Happy Easter

We had a nice Easter Sunday at the Dutton home. The kids woke up early to collect their Easter eggs and to see what the bunny brought in the middle of the night. The biggest hit was a bubble maker for Nathan -- see the pic below. And, as is tradition in many homes, we dressed our like all alike, paraded them to church, and rushed them home before they could get snot on their clothes and ruin a family picture.

We hosted Easter dinner at our home this year and had over 20 people attend. Kim and Chris came bearing presents for the kids -- Kim created a cool display for Jacob and Anna with some butterflies from her collection (the butterfly is pinned in a shadowbox). Jacob totally digs it, and it being Easter and all he was trying to draw the connection between the bug, the holiday and what he had learned in church that day. Then he asked Kim, "was the butterfly crucified?" It was a great question -- the bug was dead, and he did have pins in him. After we stopped rolling we had a good talk with Jacob. :-)

Yeehaw! Our trip to Nashville

We went to Nashville last weekend to visit Jayme, Blake and family. It's a great town -- we took a tour of Vanderbilt (where Blake is a medical student), went Honky Tonkin', visited the site of the bloodiest battle of the Civil War, toured an old southern plantation whose owner was the inspiration for the Scarlett O'Hara character in Gone with the Wind, jammed out to some country music at the Grand Ole Opry, and walked the grounds of The Hermitage (home of Andrew Jackson)....all in three days!

There were three highlights of the trip. The first was spending time with family (gotta say that one, but it's true). The second was going Honky Tonkin' -- which basically means going from club to club to see different country bands playing in the heart of Nashville. It ended up snowing that night a few inches which caused some crazziness -- schools closed, firemen stopped their truck in the middle of the tourist center to they could take pictures of the snow, and revelers started doing snow angels in the street. The third was going out to dinner with Jen at the Opryland Hotel and then seeing the Grand Ole Opry. We are not huge country music fans, but the music was great and it was nice being somewhere new without the kids so we can plan out the rest of their lives without interruption. :-)

We left Jacob and Anna with Grandma and took Nathan with us (thanks g-ma). On the final day we took Nathan to an aquarium to see some "feeeeshhhhhies." They had a stingray petting zoo -seriously, and it was cool. The stingrays come and eat shrimp right out of your hand. Nathan liked watching them from a distance but wanted nothing to do with touching them.

So, a very fun trip. Thanks to Jayme and Blake for hosting us.

Aladdin Play

Anna and Jacob "starred" in the Aladdin Musical at their school this week (well -- they performed the opening act). They did a great job. Anna loves an audience, and Jacob warmed up to the idea after a while.

Nathan was ready to party. See the picture below -- we'll certainly use this photo to embarrass him when he gets older. :-)