spring break - museum day

we actually slept in this morning! (well, i got up at 5 with a hungry manning but he went back to sleep and so did I.) mason and maddux didn't come get me until 7:30! it has been a very, very long time since i have gotten to sleep until 7am, let alone past it. that was a nice way to start the day.

i was planning on making our oat bran, chocolate chip pancakes but madelyn wanted 'plain' pancakes (aka box mix) but we don't have an mix so i got on allrecipes.com (well, the app actually) to see what i could find. and i found something delicious! we had quick oatmeal pancakes which i highly recommend. i doubled the recipe (to make sure we had enough), substituted almond milk for the milk and applesauce for the butter, added double the required cinnamon (as recommended in a review) and will try some flour substitutions and throw in some extras (like milled flax seeds) next time to up the nutrition factor just because i like to make breakfast 'hearty'. the kids were asking to have them again before we even finished breakfast.

now that we were all fed and dressed, we were off to the museum for the morning. it has been a while since madelyn has been so she was most excited. before we left home, i had gathered up enough quarters and pennies for each of them to get a 'pressed penny' suvienior on our way out to make this visit more special since they are on spring break (a fact that i stressed so that i don't get begged on every future trip for money to make a penny).

clipboards in hand - ready for fun

the museum wasn't very crowded when we arrived, but it did fill up quick! it got really crowded in the new 'science center' so i was happy that we started there (it was maddux' wisdom to insist we went there first because we don't normally). there were even two very large groups that we kept having to skip around.

they were on to the next thing before i could get a picture

they were on to the next thing before i could get a picture

mason holding very still so i could get his picture without a flash - i finally took this one with my flash anyway because they were all very blurry

manning just hangs out. he was pretty cranky on this trip and i had to carry him a while to help him calm down so that he could nap

i had to get a side view so that i could capture how truly crazy his bed head was this morning

maddux' favorite part of the exhibit

they couldn't bare to look away for even a moment, but were willing to smile for a picture

because we had eaten a later breakfast, we were able to stay past noon. it was a pretty great outing. once we were home it was lunch and nap for manning. the bigs and i tried to play outside but it was just too cold and windy; there wasn't much snow left either so we went in and watch a couple of easter movies.

the kids and i are just loving spring break! it is getting me really excited for summer! i just love these kids. love.