Plowman Family Dinner/April 2021

Last weekend, we gathered in West Bountiful for monthly family dinner. I'm really glad our niblings have the chance to hang out and play with each other on these (and other) occasions, because it turns out that they get along really well and have a great time together. That is something I missed out on when I was growing up. (Having all of my cousins living in California and England contributed to the problem.)

Anyhow, JB prepared the main course, which was a ham for the Easter season. We also enjoyed salad, veggies, and other goodies. This family dinner brought with it the return of "Pass the Parcel," an old family favorite, and we also celebrated our four April birthdays (Graham, Jenna, Jackson, and now one-year-old Sadie!).

One of the other highlights was Jackson chasing Leia around the backyard with his Donald Duck stuffed doll. I guess you had to be there.

Our Day Out with Kate

Our niece Kate's sixth birthday occurred a few weeks ago. For her birthday this year, we were able to arrange for an outing with her in much less time than we did ... because, you know, the Pandemic That Shall Not Be Named.

At the store, Kate picked out a LEGO set. We took her and it to our house to build the set together.

Here's before:

... and after:

It had been too many years since I last built anything LEGO. Fortunately, Kate has been doing a lot of LEGO building and understood the directions very quickly. We may be a bit biased, but she's one of the smartest six-year-olds we know, and she is great company for a Saturday afternoon.

Our Day Out with Graham 2021

Our nephew Graham turned five years old last week. Rather than postpone a birthday outing with him for many months this year (as we did in 2020), we instead arranged to pick him up Saturday afternoon. So, that hurdle was the first one cleared.

Graham chose to go get ice cream from Blacksmith. We were like, Twist my arm, kiddo.

Afterward, we took him to the Bountiful City park to play for a while. That was followed by video games at our house. A kid after my own heart, he chose to play Star Wars and Avengers LEGO video games with yours truly, and JB assisting where needed.

So, it was a productive and fun day.

Easter 2021

Monthly family dinners with my in-laws resumed this month–at least, we had one on Easter Sunday. Jeremy, Alice, and their kids came over to watch the Sunday afternoon session of general conference  with us, and then we enjoyed an Easter-themed dinner, followed by card games, together.

No one was more excited about this than Leia, who absolutely adores Spencer, Olivia, and Jake (picture here with our puppers):

The messages from our prophet, Apostles, and other Church leaders for general conference were wonderful. The company was equally good!