Tuesday, April 30, 2013

Letter to Four Year Old Sam

Sam -- you are FOUR YEARS OLD!!!
 
 March 2013

I've been avoiding writing this post all month, mostly because I haven't gotten a great series of pictures of you. Then yesterday my blog friend, Allison, posted a picture of her son from each month, so I decided to steal borrow her idea. And now I can write this post! (PS. Sam actually turned four on March 29, so this is a month late. Boo.)
April 2012

I think you weigh around 34 pounds and you are 41 1/2" tall! You wear a size 4 diaper and most of your clothes now are 4T, but your pants are still mostly 3T. You are still not toilet trained and we have declared a moratorium on it for now. This is one area of life where you WILL NOT be forced and Mommy and Daddy have given up. Although you did start pooping on the potty regularly in January so that was awesome!
May 2012

You go to bed around 8:30 or 9 and you sleep until around 8 most days. Going to bed, and staying in bed, has been another huge struggle. We are trying to implement a better bedtime routine. You don't like to be alone in your room and you wake up at night and come to Mommy and Daddy's bed. We are trying to get you into a better bedtime routine first and then we will deal with the middle of the night visits :)
June and July 2012

You don't sleep with any stuffed animals at all. You like to wear Carter's fleece "feet pajamas" as you call them. You also like to sometimes wear a pair of two piece pajamas underneath. You are Mommy's son in that you could live in your pajamas all day, if we'd let you!
August 2012

You don't take an afternoon nap anymore but on days you don't have preschool you still have about an hour and a half to two hours of quiet time, although you usually miss even that on the weekends. You have started to get yourself dressed more these days although you sometimes still need help getting your arms out of your sleeves.
September 2012

For breakfast you eat a "granoler bar," as you call them, some orange juice, two yogurts (usually fieldberry or peach) and then sometimes oatmeal, or toast, or a banana. Lunch is pretty random. You eat some leftovers or a peanut butter sandwich. You like cucumbers and red or yellow peppers. Your favourite supper is tuna noodle casserole and you always want to eat that. You like popcorn, apple cider, chocolate and Triscuits crackers.
October and November 2012

Sam you are a really good big brother. You play really nicely with Rachel and you let her get away with a lot. You rarely hit or push her or yell at her. You like to try and encourage her to talk and you LOVE playing in your room with her. You watch out for her and like to show her how to do things safely, like going downstairs. I adore watching you and Rachel play with each other and it melts my heart to hear the two of you laughing hysterically over some joke or game.
December 2012 and January 2013

You have LOVED going to preschool and LOGOS and Sunday School and Tot Shabbat. You thrive in those environments and it is so much fun to watch you learn new things. I can't believe you will be in school full days, every day for Junior Kindergarden in just four short months. In some ways I am so excited for you and everything you will learn and do and in some ways I am so sad because I know I will miss you so much.
February 2013
Sam, you love going places -- to church, to the library, to school, on errands, to Conestoga Mall -- you are happiest when we are on the go. But then when we come home you are so good at playing, by yourself or with Rachel. You love to play on the iPad and to watch Mighty Machines DVDs but you also like to play with your trains or trucks. You use your puzzles and other toys with pieces as items in the games you make up. You love to be outside and ride your scooter or your tricycle or dig in the dirt.
April 2009, April 2010
February 2011, March 2012, March 2013

Sam-Sam-Sam, we love you so much and can't wait to see how you grow and change in the coming year.

