The Grubers: April 2018 - Easter and Spring Break

April began with Easter Weekend! On Saturday morning we did Easter baskets, a small egg hunt at our house, and then an egg hunt at Vivian Park with the Pynes. They kindly invited us again and we have loved it ever since. Then we headed back home to listen to General Conference for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. This was the first conference since President Russell M. Nelson became prophet. We were very excited to hear and learn more about him. In between sessions, Jason cleaned out the garage since he had been using it to make trim for work. In the late afternoon, Kim picked me up and the Arbon girls met at Aubergine for our women’s date since the men had priesthood that evening. We had dinner and then went to Harmons for some Italian gelato. During this time, Jason took the boys to McDonalds and then flew their new kites they had gotten from the Easter Bunny at Draper Park. When the girls returned and Bryan got home from work, the men ate pizza from Pier 49 and watched the Priesthood Session. The girls and little boys dyed Easter eggs with silk ties I got from DI. Wow, what a day!

a little pre-hunt hike at Vivian Park

painting while listening to Conference

And then it was Easter Sunday! We had stayed the night in Draper and so had a yummy breakfast with family. We watched conference, had an egg hunt, and read the Easter Story. Then we headed to Alpine (as is typical) to be with Grubers for the second session. We celebrated April’s birthday and went to the park to enjoy the great weather.

We had a really fun Spring Break. On Monday, we met up with the Gruber cousins, Grandma Gruber, and Karl at the Obstacle Warrior Kids place in Sandy. Everyone loved it! Then we all had lunch at Chick-fil-a. On Tuesday, the boys played with Kenyon and we took a hike on the Timpanogos Trail. On Wednesday, the boys did a donut run with Dad. We went to Home Depot for some weed killer, had lunch at Pizza Pie Cafe with the Markles, and then brought Roman home with us to play. Later we had a playdate at the Lindon Park with our PG friends. On Thursday, we did some shopping at Target and then played at another Lindon Park with our PG friends. My friend, Amy, surprised us by having her baby at 37 weeks. On Friday, George and Nancy took the boys to play while I went and visited Amy in the hospital with her new baby, Tess. She was in the NICU. She was so cute! While down in that area, I visited Aunt Erin and Grandma. I picked up the boys and we had dinner at Malawis that night. On Saturday, Charlie went to Kenyon’s birthday party at the Nickelcade and Jason took Colson fishing in the pouring rain. They had to hide out under an overpass, but Colson still had a great time. He is a true fisherman at heart. That night we ended the break off right with dinner at Texas Roadhouse.

looking at years past

This year we learned that Charlie has really bad spring allergies! It was horrible. Charlie came down the stairs one morning with terribly puffy, watery, and itchy eyes. He didn’t notice at first, but Jason and I did our best to hide our giggles. After breakfast when Charlie went up to get dressed and do his hair, he finally saw himself in the mirror and started crying! “Oh no...I don’t like how I look.” The poor guy. We opted to keep him home from school and he was grateful. Over the next couple of days he really improved, but the itchiness and watering would continue for the rest of the month. We gave him some drugs to help. Because of this incident, spring has become his least favorite season.

improvement the next day

The special tulips I ordered when I also gifted some to my Mom started blooming. They were really pretty. I also planted some perennials.

a look at the flowers and tulips before the new bulbs bloomed:

and a week later:

After a week or so, Tess finally came home from the hospital and Jason and I went to visit. We took baby gifts, Amy’s birthday gift, and some carrot cake.

The Pacadas invited us again to their family’s cabin. We were all very excited! We had dinner at Cubbys on our way. We kept with tradition and had a pancake breakfast and frozen pizza lunch. We spent Saturday morning and early afternoon lounging, taking a hike, and flying kites and an airplane.

We went to Riverton for Alex’s Sunday birthday dinner and to be there for his Priesthood Ordination since he turned 12! It was great!

I took the boys to see the flowers at the Provo Temple.

We finally signed the boys up for soccer, so for one Family Night, we went to the sports store to get their soccer gear.

the boys loved practicing in their new gear

I had a Girls Night with my mom, Kim, and Camry to celebrate Kim’s Graduation. We went and saw I Can Only Imagine and then got Blizzards at Dairy Queen.

Colson had his first soccer practice at the park. It was very cute and he was very excited.

We ordered and built the bunk beds for Charlie (and now Colson’s) room! We wanted to make this transition before the baby came. We needed Colson’s room for the nursery. The boys were SO excited! They stayed up talking and bouncing around until, finally, at 10:30 pm we came in and made Charlie sleep on the floor in Colson’s room. Little did we realize the huge battle we would be facing for the next several months with getting the boys to fall asleep in the same room.

a last look at Colson's bed before moving into Charlie's room

listening to the bunk bed rules

The Jordan River Temple was renovated so we attended the Open House with the Arbons. The spring flowers were gorgeous! We had waffles at their house afterwards.

We shared the edited version of Game of Thrones with Rich and Kamilla and they had been binge watching it and were true fans! They couldn’t get enough. They loved it! We had been re-watching the series in order to watch the Season 7 finale with them. We invited them over and they brought curry dinner. The kids had a blast playing. They watched Trolls up in the boys room on the laptop while we watched the finale. It worked great. The only shock was finding the boys with pen drawn all over them when it was all over.

Charlie had his first soccer practice. His coach was really nice. We signed up with Roman Markle. That made the new experience easier for Charlie.

We had Girls Days early this year! This was to help accommodate me being due at the beginning of June. This year was in Oxnard, California. I will post about that next. But here are some pictures of home while I was gone:

some of the goodies I left by Uncle Alan's air hockey gift

a new pillow for Jason

Ward Party:

Kim's Graduation:

Kyle would be graduating soon in December.

Beyond Kim's Graduation, soccer games, and a ward party, Jason put up new industrial shelves in the garage and had it looking amazing! He also brought the boys to YM kickball.

Our friends, the Coburns, had moved away and they came to visit. We were happy to see them and the boys were stocked to see their friend, Phoenix, again. We had dinner at Asa Ramen with them and the Lovells. Then we came back to our place for dessert and to play Codenames and Bang. The kids just had a good time running a muck.

Here are more pictures from the month: