Birthday Happy

The day after Riley's birthday, Sunday, we hosted a birthday party for her with our immediate family as guests. We haven't been able to do that for any of the kids birthdays until we lived locally and it was actually quite nice. Funny when we got home from church we realized that these four were all dressed alike--unplanned...and three more of us had white t-shirts and jeans on. Weird!

Riley was so excited when her cousin arrived.

Showing off her Pin the Ring on Minnie game...Minnie just HAD to be the theme for this girl!

Opening presents

The youngest party guest

Enjoying her new Fairy mini sleeper sofa

Playing games

The kids helping spin Daddy

Make your own pizzas were a fun menu idea

Time to eat

Birthday Happy Sweet Girl!! Enjoy your year of all things being 2 will bring!

Goldy's Run

On the morning of Riley's birthday, Adam and my 2 sisters ran a 10-mile race called Goldy's Run. It was a beautiful course through the University of Minnesota campus and along the Minneapolis River Walk, ending with a jaunt down the tunnel of TCF Bank Stadium where they could watch themselves cross the finish line on the jumbo tron--the third-largest scoreboard screen in college football. It was pretty inspiring to watch them when we found them mid-race to cheer them on and proudly cheered them across the finish line as well. Hopefully if the stress fracture in my knee ever heals, I can join them  for the next one.

Here is Laura, coming to give us high fives when we found her mid-race.

Adam and Leah were just a little ways behind her hanging together since this was Leah's first long race. We almost missed them the first time around, and the kids were extremely disappointed so we quick drove a mile ahead and caught up to them again. After not seeing them the first time, Conor was especially excited to cheer them on and give them high fives when we found them again. Check out the sheer joy on his face!

Running along with them for a few steps...I just think this is a cool picture of them all reaching out to each other.

Next we went to the finish line on the field, where we met up with Carmen, Andy and Andy's mom to watch the racers finish. The kids found ways to entertain themselves while we waited....and then

Here comes Laura!!!!!!!

See her finish on the big screen

And here come Adam and Leah!!!!

See their finish

The Benedict Family

Way to go you three. We are so proud of you!!!

Your biggest little fans

Conor ran a kids race too...Halfway around the outside of the stadium, then down the chute and onto the field as well, crossing the 50-yard-line and watching his own finish on the big screen too.

We had moved to the other side of the finish line and Conor was looking all over for us, once he found us he kept waving the rest of the way to the finish line....he looked like a famous person waving to his fans!! too cute.

He was super excited about the blue powerade drink at the end of the race.

Our Little Riley Claire

Happy Birthday Riley!! Our sweet daughter turned 2 on April 14 and truly enjoyed her day and certainly knew it was all about her. When we asked her what made it a special day, she kept saying "Birthday Happy" really loud and was proud to announce and hold up 2 fingers stating her new age!

Riley is really coming into a personality all her own. She is much more outgoing and boisterous than Conor, who is a little more shy and reserved (at least at first). She is so friendly and welcoming, and loves to talk and sing and dance. She knows many songs by heart and isn't afraid to belt them out as if in concert. She will certainly keep us on our toes. She knows what she wants and often tries to do whatever she can to get it. She loves to hear stories and identify pictures in books. She likes to narrate her day and point out new things she sees. She loves to have clean organized spaces around her...she immediately wipes up spilled milk or food, throws wrappers and kleenexes in the garbage without being told, points out crumbs on the floor or stains on her clothes. She is very good at picking up her toys and games after being told only once. She can eat like a champ when she wants to---often shoving 3 or 4 bites worth of food into one mouthful if she's hungry enough. She is a great balance of girly and tomboy--she likes shoes, sunglasses, purses and baby dolls, but also enjoys jumping jacks, kicking and throwing balls, doesn't mind playing with action figures, and holds her own when wrestling with Daddy and her big brother.

Some shots of her in the last few months.....

Here is one of her first days in two big girl pigtails.
Riding the wooden rocking horse she enjoys so much.
She has been getting very picky about what she wears lately...or at least wants to get dressed in her own way and in her own time frame. This day, she saw Conor's underwear on the floor and wanted to wear them too...so she did!

Riley is well known around here for wanted her toes to be clean...no sock fuzz between the toes of this little girl ever stays there for very long. Can we say OCD?

Birthday Girl

Last night of sleep as a one year old.

Good morning birthday girl!! Riley requested a donut for her 2-year-old birthday breakfast!

Family Easter in Owatonna

After church, we headed to Owatonna to celebrate Easter with my dad's extended family. Can't remember the last time we were able to do that. It was always hard to make the trip to MN without any extra time off from work and school surrounding Easter weekend. It was nice to see our relatives and spend some time with Great Grandpa. Not everyone could make it, but we still had a good turnout of about 40 people or so. The event was at a country church that has hosted weddings, funerals, anniversary parties and other gatherings for our large family in the past. 

The kids decorated bags and used them to collect treat on an Easter egg hunt outside on the playground. Riley sits like quite the little lady, don't you think?

The kids enjoyed their time on the playground. In fact, Riley quite the egg hunt early because she just wanted to play on the slides!

And the adults had fun watching!

Easter morning

On Easter morning, I tried to get up early and get ready before the kids woke up, but Conor woke up bright and early while I was in the shower. He normally comes into my room to snuggle for a little while, or sits and chats with me in the bathroom, or goes back into his room after he pees in the morning, but this morning was different. He didn't come find me or go pee first thing. Instead, he ran straight upstairs and came bursting into the bathroom yelling, "Mom,  Mom, I found your egg on the stairs" (the one we had written "Mom" on while dying the eggs). I told him to go wake up Daddy and wait for the rest of us before finding any more eggs and he said ok, then came back a minute later and said, "Mom, Mom, I found 2 more eggs" and described exactly where he had seen them. I asked if he woke up Daddy and he said, "Yeah, he said he was getting up" but when I went into our room, I'm not sure how hard Conor had really tried to wake Adam. So I grabbed some clothes and we went upstairs to wake Riley...who wasn't quite ready to be awoken yet, I don't think. Once we reminded her about hidden eggs and baskets and candy, she woke up but was a little slower start than Conor. Once we got everyone awake, we headed downstairs to start the hunt. The kids had great fun finding the eggs, especially Conor. In fact, he had so much fun he decided to hide one himself...and didn't tell us until just yesterday--2 weeks later!! He opened the hutch cabinet and said, "Hey you guys never found the egg I hid in here" and proceeded to pull out one of the dark blue dyed eggs. That's right, of course it couldn't have been one of the plastic eggs. Smelled ok, looked ok, but not sure how much longer it would have stayed that way. Anybody know how long before a hard boiled egg starts to rot?

All dressed up for church showing off our full Easter baskets

Family Photo

Easter Fun

We spent the day before Easter dying eggs for the Easter Bunny to hide and decorating Easter cookies that Riley's godparents sent to us. What fun the kids had!!