Monday, April 29, 2013

The Most Highly Eloquent and Revered Reverend Alissa Jane B!*

 Alissa (middle) with Susan and I. We are part of a six person
online women's group who has been "meeting" for over ten years.
Yesterday we went to my friend, Alissa's, ordination. According to the Mennonite church, ordination is "an act by which the church, after appropriate personal and corporate discernment, calls and appoints a person to a leadership ministry in the life and mission of the church." (definition from here and taken from the "1989 Article".) After celebrating Alissa'a ordination with her, and listening to the sermon, I would describe ordination as a marriage ceremony between a (and "the") church and their pastor. The reason I say that is the preacher said ordination was an exchanging of mutual promises. The candidate promises that she will serve the church to the best of her abilities and remain faithful to the gospel and the church promises that they will be supportive of, and life-giving to, the candidate.
 The table at the front of the church was filled with things which have 
been significant in Alissa's journey as a Christian and a pastor.
The reason I said " 'a' (and "the") chuch" above is because, in our Mennonite faith, ordination happens within the context of a specific church (this is not the first church where Alissa has been the pastor, for instance), but she is also supported by the conference, both regionally and nationally. Alissa will keep her ordained status even once (if?!) she leaves the specific church where she is currently working.
As a memento of Alissa's ordination day, we got to take home
a hydrangea which we will plant in our new yard in August. 
Ordination is a public recognition that Alissa feels her calling as a pastor is a vocation, and we, as her faith community, affirm and celebrate that God has called her by name, and we recognize her gifts and abilities to lead us, as God's people, in the church. (Most of the above came from the sermon at Alissa's ordination, which was preached by Dave Bergen, who works for our national church conference as the Executive Minister for Formation.)
I was so happy to be able to celebrate Alissa's special day with her. As a friend who has supported her through seminary (her pastoral training education), and as she has served at various churches, it was so exciting for me to see her gifts and abilities affirmed and celebrated. As Alissa's friend, it was wonderful to see the wider recognition of how awesome and amazing she is at her job, her vocation and her calling.

*Note: Techinically I think Alissa is now Reverend "Her Last Name" (which I don't want to share on the blog), but on Facebook yesterday people were adding all sorts of things. The title is a compilation of all those suggested titles and not what you (or anyone) have to officially call her. However I might do that once in awhile just to make her feel special laugh!

Weekend Plans: The Review

So on Friday I posted a list of weekend plans and I know you've been waiting with bated breath to see if I actually accomplished all of my plans. Well I won't leave you in suspense any longer, read on.
 Rachel enjoying pancakes on Saturday morning.

Here is what I hoped to get accomplished this past weekend:

1) Get the winter tires taken off our car and all-seasons put on. I am deciding that if it snows again between now and November we will just stay home! Ha! Really this is just an excuse for me to hang out at Costco by myself for awhile on Saturday morning. Pretty awesome really!
     I woke up at 6:30 (on a Saturday no less), made myself a couple of mugs of coffee/hot chocolate and grabbed some reading material. Unfortunately when I got there at 7:35 (the tire centre opens at 9:30 and doesn't take appointments), I was the third person in line. The other two people were lined up outside so instead of sitting in my car for a bit, I had to stand outside. It was cold, it was hard to read, and it was a looooong wait. Fortunately my car was the first one done, about 55 minutes after the centre opened. And I actually got a lot read. Yay!

2) Finish writing (and publish) a couple of blog posts I've had in drafts for awhile, where "awhile" is anywhere from yesterday to a month ago. Don't get too excited -- they aren't that amazing :)
     As you can tell I published a few posts which were on my mind. I hope you enjoyed them. And even if you didn't, I mostly write stuff for the blog that I want to remember, so I'm still glad they're done :) But I still have one more long awaited post to work on. Maybe it will get finished sometime this week...?
Sam wasn't listening on Saturday morning so Dave said 
if he continued to not listen then he couldn't help make pancakes. 
Apparently twenty minutes of this was the result.

3) Go to book club on Sunday.
     I went to book club. There were five out of nine people there and since the only person with a car had to pick up her daughter I only stayed for an hour. However in that hour I ate five (small) bowls of popcorn, drank a cup of tea and had two pieces of sea salt chocolate. I would consider book club a success!
     3a) Finish my book club book. I finished my book club book on Friday afternoon before Rachel got sick with a fever and slept most of Friday evening and while Sam wrote his name in sidewalk chalk all over the outside -- the porch steps, the bricks, and, surprisingly enough, the sidewalk. Our book was "The Sisters Brothers" by Patrick DeWitt, a more contemporary Western novel. I didn't really enjoy it.
Rachel ready for church on Sunday.

4) Spring clean Rachel's room, the hallway and entry way, the living room and the dining room.
      Dave stayed up late on Friday night and cleaned the living room and dining room. Yay! Rachel didn't nap on Saturday so we cleaned her room during the afternoon. The hallway and the entry way still need some a lot of work but Dave also stayed up late on Saturday and cleaned a lot of the kitchen. Our spring cleaning feels like it is almost done and I might even be able to finish it during the kids' naptime today. We shall see...

5) Catch up on my daily Bible Reading. I'm about a week behind, which isn't bad considering we're a third of the way through 2013.
     Unfortunately I was about two weeks behind and NOW I'm only a week behind!
     5a) Figure out how we can already be a third of the way through 2013. For those of you who were hoping I'd be able to explain this phenomenon to you, I will have to admit defeat and say I can't. I have no idea how this is possible. I am definitely a believer in the theory that "The days are long and the years are short."
Rachel running with Funny Bunny!

