Happy Easter

Well this past weekend was Easter. Now in order to get ready for Easter, my mom and dad have been here the weekend and the Saturday before Easter. My mom cleaned the whole house and got everything set up for me. My dad was here the whole week trying to put up a new swing/play set that we bought the kids. We wanted to have it put together before Easter. The beginning of the week was rainy and then the weather was nice enough to put it all together. It was not an easy task. The pieces needed to be drilled and it was more time consuming than we had thought it was going to be. But good ol' papa had it done in time. I don't think that a day has gone by since that Elizabeth has not used the play set, so it was well worth it. It was also used a

lot on Easter.

The kids had a great time decorating eggs on Saturday afternoon with Nana and Papa. On Easter morning they were all awake at 5:15am. Now on Christmas we had to wake them up, but for the Easter Bunny we wake up very early. They all had to search for their baskets and then they had to find all the eggs that had been decorated the day before that the Easter Bunny hides on them. At church, Elizabeth slept the whole time. I think that she was a little tired from the morning. We then had my mom and dad, my Nana, Aunt Linda, Cousin Audra, her husband Steve, and their two children Hannah and Nate here for Easter dinner. The kids had a great time playing together and on their 116 Easter egg hunt outside. I still think that we are missing a few of the eggs. Hannah and Eric were lucky enough to find a few more eggs after all the other kids came inside because they were outside climbing trees. Todd was the one to hide eggs up in the trees. It was a very nice day.

Time to Bake Some Cakes

While Ashley was here helping out, the kids had a cake walk at there school. What this means is that we had to bake and decorate 5 cakes!!! Each of the kids decided on a different cake that they wanted to make. Ashley and I then went and got everything that we needed. Ashley really wanted the kids to make a Beehive cake. When no wanted to make it, we decided that we would make it ourselves. When Todd saw how great it came out he told us to enter it into the cake contest as an entry for the 18 and over age category. As for the kids, Elizabeth made a Butterfly cake, Alex made a doggy cake, Eric made a Guitar cake, and Tyler made a wrapped present cake. On Thursday we baked all the cakes and then did all the decorating on Friday. It was messy and a lot of fun. The kids had a great time. It was fun to decorate them, but we also had a great time that Saturday trying to win a cake. Well thank goodness that lucky Papa was there. We ended up leaving with 3 cakes. Ashley even won best cake for the 18 and over age category. We will be bringing some steak tips on vacation with us for her. She won a gift certificate to a meat market in New Hampshire while she is in Wisconsin. Her favorite food is steak, so we decided that we would pick some up and bring them with us when we see her again in May. Here are the pictures that we have from all the cake baking and the final products!!!

I'm Home

Well I am home from the hospital. I came home on Saturday afternoon. The surgery went well and I am feeling well. They had to take a little more than we had originally thought, but all is well. I am now at home resting and taking it easy. Ashley is here and helping out a lot. Thank you to everyone for your well wishes and thoughts during the last week. It was greatly appreciated. I will be sure to fill you all in a little more later on.

We are Finally Getting Better

Well the month of February was a sick one for the Bernhardt Family. I feel that I have had a sick child home with me almost every day. I guess when you have four kids that is what happens. The germs just seem to keep getting passed around. Todd started it all by getting strep for his birthday and then it all went downhill from there.

Well we were all well for vacation week two weeks ago, and then Eric had the stomach bug last week and then Todd had it over the weekend. So I guess Todd started it and ended it. Everyone was back at school today and everyone seems to be healthy. Can I just say that I am sick of the snow as well. We had beautiful weather all weekend. The kids were riding their bikes and we took long walks. Then we woke up this morning to it snowing!!!! I was not a happy camper. I will be very happy when spring finally arrives.

Well I am hoping that March is a little better for us. My niece Ashley is going to be coming to stay with us for a week at the end of March. She will be here to help with the kids while I am recovering from surgery. Yes, I finally have to have surgery for my Crohn's. I will be going in on the 19th and they will be removing about 9inches of infected intestinal tract. I should be in the hospital for a few days and then have to have help at home for a week. I will let you all know how it goes when I am back home. I am sure that I will have the time to write on the blog since I will just be taking it easy for a week.

THINK SPRING!!!!!!!!

She's Getting So Big!

Well Elizabeth has reached a new milestone!!! She now has earrings!!!!

We had gone to the Mall right before Valentine's Day and she had mentioned that she wanted to get her ears pierced when we were there. We did not end up doing it that night and I thought that she would forget about it. Well I was wrong. She has been asking about it ever since. Yesterday morning when I was watching our neighbors daughter, Elizabeth noticed that she had earrings. She then asked if she could get earrings too. I told her yes, some day. She replied with "Can we do it this day, please." How could I say no. I had told her that it would hurt. It was going to pinch her ears, but she still wanted to do it.

So last night off to the mall we go again. Nana met us there to help in case we needed it. I was fully prepared to accept that we might have to leave with only one ear done. There was a teenage girl getting hers done right before us and we watched quietly to see what happens. I asked Elizabeth one more time if she really wanted to do this. She shook her head yes. We went to the counter so she could pick out which earrings she wanted. She decided on her birthstone ones.

