Far Away Mall

A few weeks ago we met my good friend Beth and her kiddos, Natalie and Jackson, at the mall for a fun morning on a wet day. This isn't the mall that is right down the road from us; it's the mall about 35 minutes away and halfway between us and Beth! Colin has deemed it "Far Away Mall." Good enough.

So the kids ran and played and then we rode escalators and elevators and had Happy Meals. Fun for all. Especially since Beth and I got to sit and catch up a bit! Colin even ran the camera for me! These are all his work:

Miss Beth!


The ceiling above the play area!


The girls!


And cute Mr. Jackson!


Huh. One of the girls must have taken this one!


We have really enjoyed meeting up with Beth and her kids a few times this winter. I think we're going to try to make a monthly thing.

Chickens and Baby Showers

On St. Patrick's Day I had a baby shower to attend in the Great North for one of my good friends from high school. It was just a quick up and back trip, so I went by myself. It actually turned into a bit of a vacation for me: sunny, beautiful day, quiet car, my own music, seeing friends, and a cupcake. Not too shabby.

And, I got to see my beautiful friend Amy and her baby-to-be Logan:


All of that enjoyment for me meant that Daddy was solo most of the day. Earlier in the week I had found a news piece somewhere that one of the local parks was having a Maple Sugar Exhibition on Saturday. I thought it might be interesting. I mean, the kids LIKE syrup. It was also at the same park that is the county's "exhibit farm." That means they have lots of cute animals to look at and barns to explore. So, Daddy thought it sounded like fun. And it WAS a gorgeous 70 degree March day. So off they went.

The report I got upon my return was this: Maple syrup is not very interesting. The naturalist doing the presentation was not dynamic. And the chickens were really funny.




Oh well, at least there were funny chickens. And cupcakes.

I Have a Button.

So, as a mostly powerless three year old, Colin is becoming increasingly frustrated with his lot in life. He's been letting us know this with increasing amounts of bargaining and arguing. It's awesome. The other coping strategy that he's developed is his "I have a button" idea. Which, frankly, I find brilliant.

The basic idea is that when Colin finds himself in a situation that he feels is untenable, like rainy weather or bedtime, he just says, "I have a button for that." And he's going to push that button. And the button makes things better. It makes the weather nice. It makes it NOT bedtime. One time he even used it to make it be a "little" bath instead of a "big bath." It never fails to make me laugh. Makes me think of those goofy "easy button" commercials. Imagine how cool it would be if he ACTUALLY HAD A BUTTON. Who knows? Maybe this kid will MAKE a button someday.

He had better share with his Mama.

T-Ball Man

I picked up a little t-ball set for the back yard a few weeks ago. And then it got rainy and cold. And the kids nagged me everyday to go play t-ball. FINALLY last week when it was gorgeous, we got it out and had a brief lesson. Ok, Colin had a lesson. Gillian would NOT let me show her ANYTHING. Not how to hold the bat, not how to stand, NOTHING. Homeschooling is NOT a valid choice for us (not that it ever was, anyway).

Colin really enjoyed it. And he wasn't too shabby at it either!


I love this video because he spends twice as much time PUTTING THE BALL ON THE TEE as he does swinging the bat. Sigh.


Here's a nice hit though.


And here is Gillian, minus instruction.


And then she got mad, took the tee, bat, and ball and ran away.


Oy.

St. Patrick's Day Suprise!

A few weeks ago I won a prize on a little blog contest on my friend Rosie's lovely blog: Kitchens are Monkey Business

When Rosie asked what I wanted for my prize, I just told her to surprise us (with no nuts)! Well, on Thursday our packages arrived! Much to the kids' delight!

(um, ignore the clean laundry in the background)





The light up bow tie? HUGE hit.

Oh goodness, jewelry. Oh Rosie.



And M&Ms!! Oh my.


And just realizing that I never got pictures of the beautiful and lovely cookies that Rosie made! Although, there are lots of great pictures of them on Rosie's blog! They were YUMMY. Even Colin ate them, and he doesn't eat cookies (Thin Mints excepted). Thank you so very much, Rosie. We so appreciate the treats!

Life's a Picnic

Our weather has been positively beautiful this past week. I mean it feels like late MAY, not mid March! So, of course we had to take advantage of it! One of our first adventures was to use our new lunch boxes for a picnic in the park!

Off we go!



Mr. Man's sock selection for the day. Nice, right?


First we got in some playground time. It took us a bit to get into the swing of playground rules again. It involved some arguing (common for the present moment) and a couple of time outs (also very common). But, we worked it out and had a good day.







Lunch time!





YUM. Everything tastes better in the sunshine!

Eggie Tree!

Last year the house down the road had this lovely little tree in their front yard that was hung with Easter Eggs. The kids LOVED it. They looked for it each time we drove past and squealed when they saw it. And they were sad when, after Easter, the eggs were gone. So, since we have a cute little Japanese Maple in our front landscaping that isn't doing much this time of year, I thought we could have our own Eggie Tree this year!

Pre-Eggie shot:


My trusty sidekick, Gillian, was very, very helpful. She handed me the correct color egg when I asked for them and helped me arrange the colors just so. Colin was helpful in a way that involved driving his truck through the mulch.

So, TA DA! Our eggie tree!