Spring Program and Art Show

Oh golly. My guy had his school spring program yesterday. It's kind of the big hurrah to preschool because they don't do a graduation or anything like that. (Which is totally okay!) My FIL brought both of my Husband's grandmas to the program and then Husband's uncle came too so we had quite the crowd to see C! It was lovely but my mama heart is just now processing all there is to process that preschool is coming to an end.

There's only 16 days left! And it's all capped off a little too much for me because the last day of school is also his birthday! I am getting all emotional just thinking of it. All the bittersweet.

So anyway, focusing on the good stuff, his program. Want to watch a song? Yes? Well okay... if you insist. :)

They decorated the gym with all kinds of spring art work and it was so awesome to see. The art is so so cute. We got to take all of it home with us. 

These look uninteresting from far away but they are just the cutest up close! With the cheerio eyes, macaroni beaks and corn kernels by their feet. Speaking of, look at those adorable feet!! 

I wish I had gotten a picture of the tables, the center pieces were little watering cans, with flowers with the kids school pictures on it, then they had egg carton caterpillars as well as pom pom caterpillars on leaves. Super sweet. I also only got a terrible picture of the butterflies by the entry. 

It was just the sweetest little program. My guy humored me and let me take his picture with all three of his teachers and his best school friend. I certainly channeled my mother that's for sure, I was on a mission! 

My guy with his sweet teacher, she is so good with the kids. She put on a heck of a program and we will miss her for sure! Well, until M is in 4-year-old preschool. Hopefully she is still at our school!! (She's been there for 8 years so odds are in our favor I think...) 

So that was the exciting end of the week we had! 

The Post in Which I am Grumpy Cat

All of the nos. No. 

This travesty has recently come to my attention: 

They (ABC) have remade Dirty Dancing. And, it looks terrible. Because obviously.

I don't even understand why they would want to remake it. Especially in a made-for-television movie. This was an appropriate tribute: 

Because it's Jennifer Grey carrying a watermelon and even Jennifer Grey post nose-job is still Jennifer Grey.

I don't know why any actor would agree to sign on? I mean, really? Are their careers really suffering that much? Poor newcomer Colt Prattes, I just feel bad for him. His "Nobody puts Baby in a corner." doesn't even hold a candle to Patrick's. How could it? There really are no winners here. I know the internet is a place for trolls and Negative Nellys, but there is not one positive comment on Face.book and they disabled the comments on YouTube. That speaks volumes to me. 

Why on earth did ABC need "the musical for a new era" in the first place?! I have loved this movie since I was little and the "dirty" went WAY over my head. I can assure you my children will watch it too. We have the DVD and the CD soundtrack as one does. I can tell you that on May 24 I will most certainly be putting in my DVD and watching Patrick Swazye and Jennifer Grey as God intended. Until then I am just going to be horrified and saying no on repeat. 

No. No no no no no. 

The Pendulum Always Swings Back

Before I get into my post I would like to wish you all a VERY happy Miss Congeniality Day.

Weed whacking. That is one of those dreaded tasks in our household. Husband really really doesn't like to do it. And I really really like how our yard looks with the edges neat and not have tall grass around our tree and fence. So every year I nag. And every year he puts it off until he gets sick of my nagging. So I did some probing, and part of the reluctance is that our weed whacker takes a gas/oil mix and our new lawn mower is gas only and we only have one gas can. Plus the weed whacker is really heavy.

This was a problem I could solve. So yesterday after drop off M and I went to Home Depot and I bought myself a new toy.

It weighs 3 pounds and I can use it! In a "girls can do anything" kind of moment, I put it together all by myself, got the battery charged and went out and took care of business. The Rosie the Riveter mindset stuck with me all day and I was killin' it. Laundry got done. Kitchen was clean. Yard looked good. Kids played outside the bulk of the day. It was pretty awesome. 

But, like always the pendulum swung back hard today. Where everything went right yesterday, things were just a little off today. Nothing major happened but it just was a let down from the awesomeness of yesterday. Yet, here we are, fed, clothed and healthy (sans a little seasonal allergy) so life is still pretty good. I put pigtails in M's hair today for the first time ever. This picture was from pre-nap and they did look better post nap when she sat a little more still. 

We are in that wonderful time of year where the morning requires a light jacket (ha! Miss Congeniality again!) but by lunch time it's awesome. So pretty much exactly like the meme. 

