Aunt Kylie Comes to Visit

We have been long anticipating a visit from our favorite Aunt Kylie.  She finally planned a trip out here over her spring break, and we got to do so much fun stuff with her. She flew in on Tuesday evening and immediately showered the kids with gifts.  A play cell phone that has a programed message from her (which Camden confiscated for himself), a sports matching game (the kids love finding matches to their favorite athletic things- Carter always chooses hockey, Liv ice skating, Camden race cars), and some silly putty that could be decorated like an ice cream cone or easter bunny.  The silly putty had a warning to keep it away from fabric and carpet.  Sadly, it was short lived in our house because with Carter's help it found itself unremoveably attached to Liv's bedding and pillow and the shoe bins and the carpet.

I gave up trying to teach him limits and just threw the stuff away.  But it was fun for a while.

Wednesday morning (and every morning there after) Aunt Kylie experienced the Marshall children alarm clock which can be very alarming indeed when you are dead asleep and the lights get flicked on followed by three excited kids jumping on your bed and physically prying your eyelids opened with their fingers.  That day we kinda just hung low at the house.  The kids received an Easter package from my Dad which had bubbles and Aunt Kylie took them all outside to play in the bubbles for a while.

That night all the girls went out for a girls' sushi night.  We had a good time.


 
Then, we hit the craft store to buy some supplies for family birthday gifts.  Every evening Liv requested Aunt Kylie to snuggle with her before she went to bed.  But, I have evidence to show that they mostly just took selfies.



Thursday was jam packed with fun.  We got up in the am and had a pajama dance party with the kids.  Aunt Kylie and I introduced them to our favorites Ace of Base and No Doubt.  Since then, Liv occasionally busts out singing "I Saw the Sign" which brings me extreme delight.  Then all of the sudden I realized it was almost Easter and we needed to dye Easter Eggs, so I found some left over dye and we did that next.

Then, we got out my fancy butterfly tea set and had a tea party complete with tea sandwiches (cucumber and egg salad-using the newly dyed hard boiled eggs).

Then, a quick rest time and we were off to the Orem rec pool.  The kids loved the pool and Aunt Kylie for making it possible.  It was definitely exhausting constantly rotating taking kids down the slide with us.  Then, we showered and dressed everyone which is an adventure all of its own.  And then we were off to 180 Street Tacos to meet Derek for dinner.  The kids were of course exhausted and terrible.   That night Ky and I made Grandma Nyquist's traditional Easter Mint Surprise Cookies.  They were so good!

Friday morning Kylie and I made birthday magnets with all the kids and grandkids faces in them to send to family members for their birthday while Liv was at school.  Then, I went to work, the boys to Carolyn's, and Kylie dropped off Liv at a birthday party then took London on a quick hike until it was time to pick her up again.  

Then, Saturday morning Kylie came and watched the kids run around the church for our ward Easter Egg Hunt (Ky helped me stuff 400 eggs with candy for the event which was incredibly irritating because I bought cheap eggs from Walmart which were almost impossible to close).


Someone brought their pet pig which the kids thought was cool.

Then, Ky and I mailed our surprise B-day magnets and headed to the airport to send her home.  It was sad to say goodbye, and the kids keep saying they miss her.  Hopefully, we get to see her again soon!

St. Patrick's Day

London got groomed right before St. Patty's this year, so she sported some green with all the rest of us.
We had my traditional crock pot corned beef and cabbage with Steve and Diane the day before St. Patty's.  On St. Patricks Day all the kids wore green and for lunch I made green zucchini soup with a side of green grapes and green honeydew melon.  Kids loved it.

All day long Liv kept asking when the leprechauns were going to come and hide the gold coins.  When did this leprechaun thing become a thing?  There was no such thing when I was a kids.  We wore green and that was it.  Now leprechauns are supposed to come and play tricks and leave gold coins around and treats?  I was determined not to buy into it, all the kids at school, and daycare and the neighborhood were talking about it and Liv was just certain the leprechauns would come.  I started to feel guilty like I was the St. Patty's day Scrooge.  I mean this is the kind of stuff that makes holidays so fun, so I picked up some cupcakes on the way home from work and dropped them off on the counter at home before I picked up the kids with a note saying the leprechauns were sorry they ran out of gold coins and hoped the kids would accept these cupcakes instead.
 Liv and the kids were in heaven.  It was so magical and brought so much joy.   And Liv said, "See Mom I told you the Leprechauns would come."  She never doubted.

 I guess next year I will have to be more on the ball with the leprechaun stuff.

Ode to Thia

The Thorsted's cute puppy Thia passed away recently.  It was a sad thing for me and all the kids.  We loved that pup.  When she was just a little pup we would go over to Annie's house multiple times a week during the day to let Thia outside to go potty and play with her.  Annie and I were just starting to enjoy two dog runs again since Oley's passing.  Thia loved me and would still pee almost every time she saw me from excitement.  Recently, the Thorsteds went down to Zions for a family camping trip.  They left Thia with us over the weekends, and I'm so glad to have had that time with her because it was the last weekend of Thia's short life.  The two dogs played together all weekend.  The kids loved having the extra dog around.  I took both dogs on my Saturday run and Thia got her own poop bag bow.  She was pretty tired out when the Thorsteds came to pick her up Sunday night.  Then, when she woke up on Sunday morning, she couldn't walk.  Literally her legs could not hold her up.  I felt horrible wondering if something had happened to her while she was at our house over the weekend.  After multiple vet visits and finally a visit to an urgent care in Salt Lake with doggie neurological specialsts Thia was diagnosed with Polyradiculoneuritis which is so weird because one night when I was up not sleeping and just praying all night for poor little Thia I was surfing the web and came across something like Guillain-Barre Syndrome in humans called polyradiculoneuritits and sent the link to Tyler and Annie.  When they told me I nailed the diagnosis I was thrilled by my veternary diagnostic skills, but also worried because while some dogs can beat polyradiculoneuritis and have full recovery over a few months, other dogs die from respiratory failure.  Sadly for Thia and us that was the case.  The day before she died, Annie wheeled Thia over to our house in her wagon.  She looked so happy and all of us got to give her goodbye pets and even London came out and nudged her nose.  I'm glad we had that last opportunity to see her outside and so happy before she was gone.  The kids still talk about Thia and sometimes I have to remind them that she's no longer with us.  I guess I decided to write this post just so we wont forget how much we all loved cute little Thia.

Mrs. Cavanaugh's Chocolate Factory

Lydia (Lily's daughter) invited us to join her and her grandma Georgia on a tour of Mrs. Cavanaugh's Chocolate Factory.  I guess it was her one birthday wish to go on a tour of a candy factory and Lily made it come true.  The adults all loved the tour.  They had windows so you could watch everyone hand making the chocolates.  It is family owned and pretty much only family work there.  Except around Christmas when they said they often allow members of their local ward to come help during the busy holiday season.  The kids somewhat enjoyed the tour, but mostly enjoyed the chocolate samples and this little toy train set up they had.


 We bought them all ice cream cones afterwards.

 I found all there little chocolate quotes on the wall of the factory hilarious, and went home happy with a bag of hand picked chocolates.