So now it was our time. I picked her up and placed her on the tall stool. She looked so tiny sitting up there like a big girl. The woman made the marker marks on her ear lobes and asked if they were where we wanted them to be. They looked good so now it was time to pierce the ears. She tells Elizabeth that she will count to three and then she will feel the pinch. They would do one ear and then the other.

1,2,3, pinch...I waited to hear the scream, but it was quiet. Elizabeth looked for one second that she might cry, but she didn't. She was so brave and did an awesome job. After the second ear I picked her up and gave her a giant hug. We asked her if it hurt, and she said "NO" She got her lollipop and off we went to go ride a few rides.

The Time Has Flown By.....

Well here I am again, telling myself that I will be better at keeping up with the blog. I have really let it go this time. I cannot believe that I have not posted anything since August. My goal from here on out is to update it at least once a week.

I will try to update you all a little now on what has been going on with us. The kids are all in school again, though we are on school vacation this week. Tyler and Eric are in second grade and Alex is in first grade. They seem to be enjoying the year. Tyler is playing indoor soccer right now and really likes it. He will be continuing to play travel soccer this spring that he started in the fall. Eric is also going to be playing soccer this spring with Tyler. He decided not to play indoor soccer and decided to start guitar lessons, which he loves more than anything else. All three boys just finished basketball. It was the one year that all three were able to be on the same team together. Alex really liked having his older brothers there to help him and cheer him on. Elizabeth is taking ballet and tap lessons. She goes once a week with her friend Emma. It is really cute watching a room full of 3 and 4 year olds dancing and learning routines. I still cannot believe that Elizabeth is going to be 4 years old in two months. She still looks to little to me to be 4. Elizabeth is going to be playing soccer in the fall as well. She has been looking forward to this since last summer.

Todd is very busy with work as it is that time of year again. He has officially had his first case of strep throat for this season. I am just wondering how many more times is he going to get it again before May. I as well have just finished getting over being sick. Having a fever for four days is no fun. All the kids were not feeling well either. Three out of the four are on antibiotics. The doctors office actually laughed when I called on Saturday to get them an appointment and said that all four needed to be seen. Hopefully we are all on the mends and are going to be felling so much better when school starts back up next week.

I have been very busy this year. I took on being the PTA president this year at the kids school. It has definitely been a learning experience and has been a lot of fun and hard work. It has kept me on my toes. There are days when I tell Elizabeth that we have to stop by the school and she says "Oh No, not there again!" She has made very good friends with the two women that work in the front office. Whenever we enter the school she walks right into their office and hops up in their chairs and sits at their desks. I think she thinks of that space as her second home at times.

Well, it is time to go and start dinner. I will try to do my best to keep this posted once a week!!!!

Disney World

We had a wonderful time in Disney. Sorry that it has taken me so long to update the blog again. The pictures from our trip were on Todd's computer and I wanted to be able to post pictures when I wrote.

Well Florida was definitely hot when we went and I have to say that Elizabeth does not like the heat. She has been this way since she was a baby. Her favorite time was when it rained. She would be hot and cranky, it would rain, and she would be laughing and smiling. It was so funny to watch her mood change with the weather. Needless to say she was not a big fan of going on rides. Her favorite was A Small World. She loved the dolls and her eyes lit up as we went from room to room. The other part that she loved about the trip was the characters. We did a lot of character meals since we had five children ages 7 and under. She would get so excited when they would come into the room and over to our table. She even was able to hold Mickey's hand for one of the parades around the restaurant. She has fallen in love with Minnie Mouse. She did not even know who Minnie was before we left and now she wants to go back just to see Minnie.

Tyler and Eric had a blast trying some of the bigger rides while we were there. They were able to go on them with Todd and their cousins Jacob and Jonathon. Eric's favorite ride was Splash Mountain. Tyler's favorite was Toy Story Mania. They also had a good time going on the Tower of Terror, Thunder Mountain, the new roller coaster Mt. Everest, Mission Space, and Soarin. They enjoyed going back to the room in the afternoon and swimming in the pool.

Alex was a little more reserved while we were there. He would want to go on the bigger rides and would make it to the front of the line. As soon as it was time for us to go on he would back out and want to go and sit down with me. He tried so hard. His favorite ride was Star Tours. The boys actually were able to go on that ride about ten times because of the infant swap that Todd and I were able to do with Elizabeth. It was Star Wars weekend when we were there and the boys were able to have their pictures done with a bunch of Star Wars characters. They got to make their own light sabers and watch a Star Wars parade. It was really cool to have a bunch of Storm Troopers marching all around the park. Alex also enjoyed the characters. He looked like he was going to come out of his own skin when the characters would come over to us. His favorite character was Pluto. During one of the meals Pluto pretended to eat him in his giant mouth. Alex thought that this was so funny. Every time that we saw Pluto after that Alex would just go up to him and stand in front of him waiting for Pluto to eat him again. He couldn't understand why Pluto wouldn't do that anymore. How do you explain to Alex that it is not the same guy in the costume. It is times like this that I am reminded how young and little and innocent he still is.

It was a wonderful time and of course Todd wants to go back in five years again because then Elizabeth will be the perfect age. All I can say is that I will never go back in June!!!! Too hot and Too busy!!!!