MBA Graduation - Day 2

Jared's Mom flew in for convocation. We all loved having her here...especially the kids. There were tears when she left the next day. Thank you so much for coming Mom. It meant a lot! (Jared's Dad and my parents were all home sick. It is supposed to be spring!?! Go away germs.)
We had lunch together after they got back from the airport. BYU Pot Pie was the main course.

The cheering section

Jared, just moments after he crossed the stage! Isn't he handsome?!? I'm proud of you babe. (Picture courtesy of Sean. Thanks for fighting those crowds!!)

Three hours is a bit long for a 4 year old...

Thank heavens for Granny.

Nathan passed the time by rolling all over the "clean" floor as he pretended something. :) Thank goodness kids learn to entertain themselves.

"That's MY Dad. Isn't he great?"

Nathan holding the goods.

Jared and his wonderful mother.

Brothers! Aren't they great?

His master robes. Pretty cool. 65 bucks cool.

Dinner afterwards. Lisa was able to join us. Yay!

The graduate cutting the ca..oh, I mean flan.

Sean and Lisa had us over for an incredibly delicious breakfast of crepes. Gourmet. Yum.

Uncle Sean knows how to keep kids happy! This is reminiscent of the Hinton family reunions. Oh how those Otter Pops were the best tasting things on earth after an afternoon of playing hard with cousins.

Now we are off on our cruise, then to Wisconsin to choose a house, then we're packing and gone. Crazy. It went by so fast. It was such a wonderful experience. BYU is an incredible school and the memories and friends we made here will always be treasured.

MBA Graduation Day 1

Is this the MBA graduate?...Noooo. Maybe someday.

How about this one?....Noooo. Maybe someday.

Is this the MBA graduate? Yes! Congratulations Jared!! Emily, myself, and Jamie...a couple of friends from the spouse's association enjoyed each other's company during commencement.

Jared's home away from home for the last 2 years in the background.

We decided to celebrate graduation as a family by hiking the Y tonight. We hoped when we reached the top it would be lit for graduation. Alas, there were no lights, but it was still a fun adventure.

And they're off...

Happy Hiker...at least until it got past bedtime. :)

The Boys

The Girls

We're halfway there!

We made it to the Y!!!! Amazingly enough.

This was the view almost all the way back down. Nathan on Dad's back (N hiked the whole way up...with just a couple carrying rests) and Brielle in Dad's front. Can we say Dad is amazing?!?

The Epitomy of Scary

This morning Dad has turned into a tickle monster. The kids have learned to "scare back" when Dad scares them. Today Nathan added a powerful weapon to the already existing aresnal of "grrr," "hiya," and "roar"...scare away the monster by growling "Jack o' Lantern!!" in his face. Nothing could be scarier. Right?

Another delightful glimpse into the way my children view the world.

Mackrory Valentine Ball

Three years ago Jared surprised us by sponsoring The First Annual Mackrory Family Valentines Ball. It was a blast and has become a tradition. Here are pictures of this year's fun (I wasn't feeling up to blogging back then...so this is make-up blogging. :) )

Some other Valentine fun:

Long Time No See

On Saturday I got to see 9 of my cousins...most of whom I haven't seen for a VERY long time. It was so fun to get caught up. 4 of us are expecting. Thanks Tisha for inviting all of us to your baby shower so we could celebrate the birth of your baby boy AND have a mini family reunion!

Melanie, Sharla, Tisha, Lisa, Me, and Sarah (We were sad we didn't get a picture before Noel, Stacey and Tara left)

A bit of fun...

Some snatches of fun from the last couple of weeks: COSMO! Can you tell what the kids' favorite part of the BYU games are?
15 days left until Jared has an MBA degree. No more homework for LIFE! (Maybe)

We interrupted his writing of his FINAL PAPER to celebrate!

Help blowing out the candles

Brielle's friend, Addie, is having her birthday party tomorrow morning. She asked to help wrap the gift she chose tonight. She designed it. She chose pink paper, "cuz she is a girl". Then wanted to put these ribbons and paper flowers on as shown (the only thing I did was help her decide how to put the green one on...and got the tape ready for her). She has quite the designer's eye for a 4 year old doesn't she?

Our friends, the Larsens invited us over tonight to make smores in their back yard. It was the PERFECT activity for a beautiful spring evening! Thanks Jennie, Shane, Cayden, Christian, and Evan!

Now THAT'S a yummy treat!

Dad and Bre

Snitching chocolate. We set the graham crackers and chocolate next to the fire to help it melt. The kids saw that as the perfect snitching opportunity. :)

Brielle with her good "boy friend" (what she calls a friend that isn't a girl), Fire Fighter Cayden (the Cayden with the Firefighter birthday party).

The joys of Easter...

I admit. I LOVE Easter.
I love the feeling of spring.
I love the spirit of new birth.
I love spending time with family.
I love coloring the eggs.
I love Easter egg hunts. I love Easter picnics.
I love having the Easter bunny come.
And I love seeing that joy and excitement on the face of my children.

As an illustration of this, when Brielle was one I knew she was too young to really get into Easter, but I didn't want to wait another year to really celebrate it. So, we practiced. That's right. We practiced Easter morning. Each day I hid an egg or two filled with candy somewhere in the house where she would find them. She learned pretty quickly that there was something yummy in those eggs and we were rewarded by her pure joy and excitement on Easter morning when she found a whole basket of them.

This Easter we were lucky enough to celebrate with my parents and my aunt, uncle and cousin (and his friend) down in St. George. It was WONDERFUL! Not only to get away from the snow that covered the ground here and enjoy the full bloom of spring there, but to spend time with those we love. Grandma Kay and Grandpa Ken know how to host an awesome Easter picnic. We had a fabulous time.

Brielle's favorite part of the trip were "the boys." My cousin Taylor and his friend Reed are seniors in high school, but they made Brielle feel like they were her best friends. She loved playing Wii, talking, doing puzzles, going to the park etc. with them. In fact, when she was throwing a bit of a tantrum one day Jared said, "if you keep acting like this you can't play with the boys." She silenced immediately. Thanks guys for making her weekend so fun.

We were lucky enough to capture some of the Easter joy and excitement:

Nathan, enjoying his candy from the Easter bunny after a fun-filled weekend. (For some reason this picture wouldn't upload to my slide show, but it was too good to be left out!)