Coloring Eggs, Easter Baskets, and Easter

 Happy Monday everyone! I hope you all had a nice Easter, if you celebrated it. We had a lovely Easter. 

Our Easter celebration actually started Friday night with our annual egg coloring night. This was the same night that we had the bad pizza delivery experience, but we still tried to have some fun. We ended up coloring lots of eggs. The kids had fun, especially the boys when they decided to write things like "Uranus" on the eggs prior to dying them. Life with preteen boys is all I can say ;)

Saturday, it was raining and honestly, I just didn't feel like doing anything. So, we just hung around the house. In the evening, Rebecca and I attended the Easter Vigil mass, as Rebecca was singing in the Holy Week Choir for our church. It was a beautiful, long mass (it was 2.5 hours!). 

Sunday morning, the kids woke to find their Easter baskets before church, so breakfast may have been a piece of fruit and chocolate from their baskets. LOL 

Rebecca's basket had a book, how to knit kit, candy, bubbles and a frisbee underneath.

Jacob's basket had a Kermit (he loves frogs), a NFL draft magazine, bubbles, candy and a frisbee. 

Ben's basket had a new wrestler, a book, bubbles, candy and a frisbee. 

My basket had new sandals, a book and candy. 

Bill's basket had new sandals, the new Spiderman bluray, and candy. 

We all attended mass as a family and we actually all dressed up (we are typically in jeans). I took a picture of the kids before we left. 

In the afternoon, we headed out to my parents' house for dinner. It was a fun time with my parents', niece, nephew, my sister and her dog, and my brother and his fiancé. I didn't take any pictures that afternoon/evening, but just know that it was a simple, low-key, great Easter. 

Today, has been a long day. I was subbing for my co-worker so I went in to do breakfast this  morning. Thankfully, I think I did everything right and don't mind getting the extra hours. Then it was time to do kid pickups and then take kids to choir. Next week I believe is their end of the Spring season concert. We are entering that time of year, where there are a lot of end of the year things and events so I have to make sure I keep my calendar updated. LOL

I am going to end this right here as I am getting sleepy. I need to put Jacob to bed and then I am going to head to bed myself I think. I am exhausted. 

Have a good night! Until next time...

Hello

 Happy Good Friday everyone! It's been a minute since I have updated here. It is just the season of life I am in and sometimes things have to not be done and usually it comes down to this here space. 

So, what have we been up to... let's catch the highlights of what I can remember...

I took my mom and Rebecca to see Amy Grant in concert in our town. We went to dinner before hand at our local Mexican place and then went to the concert. It was a fantastic show and I am so glad we went. 

The weather has kept us all on our toes. One day it is sunny and 70, the next it is cold and 32, etc. Last weekend we had all 4 seasons it seems in a course of 24 hours including snow, sunshine, wind, rain and thunderstorms. Today it is wasn't too bad out but we have had a wind advisory. 

Work has been crazy. When we came back from Spring Break, I had to work with a sub and the health department came. So it was insane. The next day we didn't get our delivery of salads that were needed for lunch that day so that crazy and hectic. It has just been insane. Thankfully, we have a 3 day weekend this weekend so I can rest.

Kids are keeping me busy as usual, between school runs and choir runs, etc. Our church put together a holy week choir and Rebecca joined so I have been shuttling her to practice and we have had mass and service this week. We are getting ready for the end of the school year craziness so that should be fun. 

I just wanted to jump on here real quick for an update. Pizza just arrived (and of course now the order was wrong....urggh....) so I need to go deal with that. Hope everyone is doing well!  

Ben is 10!

Happy Sunday everyone! How is everyone's weekend going? Mine has been busy, as yesterday was Benjamin's 10th birthday!! How can it be that my baby is 10 years old?? Seems like just yesterday I had him. Crazy how time flies! 

We celebrated Benjamin all day. He got to pick out his lunch and of course he requested McDonald's and he wanted to eat there. So that is what we did. 😄

In the afternoon, he got to talk to his grandparents in Florida and thank them for a gift card they sent him in the mail. 

Then it was time to head to my parents' house for his birthday dinner pizza party. I decided to have it there as they have much more room than we do, and it is dog friendly for my sister to bring her dog. (I don't think her dog would do very well in our small home and with our cats!). I took over cut up cantaloupe and a huge salad to go along with pizza that I was going to order from a local pizza place. I also took along his cake that I had made him. 

He had a really fun time playing outside with his cousins. They played some basketball and practiced some baseball before dinner. He even played a couple rounds of "Guess Who" with my sister.  

After dinner, it was time for cake and presents. Ben loved his cake. I tried to incorporate his favorite things... WWE wrestling, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Battlebots and Legos. 

He received some nice things...including a couple of Hexbug Battlebots which he has been playing with all day today. He also received a couple wrestlers that he didn't have, a couple dress polo shirts for church, a Tom Brady t-shirt and a Tom Brady book. He was one happy kiddo! 

I still can't believe he is 10. I wrote this on Facebook as a tribute: 

Happy birthday to the craziest, loudest, Star Wars loving, WWE loving, Battlebots loving, Tom Brady loving, bracket loving, basketball playing, McDonald's loving, super opinionated kiddo out there! Ben, you've completed our family as the best son and brother we could have asked God for. 10 years ago, I had no idea the wild ride that I was taking on as being your mom, but I thank God every day that he chose to bless us with you! We love you! 

Happy Birthday Benjamin! 

