Cousin fun!

One of my most favorite things about having children and being a mom these past almost 2 years has been sharing that experience with my sister, Emily.  Emily has 2 little ones, a lovely little girl, Claire who is 10 months older than Lainey and a sweet new baby boy, Will, who is 3 months younger than Wyatt.  I think it's so funny how we both have an older girl and a younger boy - it is just too fun.  We both have great memories from growing up that involve spending time with our cousins and we hope our kids will have the same - that they'll enjoy playing together and growing up together and making fun memories together.

Emily sacrificially and bravely made a cross country trip ALONE with her babes so that I/we could all meet Will and enjoy a visit together.  Traveling with kids is no small task.  Jimminy, I sometimes struggle to travel to the library with my kids, but Emily had to take 2 flights each way and did it with relative ease.  I am SO SO SO thankful she did.  We had a great visit.  I was even able to go to Minnesota with the kids to my parents for a few days to spend some quality time with Em and the kids.

Baby Will is so so so cute.  He is just a peanut.  Wyatt could eat him.

Claire and Lainey picked up right off where they left off the last time we saw each other in August.  Claire and Will (as well as Em and Bud) are daily conversation topics in our house, so I knew they'd warm up easily.  First thing we did was walk to the park by my parents house!

The boys weren't impressed.

Lainey pretty much did everything Claire did, just a few steps behind.

Except for when it came to the iPad ... Lainey was showing Claire the ropes.

We enjoyed a trip to the Como Zoo one day too.  Not many of the animals were out but the girls still had a good time and did a TON of walking!

Crazy how much this crew grows and changes every few months!  Can you believe we got them all to sit still? :)

We spent 4 days in Minnesota, had one day back in Des Moines to ourselves and then my parents, Em and the kids came down to Iowa to visit our family here!  More time together!  Yeah!

This Papa is pretty proud to have 2 extra handsome grandsons!

We were able to spend some time Saturday in Pella, one of my favorite places on earth, to see the tulips!

Claire... she is just the cutest.

Claire running and Lainey trying to keep up :)  Not only is Claire fast, and 10 months older, but Lainey insisted on wearing her rain boots, per her usual, which definitely slow her down :)

Just the CUTEST...!  Lainey loves holding Wy like this, for about 15 seconds, and then he gets a good shove.

Here's Miss Claire showing off her flower from church on Sunday!

We had a fabulous visit with the Thomas clan and wish Bud could have joined us for the crazy fun.  We are already looking forward to July when we hope to make a trip out to North Carolina again!