6) Knock a few more things off my "41 Before 41" list.
     I learned how to use the printer. That's about the only thing I was able to knock off my list.
     6a) Write a post about why some of them will never be accomplished. You can check back on Friday for this post.
          6b) Think up convincing excuses reasons for 6a. You will have to see on Friday if my reasons why I didn't accomplish everything are convincing enough acceptable and valid.

 7) Go to Hamilton to celebrate Alissa's ordination with her.
     I definitely did this. Check back later today to read all about it.
     7a) Think about how to explain what "ordination" means in our Mennonite church context. I figured this one out too. Check out 7b) as to how I did it.
          7b) Figure out who to ask about 7a. It turns out that if you go to an ordination service and listen to the sermon you will actually learn some things about ordination. Who knew?!?
Attempt #1 to get a new blog header picture.

8) Change the blog header to reflect the more Spring-like weather. I think, with Dave's help, the blog looks a lot more Spring-like now. What say you guys?
     8a) Hope the weather will take a hint from the updated blog header and STAY THAT WAY! It seems that the weather reads our blog and has been convinced of the merits of Spring. The lows for the week are between 9-10C (around 50F) and the high for my birthday (on Thursday!!!) is 21C (70F). That is definitely gorgeous weather!

9) Deal with the pile of paper on the plastic organizer, which is really an extension of my desk.
     I read through a bunch of the paper while I was waiting in line to get our tires changed and some more while I sat outside on Saturday afternoon. When I wasn't cleaning that is.
Attempt #13 to get a new blog header photo.

10) Go to the gym. Preferably on my own. Possibly with the entire family in tow. This, sadly, did not happen. At all.

11) Take some pictures so that I won't have to post any more picture-less posts. It doesn't bother me when other people do that but it does when I do that. I threw some random pictures of Sam and Rachel into this post for you. You're welcome. Some of them Dave took on Saturday morning while I was having fun at Costco!
     11a) Figure out why I hold the double standard mentioned above. This one is easier to answer than 5a) because it deals with my own thoughts. I think I find other people's lives interesting enough to read about that I don't feel the need to see pictures all the time. However, I don't know why you would find my life interesting enough to read about, without the pictures to break up the monotony. And I know my mom only checks out the blog to see new pictures of Sam and Rachel! (Hi mom!) There is always the chance that you all hold the same double standard as I do and then I don't need to worry. Except for the fact that then we all think we need to have picture-filled posts. Oh sigh...!
 
Attempt #27 to get a new blog header photo.

Saturday, April 27, 2013

On Going To The Gym Again

So on Wednesday night I went to the gym. Which wouldn't have been such a big deal if it weren't for the fact that it was my first visit in 67 days. (Why am I even telling you guys this?!?!) I paid $90.40 for that one visit. I joined the gym because I figured at going 3 times a week I'd only be paying about $2.50 a visit. Obviously that logic only works if I go 3 times a week though. So I didn't go for awhile because I wasn't feeling great and then I was down about our incredibly loooong winter and then we bought a house and then my parents were here to visit and then I was tired and then... Well, you can see how it goes. Anyways, I wanted to share my random thoughts on going to the gym again after a really (really really) long break.
Since we're not allowed to take pictures at the gym (Thank Goodness!!!),
you have to make do with a picture of my gym bag. Which is actually
an important part of this post :)
1) Those workout capris I bought after my last gym visit are way better to work out in then my really old gym shorts. Good purchase. And at this rate they are only costing me $20 a visit! I justified getting them because I read somewhere that if you can get yourself down to $1 per wear on a piece of clothing then it is worth buying. So if you pay $80 for a pair of shoes you should wear them at least 80 times. Makes sense right? Well I figured I'd have those capris paid for within a month (remember, three gym visits a week?). At this rate they'll be paid for in 3 3/4 years. I think I need to work on that a bit :)

2) I did the cross trainer and I just about died. Seriously at the end I was counting down the minutes and seconds just to get myself through. Maybe I shouldn't have jumped back into things full steam ahead. Ten minutes of working out would have been perfectly acceptable right?!?! I was just happy I could walk the next day with little ill effect. Next time I'll have to attempt the weight circuit too...

