantastic. And now we can say that we've been to an American Brazilian churrasco. Yum!
More snow. What a silly spring break.
We randomly decided to watch Back to the Future this night, and we all liked it enough that we watched the whole trilogy over the break. Our kids finally know what 1.21 gigawatts means! You could definitely say this spring break was a success. :)
Day 9- Friday was another exciting day- St. Patrick's Day! These funny kids happened to line up on the stairs before starting their search for Lucky Charms and Rolos.
They spent a good chunk of the day playing laser obstacle course and parkour.
Bingo!
We spotted tiny leprechaun footprints leading right out the sunroom door.
Of course, Laney wasn't quite sure what all the fuss was about but she was happy to try woofing at something!
Green? Check!
Toward the end of the week I was starting to feel the itch to just pack up and go somewhere- anywhere!- before spring break was over, but there really aren't that many options within a day's trip that we haven't explored before. Especially not many options that weren't even colder, snowier or busier than home! But I did discover a DSM treasure that we've never checked out before, and Friday was the day to do it- the Governor's Mansion- Terrace Hill.
It was super cold again this day, but we enjoyed taking a quick trip into another world at this beautiful house on the hill in Des Moines.
Places like this remind me of the incredible blessing that the temple is- most people never get to see such beautiful artwork, stained glass and chandeliers on a regular basis, but they are in every temple around the world!
After our tour we hit up Chick-fil-a again- with gift cards, freebies and rewards we ended up with 3 chicken sandwiches, 16 chicken nuggets and 6 oatmeal chocolate chip cookies for a total of 55 cents. I love a good deal like that!
Emma got to play with her friend Cora that afternoon while the rest of us relaxed at home and prepared dinner- corned beef and cabbage of course! And that night we watched part two of the Back to the Future trilogy- 2015 doesn't look quite like they thought it might.
Saturday- the girls and I went to a baby shower, Adam interviewed his grandparents, and we wrapped up the Back to the Future trilogy. It was a fantastically lazy day.
Sunday- another happy day at church, an epic couple of rounds of Spoons, and a whole lot of grumping about going to bed early and nerves about going back to school the next day. This spring break, like any break from the routine of our every day lives, has been a great one!
Thoughts on staying home- it wasn't horrible. ;) If anything, it was a great reminder that our happiness has much less to do with where we are and more to do with who we are lucky enough to spend our time with and how we choose to spend that time together. I read once that rather than constantly dreaming about and working toward our next vacation, we should work to craft a contented life that we aren't constantly trying to escape. That can be hard to do when we're 'stuck' in the middle of the country in the middle of a winter that has been going on fooooooorever, but I think that generally speaking, we have created a great life that we are all happy to be living together. And now we are going to be just that much more ready and excited and grateful for our next adventure!
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