His first published play

One of Ben's projects in fifth grade has been to write a play with WiseWrite, a group of people from the Repertory Theater in St Louis.  They teach kids how to write a play and then they pick plays to perform.  Ben's play was picked for the kids at school to perform and they had his play printed and bound for him.  I think he was more excited about that than his birthday!!!!

Well, so much for that thought.....

The Go! St. Louis event was today. I had planned to run a 5K with a couple of friends from the school and Sam was going to run at his own pace. The kids were running the last leg of their "Read, Right and Run" program which involves reading 26 books, doing 26 good deeds and running a marathon. They run the last 1.2 miles at the Go! St. Louis Day. The forecast for Saturday had been looking bad all week, but it was dry when we headed down to Forest Park. It was fortuitous that Maggie needed to go to the bathroom (as always) and we were in the Visitor's Center when the heavens opened and it started pouring.

First they delayed the 5K walk/run for 15 minutes and eventually cancelled all the events. We picked up our 5K medals and the kids will get theirs at school. Hopefully,we can do some kind of event for them at school. One of my friends was doing her first 5K, I felt really sorry for her.

Substitute teacher....

Maggie:  Mum, we had a substitute teacher today
Me:  Oh no.  I hope you behaved.
Maggie:  Oh yes, of course.  Oh, hang on.  No, not really
Me:  Maggie!!!
Maggie:  Well no-one was listening, it wasn't just me.  Mrs Foley wasn't happy.....
I guess it's OK if you just go with the crowd....

Easter Sunday

Ben was up before the Easter bunny on Sunday morning. I had to send him back to bed before he went hunting eggs. In that time, he'd managed to wake Maggie up. They are ready to to egg hunting-they look like they are in the Hunger Games!!!!

Spring has come so early this year that it was so easy to hide the eggs this year as the plants were so huge

Some where up high on the bird feeders and Maggie had to jump up to get them

As usual, they got an insane amount of candy, but I am glad to say that the majority did NOT come from me!!!!

I took Ben & Maggie to Old Navy to get new clothes for church on Sunday.  This is as good as Maggie is ever going to get.  She nearly had a stroke when I mentioned dresses, but I know when there's no point wasting money......

We got to church early and found out that the donuts were late!!!  They brought Ben & Maggie special donuts because they felt so bad that they didn't get one before the service.  Is there no limit to the people that spoil our children????  They did well in church and even helped take the Easter lilies to the altar at the beginning of the service and hand out balloons at the end

Waiting to release the balloons at the end of the service....

brilliant launch-they missed the trees completely this year

They got to do another egg hunt when we got to Jan & Julie's

After lunch, we played croquet.  Jan & Julie's hammock was a big hit-I really want one!!!!

At the end of the day, we had bags and bags of candy. Both Sam and I brought some into work to get rid of it, but we still have candy to feed the whole neighbourhood. Saddest of all-I sat eating Cadbury's mini eggs last night and Ben asked me to cut up an apple for him. Just who was the candy really for???!!!! Starting the Whole 30 paleo diet again tomorrow.......

Egg dyeing

We always go over to Arline's to dye eggs. This year, Alicia had blown out some eggs and filled them with bird seed, so the kids got to hunt for them and smash them against the wall or each other. Ben's favourite trick was to crack them on top of his head!!!

This year, we dyed 54 eggs in total.  They never get tired of trying different patterns

They came out as good as they usually do

These were the two dozen that we took home.  A lot of them have already been eaten

A little bit of England......

Another place I love to visit (and close to where I grew up) is Staunton Harold. It really just personifies England.....

Bradgate Park

Loughborough is very close to Bradgate Park, and it's one of my favourite places to visit. I actually went there twice on my last trip. I got some great pictures of the park and of the trees in there.