3) I have a mix of music I listen to on my iPod shuffle while I exercise. I found the songs which were really inspiring to me this time were the instrumental Kindermusik songs from the DewDrops curriculum. It was a lot of Irish music. I also really liked "Do You Hear The People Sing?" from (the Broadway production) Les Mis soundtrack. That one was so awesome I had to repeat it a couple of times. "When the beating of your heart matches the beating of the drum there is a life about to start when tomorrow comes." This line takes on a whole new meaning when your heart rate is over 150bpm (according to the (potentially inaccurate???) machine) and you are at the gym for the first time in over two months. Also "Don't Stop Believin'" from Glee was a good one.

4) The gym should have an alarm that goes off when your membership cards gets swiped and it's been more than a month since your last visit. I think a little public humiliation would inspire a lot of motivation to get to the gym. Although last time it had been a while between gym visits I asked the desk guy what the record was and he said there was one person who hadn't been to the gym in 1009 days and counting. That's almost three years of no gym visits people BUT still paying to be a member there. Why???

5) They renovated the gym since last time I was there. (They were working on renovations but not quite done in February.) I got lost. It was embarrassing. But not quite the public humiliation and motivation needed from number 4.

6) I had to look up my lock combination. Sad but true.

7) In February I lost a necklace which I bought when I went to Jordan with my parents. I looked everywhere* for it and honestly blamed Rachel. She'd been playing with my necklaces and throwing things in the garbage and I reached what I thought was a logical conclusion. It was trash. Then I was looking through my gym bag on Wednesday, trying to reacquaint myself with what was in it and, lo and behold what to my wondering eyes did appear but a miniature sleigh and eight tiny reindeer my necklace! There was much celebration and I apologized to Rachel for blaming her.

*Obviously I'd looked everywhere except in my gym bag.

8) Honestly, I've missed going to the gym. I've missed the exercise. I've missed feeling like I was doing something proactive to stay healthy. I've missed my exercise class, which I love. Sh'Bam, in case you're wondering.

So there you have it -- go work out because you've paid for it, you'll hear some awesome music, you might find something that once was lost, it won't be embarrassing and you might even enjoy it.

Friday, April 26, 2013

Wisdom

So I'm a little late in posting my scripture memory verse for the latter half of April but I wanted to write about it a bit.

Ecclesiastes 7:12

Wisdom is a shelter as money is a shelter,
but the advantage of knowledge is this:
that wisdom preserves the life of its possessor.

As I've written about before, Grandma lived to be almost 104 years and nine months old. Everyone always asked her the secret to a long life and in her Bible I found the latter half of this verse underlined: "Wisdom preserves the life of its possessor." I think Grandma knew that she had found the secret to a long life!

But I also think she knew that her words of wisdom would live on long after she had passed. The one thing I remember Grandma saying is "Don't think that way." Whenever we were worried about something or having negative thoughts Grandma would tell us "Don't think that way." She knew that a positive attitude would take you far in life. After all, look how far it took her :)

She also taught some important lessons about money. She knew that money would not help her live longer so she gave a lot of it away. She firmly believed in giving to charities which helped people who were less fortunate and that is another piece of wisdom I believe she firmly passed on to all who knew her. This line from her obituary has stayed with me, "She expressed regret that the younger generations did not appear to give as freely as she had hoped and wondered what would happen to the poor of the world."

So for these past few weeks I have been thinking about wisdom and money and Grandma. It's been a good verse to spend some time with.

Weekend Plans

(I am totally copying this from NieNie. I have no original ideas of my own today!)

Here is what I am hoping to get accomplished this weeked:

1) Get the winter tires taken off our car and all-seasons put on. I am deciding that if it snows again between now and November we will just stay home! Ha! Really this is just an excuse for me to hang out at Costco by myself for awhile on Saturday morning. Pretty awesome really!

2) Finish writing (and publish) a couple of blog posts I've had in drafts for awhile, where "awhile" is anywhere from yesterday to a month ago. Don't get too excited -- they aren't that amazing :)

3) Go to book club on Sunday.
     3a) Finish my book club book.

4) Spring clean Rachel's room, the hallway and entry way, the living room and the dining room.

5) Catch up on my daily Bible Reading. I'm about a week behind, which isn't bad considering we're a third of the way through 2013.
     5a) Figure out how we can already be a third of the way through 2013.

6) Knock a few more things off my "41 Before 41" list.
     6a) Write a post about why some of them will never be accomplished.
          6b) Think up convincing excuses reasons for 6a.

