Faces......eat 'em up!

Silas Benjamin...

(he got into the markers again...it's not a black eye!)

This is one of Silas's drawings...a boy holding a balloon.

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Eli Jacob...

And just a few family shots...

(the photographer)

the zoo!

Last Saturday our family went to the Denver Zoo to celebrate Adam and Aaron Brown's (Eli's identical twin friends) 4th birthday! It was a little cold, but we had a fun time!

Impromptu family photo of the 5 of us...yes, I am definitely showing!

The birthday party gang: Monique, Thea, Alex, Staci, Aaron, Allison, Henry, Austin, Adam, Silas, Esther, Gwendolyn, Haley, Destin, Henry, and Eli! Quite a crazy crew! (One of the parents yelled, "Look, there's a dinosaur!" to get them all to look at the cameras). For a while after that, Silas kept asking where the dinosaur was.

Why use your fingers when you can just dig right in with your face?

Grizzly bear! The kids were all growling to get the bear to look at us. I was just glad he was behind the fence.

One of their favorite things to do--play the drums!

Ring-tailed lemur

The boys rode the carousel. Eli got to ride on a hippo, while Silas got the big baboon eating a banana.

Silas was very excited to see the elephants, but we were inside so I didn't get a great photo of them.

Another majestic animal I was glad to be on the other side of the fence of.

Going to see the gorillas--Eli's current favorite animal!

Arizona!

April 2-7, Eli, Silas, and their pregnant mom took a trip to Arizona to visit Grandpa and Grandma Van Guilder who were there on spring break. We had a great trip and saw some beautiful sights, such as the red rocks of Sedona and the Grand Canyon.

The boys had a lot of fun throwing rocks in Oak Creek behind my parents' timeshare condo in Sedona. It is a beautiful area.

Grandpa Dennis is showing Eli how to putt in mini golf.

And it paid off! Eli got a par 2 on hole 2!

After the first few holes, Silas decided it was just plain easier to walk up to the hole and toss the ball in!

My mom (a.k.a. Grandma Dianne) and I went for a short hike through the desert-terrain of Sedona. We saw lots of different species of trees and bushes and cacti, as well as two coyotes running through the brush, and thankfully no rattlesnakes!

My dad and I hiked up a little hill to get to this picturesque spot.

In Sedona, there is a church built into the rocks for people to come visit and pray in. Here is Grandpa praying out loud with his grandsons. Grandpa would pray a line, and the boys would repeat after him. It was too precious (insert weepy-eyed pregnant mommy here)!

Sedona has quite the art culture, so we walked through an outdoor gallery. Silas loves eagles so we stopped by this sculpture. I have entitled this, "The Offering."

Grandpa and Eli looking at the red rocks from our balcony.

We thought it would be fun to go out to eat at the Red Planet Diner, which did have a pretty cool Mars and outer space theme going for it. Unfortunately, it didn't have its food or its prices going for it (6 bucks and some change for a kid's grilled cheese and five french fries?!? I'm talking cheap white bread and one slice of cheese...you've got to be kidding me!!! I mean, what kind of profit margin is that?!? ...Okay, I'm over it now.)

Every day we went swimming! Silas had a lot of fun splashing, and both boys loved jumping into the water and having one of the adults catch them!

The boys absolutely loved going under the "waterfall" that came spouting out of a mushroom-shaped fountain in the kiddie pool. Here are Eli and Grandma coming out of the spray. I think I went in and out of the waterfall with Silas about 30 times!

After spending a couple of days in Sedona, we drove up north to see the Grand Canyon! We got there just as the sun was setting and it was getting really cold. The Grand Canyon really is "grand!" It is so huge, it is difficult to capture its magnificence and beauty on camera. At this point in the canyon, the average distance from one side to the other is 10 miles. Here is Silas looking out at the canyon and saying, "AriZOna!"

The Grand Canyon at sunset.

The next day we spent touring the Grand Canyon, and we were lucky to see a California Condor! This bird is considered one of the rarest bird species in the world and is critically endangered as there are only 297 known condors to be living, with only about 50 of them inhabiting Northern Arizona (the rest live in regions of California). They also have the largest wingspan of any North American bird at an average of 9 feet! The bird circled above us (it is in the vulture family...it must have noticed my dad's shiny bald head) and then flew away. I quickly snapped a photo of it, and then had to significantly zoom in and crop the photo in order to post it on the blog.

Enjoying the view!

Eli is exploring the canyon using Grandpa's binoculars. He wasn't in the mood to pose for any pictures.

This is so I can show our baby that he or she was at the Grand Canyon when they were the size of an avocado. (Looks like I should've worn my sunglasses in this picture).

That muddy brown stream way down below is the Colorado River, which starts in Rocky Mountain National Park, not very far from where we live now, and runs all the way down to Mexico for a total of 1450 miles, 217 of which are through the Grand Canyon.

Our last day in Arizona, we drove down to Phoenix and stayed in a hotel in order to be close to the airport the next morning. Here is my dad trying to catch some last rays before going back to Michigan. We had such a fun time! Thanks, Grandpa and Grandma!