Weekend Recap

I'm sitting here trying to brace myself for tomorrow morning.  The forecast calls for 1-3" of snow with a windchill making it feel like it's back in the teens.

And just a day ago it was 77 and partly sunny.  Even though it was warm enough for shorts and a t-shirt like my husband, Scott, was wearing, it felt wrong to have the kids in summer clothes.

Regardless of the impending weather, it was a gorgeous weekend and we made the most of it.

Friday, my parents came over after work and we all went out to Chili's for dinner.  My choice, of course.  Bottomless chips and salsa, strawberry lemonade, tortilla soup, yum!  Even Evan, my picky eater, was gobbling down spoonfuls of the spicy tortilla soup.  I guess maybe he's a more adventurous eater like Scott.  Bring on the spices!

Saturday, we loaded in the van and headed over to my school to watch the construction on 96.  Since there's a pedestrian crosswalk for my school, we took advantage of that and let the kids run up and down the crosswalk while watching the working trucks.

Sean was in his element.

Evan amused himself by waving at every truck that drove by and screamed in delight when he found that a few of them even honked.  Let's be honest.  We all were pretty excited when those trucks honked for us.

As we worked our way back down the service drive towards home, we decided to stop at another spot where a huge crane was working to build a retaining wall.

Now Sean tells us he's building a freeway as he plays with his working trucks in the dirt and rocks in the backyard.  I'm glad we could give him this experience.  And the added bonus: We can go as many times as we'd like from now until October.  The one plus to the massive construction that's messing up my commute to work.

After watching the trucks we headed to a park on Hines Drive to let the kids run around and blow off steam before lunch and naps.  It was packed!  But, so much fun!

When did he get to be such a big kid?  Climbing up the play structure and going down the slide himself.  Crazy...

After naps, I took the boys over to my friend Trisha's house for a play date and dinner with her two kids.  She put together a fun Easter egg hunt in the backyard and we got pizza and salad for dinner.  The kids had a blast and I had to peel them away from the toys.  I guess playing with princess stuff was a nice change.

Amazingly enough, none of the kids fought over the eggs during the hunt and it was good practice for the big egg hunt at Maybury Park this weekend for Easter!

By Sunday, everyone was exhausted.  We just enjoyed the usually mild weather, played outside, and did our usual weekend chores.  I even managed to escape after tutoring to go to Bed, Bath, and Beyond and HomeGoods to get some supplies for my spring break projects.

Speaking of spring break...only 3 more days to go!  And then I'm off for a glorious 10 days!  And the best part is, when we return to school, there's only 7 more weeks.  Time is flying by!

Another fun weekend in the books.

3 1/2 and full of sass!

It's been an interesting night in the F household.

And by interesting, I mean it's a small act of God that I survived the evening at home with my 3 1/2 year old who thinks he's a 15 year old teenage girl.  While I'm sure that a 15 year old girl doesn't fill her days calling people "poopy" or making "shooting" noises at people, I'm pretty sure smirks, heavy sighs, and bouts of yelling fit the description.  Oh, the drama!

We are in full-blown preschool mode.  While I envisioned these days being filled with silly conversations, singing songs, learning sight words, and practicing handwriting skills, I wish someone would have warned me that was merely a fraction of what it means to be a preschooler.

A better description would be three-is-the-new-two, coupled with attitude-for-days, and pushing-the-boundaries-until-mom-snaps.

Introducing Sean:

He may look innocent, but he's been known to take away his brother's toys, pinch, hiss at you, and even growl at you like a scary monster.  Look out now!

But, when he lets down his guard, he's also been known to give the best.hugs.ever!  He'll randomly surprise you with comments like, "I love you so much mommy.  That makes me so happy."  He also decides at certain moments to reach out and hug his brother as tight as he can.

It's times like those when I begin to overlook the "poopy dinner" he refused to eat or the tantrum about going to Tiny Town at 8:30am on a Sunday morning.

Because deep down inside, he's just a little boy that is afraid of bugs, but loves to dig in the dirt and sand knowing that they'll be bugs in there.

He's willing to try new activities like skiing or t-ball, but hasn't quite found his niche yet. 

He's so intent on being independent one minute as he hits the t-ball with the bat "BY MYSELF", but needs help getting his shirt off before bath or figuring out which shoe goes on which foot.

His daddy is his favorite friend and the one he asks to read him stories before bed every night.

He's a dreamer.  He prefers made-up stories to actual paperback books.  He'll tell you stories himself when we've run out of stories to tell.  They have to be about working trucks and they usually involve a swimming pool.  He draws pictures of ghosts and monsters.  And he loves to say, "I have an idea!" all wide-eyed.