7) Go to Hamilton to celebrate Alissa's ordination with her.
     7a) Think about how to explain what "ordination" means in our Mennonite church context.
          7b) Figure out who to ask about 7a.

8) Change the blog header to reflect the more Spring-like weather.
     8a) Hope the weather will take a hint from the updated blog header and STAY THAT WAY!

9) Deal with the pile of paper on the plastic organizer, which is really an extension of my desk.

10) Go to the gym. Preferably on my own. Possibly with the entire family in tow.

11) Take some pictures so that I won't have to post any more picture-less posts. It doesn't bother me when other people do that but it does when I do that.
     11a) Figure out why I hold the double standard mentioned above.

Have a great weekend! What are your plans?

Wednesday, April 24, 2013

Earth Day Cupcakes: A Pinterest Inspired Make Work Project!

A friend of mine teaches first grade and she pinned this to her board and when I saw them I knew I had to make them!
So how did they turn out? Well read on to see...

The main point of making them was not that I thought it was super-important to celebrate Earth Day on Monday because I think we should celebrate Earth Day every day. As you can tell by the fact that I made these yesterday :) The point was that I thought they would be fun to make. And they were. I just made my regular cupcake batter. And then I divided the batter in half and dyed half of it blue and half of it green. I think the original poster used day-glo food colouring because I added a lot of it (like 25 drops to each half) and couldn't get the bright colours she got. However, as I may have mentioned before, I am not a perfectionist so I decided to just go for it and see what I got.
Then we took a beater licking break because Sam couldn't wait any longer!
And it was entirely planned completely random that Sam and I just happened to be wearing shirts which matched the batter colours!
 Rachel thought this beater licking thing looked pretty cool and she wanted to give it a try.
The hardest part for me was trying to figure out how to get the cupcake batters mixed together in the muffin cups properly. I mostly just winged it (wung it???).
Here is the non-baked finished result. I was just hoping they would turn out at this point but it was an 18 minute wait while they baked.
And the final result! Even though I didn't end up with the brilliant colours of the original one, I was pretty impressed that they looked like abstract little earths. Yay me! And they tasted really good too which was the really important thing. If you're looking for a fun little thing to do to commemorate Earth Day (a day late mind you!) then I would highly recommend making these. We also celebrated Earth Day by eating vegetable chowder, the bread I baked on Saturday and then working in our yard all evening. Yay for The Earth :)

Tuesday, April 23, 2013

Making Time For My Friends

I'm joining Kelly and the other Build 'Em Up bloggers in talking about I make time for my friends. Go here to join in on the conversation. My friends are so important to me. Except for our time in Edmonton most of my closest friends are either from church or from the residence I stayed in at university. I stayed at my church's residence at a secular university and it was the best of both worlds for me.
My closest friend, Janice, and I spend a lot of time together, usually with our husbands (who thankfully get along well!) and our kids (who also thankfully get along well!). We also manage to take time together just the two of us by planning pedicures or going out for tea. For these next few months we signed up Sam and her son for swimming lessons at the same time (even though they are nowhere near to being in the same class) and we are going to spend some of those evenings either going for a walk or going to Starbucks or both :) We also plan things for our families to do together, some of which you've likely read about before if you're a regular around here. I'm thankful that Janice is intentional about making separate time to spend with her friends because it helps that we both think it is important.
Another way we spend time together is by going on some double dates. We have done this a few times in the past year and have more planned in the future. It's a nice way to have some couple time AND some friend time. Yay for multi-tasking :) I highly recommend this as a good way to spend time together, especially if your husbands get along well.

I am also part of a monthly women's craft night at our church. I find that time is so important for me. Not only is it a chance for me to get things done, or learn something new, but it's a chance for uninterrupted adult conversation both about life, our church and our families. We are talking about doing a weekend retreat sometime in the near future and I cannot wait for that to happen. It would be such an amazing time with them. I have no pictures from Sew Be It (as we call it) because I'm usually too busy crafting talking to remember to take any!
The above groups of friends are from university and we don't see each other as regularly. And when we do it's usually with our families. Once in awhile I get some girl time with them and I really enjoy it. I do find it's a lot harder when we almost all have kids, and don't all live near each other, to get kid-free girl time. We usually get together with our families included.
Another couple you've probably heard about if you've read here for any length of time is Donny and Marika. They are another good couple friend of ours and they don't have kids. We get lots of time to visit with them after our kids go to sleep. And they are really great with our kids so Sam and Rachel love Uncle Donny and Auntie Marika. Even though Donny and Marika live about an hour and a half away, we see them a lot which is so great. Again, what helps this relationship work is that we are both intentional about making time for it.
 
