South-Eastern Area Day of Service / Lengthen Your Stride 5k

Today was a big day of service across the South-East. Every stake of the church in the area held a Day Of Service and organized huge service projects. Our project was a food/clothing drive. The catch was that it was also a 5k race. To enter the race you were supposed to donate 10 cans of food for the North Carolina Food Bank. We were also collecting clothing for an organization that helps young single mothers. I was on the committee that organized the race and when we first started planning it, we had hoped to have about 250 participants. By the time Internet registration ended yesterday, we had over 700 participants, and when walk-up registration ended and the race started this morning, we had over 1,000 people racing. That's over 10,000 cans of food for the food bank!!! Later today, more people are going to walk through neighborhoods and knock on doors to ask for more food, so who knows how much it will be by the end of the day! It was a beautiful morning for the race- not a cloud in the sky and about 70 degrees when the race started at 9am. All 4 of us entered the race. Michael and I took turns pushing the boys in the double stroller. Matty would get off and run occasionally. Here is Matty doing jumping jacks to warm up before the race started. We had the primary children sing "I Am A Child of God" before the start of the race. Here's Matty with a couple of his friends getting ready to sing.
Here we are before the start of the race. Eric got a race t-shirt too, but it was humongous on him and he wanted to wear his Thomas shirt instead.
We kept a pretty good pace the entire time. We probably jogged about 1/3 of it and speed walked 2/3. I think we finished it in about 45-50 minutes- they probably wont have the official times posted until Monday though. The very last part of it was a lap around the church building, so when we got there we parked the stroller and had the boys get off and run the last lap with us so we could all run across the finish line together. Here we are after the race.

The boys enjoyed all of the food they had waiting at the end for the racers- all kinds of breads, bagels, bananas, and sports drinks. They had the primary kids sing again- this time they sang "If the Savior Stood Beside Me" and they gave the kids little cards with the words on it. Matty was so cute- he concentrated so hard on reading the words. He could probably only recognize about 1/8 of them though!

We weren't able to stick around for the awards- Michael had to come home and shower and then get to work by 11am. I will be interested to hear what the final canned food count was though- hopefully we were able to do a lot of good for the food bank!

Wedding Cake... and some other pictures...

This is a wedding cake I made for a couple at church that got married this weekend .

The boys wanted to help Daddy and Grandpa put up the chair rail in Baby Paul's room. They really liked using the hammer.

Daddy was being goofy with the grapes and the boys decided to try it too.

The boys love playing with their bubble guns that they got for Easter. It keeps them busy out on the deck for quite a while.
Eric was playing in his "boat" with his puppy. He spends a lot of time pretending he's a puppy lately... it's so cute.

Easter Sunday

The boys were very excited to wake up and see their Easter baskets this morning.Matty loved getting a new Star Wars game for his Leapster and Eric was soooo excited about his Easter Thomas the Tank Engine set.
The Easter Bunny hid 5 plastic eggs for each of them in the living room and we let them have a few jelly beans this morning before getting ready for church.
Eric also got his first pair of Big Boy Underwear in his Easter basket- they are Thomas ones, of course. Hopefully they will give him a little motivation. He sure looks cute in them!!!

After church we went to Grandma and Grandpa's to take pictures. It was a beautiful day!!!
My belly at 31 weeks- side view
Front view

This is 8 of the 9 current Montgomery grandchildren (2 more are due within the next 2 months).

Grandma Cindy sewed the dresses for the girls and bought the boys their shirts.

Grandma Cindy and Grandpa Mark with all 9 grandchildren.Eric and his cousin Katie

And here was my contribution to our Easter dinner: chocolate-peanut butter pie, coconut cream pie, and strawberries and cream pie.

On The Hunt

We enjoyed quite the week of Easter festivities. The boys participated in 3 Easter Egg Hunts and the weather was absolutely beautiful for all of them. The first was on Thursday with Matty's preschool. Earlier in the week Matty had made a bunny basket out of a milk jug in class, so I decided to make Eric one too. The preschool hunt was at a big beautiful park. The boys got to play on the playground and in the sand box for a while first. Eric spent about a half hour making an elaborate (for a 2 year old) sand castle. He was so into it- he piled up a bunch of sand on the sand box border and then went hunting for sticks to put in it. I think he would have probably kept it up for at least another hour if it hadn't been time to go hunt for Easter eggs.

It wasn't much of a hunt- the eggs were just scattered across a huge soccer field- but there were tons of eggs. Matty had his eye on one of the "golden prize eggs" before the hunt started and headed straight for it when his teacher said "go". The problem was, another boy had his eye on the same one and they collided and went down before either of them got to the egg. We wish we would have gotten a picture of that! They were both back on their feet in seconds and soon had bunny baskets full of eggs (although Matty never did end up finding another golden egg). After the hunt was over, the boys looked through their eggs and we enjoyed a wonderful little picnic.

The 2nd hunt was at the home of a family we go to church with. They have an Easter Egg Hunt for all of their friends and neighbors every year. At this one, the boys had a lot of fun playing in a bounce house and going down an air slide. Eric couldn't climb up the slide, so I had to push him up with one hand while I pulled myself (and Paul) up with the other. I'm sure it was a sight to see, but he loved it.

Eric also spent quite a while blowing bubbles with his friend Teryn.

And the boys made some pictures with sidewalk chalk (most of it ended up on their pants though- they looked like they were wearing tie-dyed pants).

The 3rd and final hunt was at Grandma and Grandpa's house with all of the cousins.

Grandma, Aunt KK and Aunt Juju also made a pinata for the kids to hit. They loved that.

So between the 3 egg hunts and the pinata, I think we will have enough candy to last us until next Easter!

Dog Sitting

We are taking care of a cute little doggie this week for some friends of ours that are out of town. His name is Fitz (Fitz William, really, but he goes by Fitz). He is a long-haired Chihuahua and the boys are having lots of fun with him. I think it will be a sad day when his family comes to claim him.
He is just he right size for Matty to be able to walk him and it's really cute to watch.

He is a really cuddly little guy. He'll sit in my lap and sleep pretty much all day long if I let him. He also likes to play though. He always wants Michael to get down on the floor and fight with him.

Our Silly Boys

It seems like every time I turn around the boys are asking me to take their pictures doing something silly. Here are some of this weeks pictures.

While I was going through the baby clothes, Matty tried on one of the baby hats and thought it was just hilarious.

The boys got Easter stickers in the mail from Uncle Tom and Aunt Kristy and have been sticking them all over the place. Matty thinks it is the funniest thing when he puts stickers on his face.Yesterday, Eric wanted to see what his different expressions looked like. First he asked me to take a picture of his sad face.

Then he did his happy face.
And here's his "I love Mama" face.
Every morning for the last week or so, Matty has been running into my room and exclaiming "Mommy, it's my birthday!". He knows his birthday is getting close, but couldn't quite remember how close. So today we made a calendar together that he can cross the days off of to count down to his birthday.
Matty and Eric's new favorite place in our house is the pots and pans cupboard. They are constantly running into the kitchen to "hide" in there and they think it is just the coolest thing that they both fit in there together.