He can be stubborn and gets frustrated easily when something is challenging.  Working on a letter and can't quite make it the right shape?  He'll scribble all over in frustration.  Trying to peddle a trike down the driveway and he gets stuck?  He'll put his feet down on the ground and use them to push off the cement instead.  Ask him to draw a circle?  He'll draw lines that represent ghosts.

He's smart.  He's inquisitive.  He knows exactly what he likes and doesn't like.  He thinks he's got life all figured out.  And despite the challenging age and all that comes with it, it's an age of independence and discovery and he finds a way to make me laugh every day.

Like tonight, when he told me to "make good choices" after he got out of time out.  Apparently, my decision to put him in time out wasn't a "good choice".  How can you not love a smarty-pants like that??

Forever Frozen

Oh my gosh.

We are obsessed.  Obsessed with everything Frozen.

 Well, except when things are Frozen outside of course.  But, seriously.  The soundtrack has been on repeat non-stop since Grandma bought it for the boys for Valentine's Day.  The movie has been on or in the background once a day since it was released two weeks ago.  And it never gets old.

Here's Evan indicating that we better put Frozen on, or else.

And his reaction when he realized we would put it on.

We had to share this addicting movie with my parents who hadn't seen it yet this past weekend.

Yup, everyone was captivated by it.

But, since we've been blessed with some warmer, Spring-like weather these past few days, we've ditched the movie and got ourselves outside before Mother Nature, or Elsa, throws us a curve ball.

And with Spring comes Opening Day!  My have the times changed.  Our days of heading downtown at 8am to tailgate with friends all day have ceased.  Now, we're resorted to taking annual pictures of the kids decked out in their Tiger's gear and watching the game at work on TV.

A Tiger's victory and 60 degree weather certainly made for an exciting start to the week!

Since Easter is a few weeks ago and the warmer weather has me desperate to change something in our house, I've been frequenting Pinterest for craft ideas for the boys and home renovation ideas.  First round of Pinterest projects brought on Easter eggs made out of coffee filters, markers, and a spray bottle with water.  Sean loved watching the colors "bleed" after I sprayed the water.

Now they look very "Spring-y" hanging in our front window of the house!

These also tie in well with my other project.  Decorating the mantle for Spring!

Say adios to our tacky mantle and our gold fireplace doors.  Our first home renovation project this year starts next week with Scott on spring break.  He's going to re-paint the mantle a wood tone that matches our furniture and he's going to spray paint the gold doors a brushed nickle color to match the hardware in the living room.  I hope it makes a huge difference!  A cheap difference, I might add.

Speaking of Pinterest....it's calling my name.

The Butterfly Effect

We escaped to a tropical climate with lush, green plants, warm air, and exotic birds and insects.

Well, for a few minutes at least.

The Detroit Zoo was our playground this past Saturday.  With temps in the 40's and a forecast projecting colder weather again, I knew this was our opportunity to get some fresh, brisk air while doing something we haven't done since the summer.

See, there's reality.  Winter coats, hats, gloves, and boots.

One of the many benefits of going while the weather was still cool was the fact that many of the animals were indoors.  This gave us time to warm up and it allowed us to be up close and personal with some of the animals that are normally farther away.

The kids had a great time and both Scott and I commented on how quickly the time goes when you're out and about.  The boys didn't bicker, there wasn't a mess to clean up, and both kids were so tuckered out that they took a 3 hour nap!

In other news, we've been keeping busy at home and at work.  March starts the busy season at the high school with ACT testing, spring conferences, and all the senior events including the Mr. Thurston contest I judged last night and Prom that I'll be chaperoning in May.

Sean and Evan are growing so fast!  Evan was measured at his well-visit appointment at few weeks ago and he's already 33.5" tall!  No wonder some people have asked us if the boys were twins.  He's catching up to Sean!

Sean is working hard at his handwriting skills and bike-riding skills.  His new tractor I scored at a Mom2Mom sale is helping keep him motivated at learning how to peddle.  We just need some warmer weather to justify being outside on this thing every day!

We are starting to really get excited about our Portland trip in June!  I even ordered a travel cot for Evan to sleep on at my brother's place.  We booked a return trip to the Great Wolf Lodge in August since we had such a blast a few weekends ago!  This time we're bringing my parents being as though they've never been to an indoor water park.  And there's even talk of a Disney trip next year.  Whether it's in February during mid-winter break or the summer.  We ordered our free Disney planning DVD and all it took was a 30 second clip of Magic Kingdom and Sean was jumping around in excitement.  He didn't quite understand that we couldn't just put our shoes and coat on that minute and go...

In the meantime, I'm gearing up for a field trip this week with my Spanish 2 students at the DIA in Detroit and picture day at the daycare!  It's never a dull moment, but I wouldn't have it any other way.