However your days have been so far this week, good or bad, I hope you are able to find the goodness in them. Perspective is always helpful. 

Hot Wheels Party!

Happy birthday to my favorite!! Today is Husband's 33rd birthday and we celebrated the way all dads do... with a Hot Wheels party! C got it into his head that his dad should have a Hot Wheels party and that he wanted to get him a box of Hot Wheels fruit snacks for a present. Husband rolled with it and we had a pretty awesome party!

The ladies at the grocery store thought that C was hilarious. He was SO proud about picking up the cake that he picked out. Why is grocery store sheet cake so darn good? 

My mom LOVED the theme and got Husband appropriate gifts including 4 new Hot Wheels vehicles. (C and M were VERY pleased with that development.) We also obviously had BWW for dinner. 

So while Husband was in Vegas I got to work on a mini bedroom makeover. Husband has been a trooper for the past three years and has had a book shelf on his side of the bed. With one of the shelves acting as his night stand. On Wednesday night I took everything off the bookshelf, tore it down to pieces, got it out to the garage and cleaned the spot out. It was a little dusty. 

Thursday night I got to work building the night stand. I will admit here and now that Husband is usually the builder of furniture in our house but it didn't take me too long! We "wrapped" it with a big bow. M really loves the big bow. If you have a toddler in your life, make any gift more exciting with the addition of a big bow. 

Friday after art class I put all the new bedding on to the bed. I got new sheets and pillow cases just because. And then I also got a new duvet cover and shams. We had a quilt but it was getting stained and ripping. It wasn't a nice quilt, I think like $40 at Kohl's so it was super okay to move on. 

I did get it looking a little nicer and neater for Saturday when he got home but this was a quick picture while the light was good in there. It reads much more gray in pictures and on Skype, but it is more blue than gray. I like it. Husband also likes it. Everybody wins! 

Well when he got home from Las Vegas he was tired (because the red eye) and coming home to a nice clean bedroom with new bedding was an even better treat than I imagined! 

It was a GREAT birthday day spent at church (With a two year old who loudly proclaimed during the baptism "Church is NOT my favorite!" Oy vey.) and in the backyard with a little partying in there too. I am so happy we were able celebrate Husband and we get to love him another year! 

7QT: Happy April Takes

1. I have been flying solo since before dawn on Wednesday morning. Husband is off in Las Vegas for his annual conference. In years past (like for as long has he's had to go to this event) I have either tagged along and left kid(s) with my parents, or I just went to my parent's house to not be completely alone for an extended period of time. But this year, Husband is able to come back earlier and doesn't immediately head to a big retreat for work, so we stayed home and life continued as normal.

2. I have been up to some projects for Husband's birthday and I would LOVE to tell you about them, but he reads this blog and therefore writing about them would ruin the surprise. Kind of handy to have several days to pull off a surprise! But just know that I have been keeping busy while he's been gone and I am totally excited about it!

3. Do you ever fall victim to the trap of buying presents that you would like for your spouse? We are pretty bad about this, so I really hope he likes his gift! Because I really do and when I invented this idea it really was for him! In defense of myself just a minute: I did ask him like 50 times if there was anything specific he wanted.

4. Today was M's very last art class of the year. We have so enjoyed going to art class, even when I haven't been particularly excited about going in the morning. Today's crafts were butterfly themed and since I have been very lax at sharing art pictures here I will go ahead and do that.

5. I don't know if I have ever written about my love for pineapples before, but I love them. They are a sign of southern hospitality and apparently I should just move to the south. I have a pineapple in every room on my main floor and one in my flower bed too. It all started with a pineapple cookie jar I got at the church garage sale in 2008. There were two matching jars and I have one and so does my brother. Then I slowly started accumulating them. I love that they are on trend! My Scentsy warmer pineapple is my current favorite because it's adorable and also makes my house smell like pineapple! We are ordering pizza tonight because I am way not a martyr, and I am totally going to get my pineapple pizza. If I was really nuts I would tell you that I am wearing pineapple pajama pants... I may have a pineapple problem.

6. M has been super duper into listening to music lately and her top contenders are "Shake It Off" and anything from Moana. So there's a lot of that in my life lately. I dreamt Taylor Swift last night. But the radio killed it this morning and played the Backstreet Boys. Which, speaking of, they're in residence in Vegas right now and Husband refused to go and Skype me in. Lame. He went to see Cirque instead which I suppose is still awesome. 

