This last week was a pretty typical one for the end of March. I can hardly believe we’re at the end of March. It seems like I was just tucking the Christmas decorations away last week! The weather was pretty typical for this time of year: chilly mornings and warm afternoons. The kids had a minimum day on Wednesday, so we met up with friends at a burger place that has a huge fenced in field (that’s laid with astroturf). It felt good chatting with my friends while the kids played…except we were sitting in the sun and I hadn’t thought to bring my hat. What a rookie mistake! My face got pretty pink and so did one part of one of my legs (I guess the rest of that leg as well as the other one were blocked somehow? I’m still scratching my head about that one). I enjoyed getting to be outside for my daily walks (for which I was sure to grab my hat), and the kids have enjoyed it being warmer when they’ve gone outside for recess at school. Paul had his annual work picnic this week as well. Unfortunately, it was on a weekday, so it didn’t line up to have me take the kids out for it. This morning I got to go to the stake Relief Society activity celebrating the birthday of the Relief Society. It was so fun getting to see my friends from other wards as well as my friends from my ward who I don’t get to see often because we’re busy with our callings during Sundays. While I was gone doing that, Paul took the kids to Lowe’s and came home with new flowers for the front and a cute birdbath for the back. I have a feeling that Abigail influenced the choice of which birdbath to get…you’ll see why I think that in a moment.
Once St. Patrick’s Day passed, Abigail started asking when we would put out the spring decorations. I complied pretty readily. I left up the rainbow garland (it works both for St. Patrick’s and spring), but traded the shamrocks out for flowers. 🙂This is a quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson and I simply love it.Those bunnies right there were the reason Abigail kept asking about the spring decorations. She remembered them from last year. She absolutely loves those bunnies. I’ve told her she needs to be careful (they’re plaster and probably wouldn’t survive a fall from the piano to the floor), so she’ll ever so carefully stick out a finger and pet their heads. 🙂My purple shamrocks…*happy sigh*…they sure are happy with the warmer temperatures!I jokingly told her she needed to stick two fingers up for the picture (she doesn’t really know about peace signs just yet, I don’t think) and she was happy to comply. I sure love this little bug!Can you tell I was wearing big sunglasses? 😂Here’s my leg. 😬Do you see the remnants of Wednesday’s outing on my forehead? My poor face, haha. Paul got a few flowers to fill in the front (which, in this picture is on the left). Some of the wildflowers have come back and last year’s snapdragons (on the right) are back in full force. Paul also made the tree ring bigger and added more mulch. It looks really nice!Do you see why I think Abigail influenced the decision about the birdbath? Now I just need to remember to keep the water in there fresh so that the mosquitoes don’t turn it into a breeding ground. 😉
Ahhhh…NOW it’s spring! The sun is shining, the air is warm, the days are longer (one perk about DST is that the evenings are now light again, so we can do stuff outside after dinner, when it’s a bit cooler)…spring in central Texas is kind of my favorite. It was spring break for the kiddos, so we hung around the house and just relaxed. Abigail lost yet another tooth (at this point, I’m seriously considering blending her food, haha), we celebrated St. Patrick’s Day with some yummy food, and we went to our favorite BBQ joint so that the kids could play on the playground after we finished eating. Overall it’s been a pretty great week!
Joseph had some money saved up, so he decided to get this little Mario Kart themed Hotwheels set. Abigail was “taking pictures” of the race with her toy camera.She has so many holes in her mouth right now!Abigail spent the last of her saved up money on a baby Groot.Playing hospital. The last time they played this, Abigail decided Joseph needed some limbs amputated…so this time, Joseph came armed to make sure she didn’t go overboard, haha.One day, we walked over to the park and met up with friends to play. The walk back wasn’t as fun (it was quite a bit warmer than the walk there).The coat I’ve been eyeing finally restocked, so I bought it before it went back out of stock. I obviously won’t be able to use it for a few months, but at least I’ll have it when the weather cools back down.A nice picture always has to have a silly picture to follow. 😉For St. Patrick’s Day, I made shepherd’s pie and Irish soda farls (basically Irish soda bread but I cook it in my cast iron skillet on the stove as opposed to in the oven). This is the playground at B Daddy’s (our favorite BBQ place). We haven’t been (other than picking up food to go) for over two years!Going down the tube slide at B Daddy’s.They were pretending to be pirates.“Hard to Starboard!”She told him they needed to abandon ship because they were going to crash into an island.Exploring the “island” that their pirate ship crashed into.Sunlight and live oak trees…*happy sigh*
It’s not even April, but I was still fooled! I was embracing spring temperatures and the sunshine that comes with them…and then Mother Nature chucked a curveball, haha. Yesterday and today have been rather chilly. At least today is sunny…it was downright miserable yesterday: cold, overcast, rainy, and windy. I managed to squeeze in a walk in the morning (without getting rained on…too much) before the cold front fully moved in. Paul took the day off yesterday (he had some last minute things to get ready for a Libertarian conference that he’s at today), so Abigail hung out at home. Spring should be back by tomorrow afternoon, though…just in time for the kids’ spring break from school! I’m looking forward to having a bit of a break from the back-and-forth routine with school. The week did go well, though. I was kept busy with my routine of working out, taxiing kids around, running errands, and finally forcing myself to not just tidy, but actually CLEAN the house. I sometimes think I have to try to clean the entire house in one day (like I used to be able to do when we were living in itty-bitty apartments), and the thought of that is understandably overwhelming. The result of that overwhelming feeling is me sitting on the couch, looking at the mess, and saying, “Man…I need to clean this place…” and then not doing it! *insert eyeroll here* This past week I finally said that enough was enough and I broke the house down into zones. I tackled one zone each day. By the time yesterday hit, I had the house much cleaner than it had been on Monday. One other thing that I’ve started doing is getting up at the same as Paul and squeezing in some time to read and study Come Follow Me. I have been working at being consistent with this for a few weeks now and I really feel like it’s making a difference in my life. I’m more patient, not as cranky, and I’m just generally happier. It’s been a good change. Paul has been pretty busy with work, HOA stuff, and Libertarian stuff…and working around the house and yards. I appreciate him so much!! The kids had a great week at school, but are definitely ready for spring break (what kid isn’t, haha).
Here’s my clean kitchen! It took me waaaay too long to get it to this point, so my new goal is to be more consistent with my cleaning so that it doesn’t get as bad as it got.This was a fun sight. Joseph decided to not stick with piano lessons, but he does still like to fiddle around on the piano, making up his own little tunes (or picking out tunes from different video games). Abigail decided she wanted to join in, so she pushed a chair over there. Joseph did start learning recorder in music class at school, so he’s been pretty into that lately.It’s always a good sight to see the treat jars full. 😉This was a pretty epic pool noodle battle.Joseph heard us battling and decided he’d get involved. He made a marshmallow shooter at Primary activities, but he has modified it so that it can shoot Nerf darts (that kid!), so he brought that down and pretended the darts were tranquilizer darts…it was pretty funny. Since it’s breath-powered, the darts don’t come out very fast, so there was no way she could get hurt if he hit her with one (unlike when they come out of a Nerf gun…those things can be pretty powerful!).