And I would be remiss in talking about spending time with friends without mentioning my New Mom's Group from Edmonton. We all met when our first children were between four months and six weeks old. We were part of an official group through the City of Edmonton for six weeks and then we just kept meeting. We had weekly playdates and some of our kids were in Kindermusik and gymnastics together. We looked after each other's kids and a lot of us went through our second pregnancies together. This is an amazing group of women and I miss them so very much. Even though we got to spend a lot of time together with our kids we also got a few women-only evenings and they were so much fun.

I think the best way to make time for your friends is to just do it. Like me, I'm sure most of us spend a lot of time with our friends AND our kids and sometimes our husbands. But it's also vital for me to have time with them that is away from my kids. I'm thankful that Dave, my husband, is supportive of that and recognizes that time is important for me because it does take time away from our family. But he knows that it makes me a better wife and mom and I almost always come back from time with my friends with renewed energy to parent again and that's a win-win situation for everyone!

Monday, April 22, 2013

Spring Has Sprung!

(And I've been too busy enjoying it to blog!) There, that's my true confession. It's not that I don't have anything to say, it's that we've been taking full advantage of the weather and doing as much as possible outside. And spring cleaning the rest of the time. And oh yeah, we went to the synagogue and to church this past weekend. No wonder I had a nap this afternoon :)

Instead of a well thought-out blog post you get a random assortment of stories and pictures from our weekend. Friday morning we had a playdate with Karen, Caleb and Nathan because Caleb had a PD day and wasn't in school. It was so much fun to hang out with them. And we got invited to stay for a leftover lunch that was awesome! That night we had Shabbat and Sam and I watched a DVD about fire trucks and ate popcorn and drank smoothies. I think that was possibly the highlight of Sam's week.
Rachel (mostly) successfully drank out of a cup on Saturday morning. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I see a future when I'm not washing sippy cups every day. Whoo hoo!!! Then we went to a service at the synagogue where Dave was playing music, along with a bunch of other people. We weren't planning on staying for the oneg (after service lunch) but we did, and thanks to Dave's parents, it was good. They did a lot with the kids while Dave and I actually got a chance to eat.

That afternoon we started our spring cleaning, which Sam was super-excited about for some reason. He was actually somewhat helpful and I'm amazed that he was entertained for an entire two hours of cleaning. I also baked bread which you can read about in my previous post.

On Sunday after church we had an impromptu potluck and it was so amazing and so much fun. I just love my church and this is one of the reasons why. Plus we sang some great hymns that day which I just felt like I'd been missing lately. I'll have to see if any of them can be turned into a Hymn Of The Week later on this week. That afternoon we did more spring cleaning and now I just want to live in our bathroom!

While I made supper, Dave, Rachel and Sam headed outside. They ended up joining in on a road hockey game. By the time I got out there to get some pictures, the other players had deserted the road. By my intrepid team played on!
This morning I went to playgroup at my church and then we went to Carla, Aaron and Ella's for lunch. But first they introduced us to an amazing family farm which sells everything from apples to flowers to cheese. Their apple orchards inspired me to take some pictures.
We spent almost the entire time at Carla's outside and my kids never ate any lunch. I had two huge helpings on the awesome pasta salad so I think I made up for their lack of eating. Rachel didn't want to wear her shoes so her socks are sooooo muddy but she had such a great time! Then we came home and we all napped after our exhausting day. Dave came home to "The Napping House" as he called it when reading Sam that book tonight :) We headed out for supper because I'd napped instead of making supper we'd won a gift card to Swiss Chalet and then, because Rachel was devastated that she was the only one without sunglasses, we went shopping and rectified that travesty.
And now I'm off to bed. But first I have to share my first outdoor planter of this spring! And a funny story -- I was telling Dave I'd bought pansies at the farm and he said, "I saw the tulips, where were the pansies?" And I replied, "On the front porch steps which you went up and down no less than two times tonight." And Dave sheepishly replied, "Three times." At which point I started to worry that someone had stolen my pansy planter since Dave hadn't seen them. Turns out he really wasn't paying attention.
And that's what's been going on around here the past few days which is why I haven't blogged much lately. Tomorrow will be an exciting day of laundry and dishes and errands because there hasn't been much of that going on around here either :)