7. The *grand-parental* Easter Bunny sent the kids the game Zoo on the Loose. I am really surprised how much they love playing it and the learning that is happening. It's for ages 4+ and M can't really focus for the whole game but she does a great job at the beginning. C can read most of the words on the cards and is getting pretty good at an educated guess of what the words he doesn't know are. I have not been pushing reading on him but this summer if we work at it a bit, he will be a reader! He is SO close. 

Have an awesome weekend! Hope you get to do something fun. 

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter to you! My kids are deeply disappointed that it is no longer Easter. And, I know that it's an octave and all that but it's the secular hunting for eggs and baskets they would like to repeat, not the Mass so... whatever.

We did have a great little Easter. Saturday was spent in preparation cleaning the house, watching the new baby giraffe and having some fun family time. We went out for a pizza dinner which was fun and wonderful then came home to dye our eggs.

It was fun and no one lost their temper, but it was kind of a comedy of errors. Let's just say that I am glad I insisted that everyone be in play clothes. Every single one of us spilled some dye, from the adults with some tsunami like waves to the kids full on cup emptying. But in the end only one egg was lost (by a two year old) and everyone was happy with how they turned out. 

The kids also drew pictures for the Easter bunny. Which were quite cute. Husband helped tape the pictures to the back door so he would be sure to find them. 

We do a combined tradition at our house. Growing up, we found a hidden basket of goodies. Husband grew up hunting eggs. So we hid baskets that had two books, two tsum tsums, (referred to as "little guys" in our house) some Reese's eggs and a little extra candy sprinkled in. Then the kids looked for 20 eggs each filled with jelly beans, M&M eggs and Reese's peanut butter rabbits. This basket picture is staged. They did not have eggs in them when the kids found them, nor were the goodies so high because #ihateeastergrass. We totally added some plastic grocery bags under the liner to prop up the stuff for the picture. 

Everyone loved Easter morning! 

We went to our normal 11:00 Mass. It was crowded but not crazy crowded. We got there a half hour early and someone had already camped out in our spot. So we were like three rows back from normal. Frustrating for me because getting my spot is one of those small victory competitions in my mind. We also missed our row by about 25 seconds for Holy Thursday. (Which was the only part of the Triduum we attempted with the group.)

But we made it through Easter with no real problems. There was a little girl in the row in front of us and she was not a good influence on M who is our problem most of the time. She was eating crackers so we of course had to bust out our "talking during the consecration" crackers WAY early. Overall behavior gets a B and I will take it!! 

C's shirt is untucked because his pants were too big! They were an elastic waist but not adjustable waist and we had to safety pin them so they would stay up! Luckily the shirt covered it! I may have to take uniform pants into a tailor depending on the pants I can find. 

Anyway, that was basically our Easter in a nutshell. I hope you had a wonderful one!

Spring Cleaning

All right people. It was 80 degrees hot yesterday. #lovinit! Friday afternoon Husband came home and we headed out to "The Orange Store" *Home Depot* which obviously is the cousin of "The Red Store." *Target* So anyway, the kids were not excited about the fact that it was "a grown up toy store" but we picked up our new lawn mower and rug and they are awesome! We also bought some tulips because I normally get some for Valentine's Day, it's our little tradition but Husband couldn't find any in February.

We also got 12 bags of mulch and got our flowerbeds all cleaned out and tidy. Our city has two free lawn waste weeks in the spring, and today is our last pick up before we pay $5 a bag so we made good use of the good weather! It probably seems so lame to say this, but my yard really makes me happy right now.

The porch project took much much longer than I anticipated. The rubber on the bottom of our old rug had degraded and was all stuck to our floor. But now it is super clean and looks great! I am so excited to be rid of the winter grime and gear! This is just my favorite room in the house with the sun and the breeze and the comfy chairs. It's wonderful.

This is all the positive part of my weekend. The #reallife part of my weekend was that my kids were fairly crabby and overtired all weekend. So much so that we didn't even pretend to bring M to Palm Sunday and she just got checked into babysitting when we arrived at the church. I have zero shame in this. Babysitting rocks and I am glad it's an option on those days where you know it isn't going to go well! 

And now it's Monday bringing all the Monday things, which mostly just means the typical everyday-ness of it all. Fine by me!