Visiting, Waterfalls, and Taste Testing

Happy Thursday night everyone! This week the kids and I are on Spring Break from school and honestly the week is flying by. I would like to say that I have been very productive, when in fact the opposite is true. This week has been up and down emotion wise for me. For example, today everything and everyone has been annoying me and I really don't know why. I just am annoyed. It is what it is. 

There have been some good things though this week. On Monday, I took the kids out to my sister and her partner's new apartment to check it out. We had a nice time hanging out and had sandwiches for lunch. Then we all played the game "Headbandz" which was quite fun. 

When we came home, Bill was still at work and when he came home, he surprised me with roses as he knew I have been having some bad emotional, depressive days lately.

 

Wednesday, the weather was beautiful (with highs near 74) so we headed out to see what fun we could get into. We went to Goodwill, where Rebecca found a lovely, formal dress for her choir performance in May and 2 pairs of shorts for Summer. When we left Goodwill, I decided that I needed some Nature therapy, specifically with a water feature. So, we headed out to Honey Run Waterfall. It was the perfect day to go, and I felt so much better after we hiked a little. 

Like I said, today I have been annoyed all day. However, trying to salvage the day we did a fun activity for dinner. We decided to do blind taste-testing of a few items off of fast-food restaurant menus. We decided to try out chicken nuggets, basic cheeseburger, crispy chicken sandwiches, and French fries from Wendy's, Burger King and McDonald's. 

First up, was the kids. We blindfolded them. Then they sampled a taste of each thing. After they tasted it, they scored it from 1-10 and then guessed where it was from. It was fun.

Then, it was mine and Bill's turn.

 

What we learned was that overall McDonald's was our winner. However, Burger King came in a close 2nd with Bill and I. I went in thinking Wendy's was the best, but obviously that isn't reality. It was a fun activity and one I think we will do again over Summer break with other foods (like potato chips, or something healthier like different kinds of apples or berries.)

We will have a busy couple of days this weekend. Tomorrow, I have to go to the store, CVS, make a cake for Ben's birthday, get Jacob and Rebecca to do any school work they need to do. Saturday is Benjamin's 10th birthday and we are having a small pizza party for him out at my parent's house (as they have a larger house and are dog friendly! LOL). 

How is everyone else doing? Have you ever done a blind taste test? Do you like being in nature? 

Crazy week & Crazy weather

 Happy Sunday everyone! How are you doing in your corner of the world? 

Here I had mentioned that it was going to be a crazy week last week and boy was it ever. Bill had inventory at his job and being in his new position of team lead, he had to work really long days. To give you an idea on Tuesday he went into work at 7am and he finally came home around 11:00PM and that was only having one lunch break and maybe another 15-minute break. It was insane. Then he was back up and in the store at 5AM the next morning for actual inventory day. He worked 12+ hours days for most of the week. He was sent home on Wednesday night around 7 when the store manager told him he looked sick and to go home since he had stayed around the night before. He wasn't really sick, just exhausted and dehydrated. Thankfully, he had Friday and Saturday off to recoup. 

Those days meant long days for me as well, since I was responsible for EVERYTHING those days. I also don't know about you guys, but I can't sleep very well when my husband is not at home so I couldn't fall asleep like normal and that messed up my sleep schedule which was already messed up by the change in time. Add in a change in my own work schedule, crazy weather, and a sick kid for 2 days and it wasn't the best week. 

However, I survived and there were some highlights. I packed a salad Monday to eat at the park between work and picking kids up from school as I knew that it was going to be the best weather day. It is so relaxing by the water. 

Tuesday and Wednesday, I got called to another school to work. (I would love to go a full week working the job that I am contracted for and not being pulled to work at other schools.) The weather was cloudy and icky. In fact, on Wednesday, we had tornado watches in our state. Thankfully the bad storms passed us over and we just got really heavy rains.

 

Thursday was my mom's birthday and also a day I had to call off work because Jacob was sick. He had a fever and diarrhea. I think it is the same thing that Ben had last week. I want to say I got some stuff done at home, but I didn't as I was exhausted. 

Friday morning, I was greeted with just about 3 minutes of a lovely sunrise. It was enough to make me smile.

Jacob tried to go to school, however within a half hour I got a call from the nurse's office that he wasn't feeling good, so I picked him up and brought him back home to spend the day with Bill while I went to work. Thankfully, I was back at work at my contracted school, and we were all glad because at end of the workday it was the beginning of our district's Spring Break! So, I am off for a week! 

Yesterday, we went to my parents' house to celebrate my mom's birthday and my brother's upcoming birthday (on Tuesday). We had a yummy dinner of burgers and hot dogs (cooked inside as it was snowing and freezing out). My dad and nephew made the cake, and it was super yummy! My dad insisted on putting lots of candles on the cake. There were 85 candles on it (61+1 to grow on for my mom and 22+1 to grow on for my brother!). It was a nice time!

 

Today, we woke up to snow! The kids and I ventured out to church and then back home. 

After lunch, I cleaned up the kitchen, pantry and started laundry. I am trying to get some things done today to jump start our week. I am hoping to try a new recipe for crescent chicken rollups for dinner. 

This coming week, I am trying to plan a few things so we are not just sitting at home, but I also need to get some cleaning done as we will have the family over for Ben's birthday next Saturday. The weather is supposed to be weird so not sure what we will do just yet (it is supposed to be in the upper 20s tomorrow, 30s on Tuesday, 73 on Wednesday, 60 on Thursday and then back into the 40s for the weekend!)

What are you up to today? What's the weather like where you are? 

Happy Spring!

 Happy Sunday everyone! And Happy 1st Day of Spring! Yahoo! Today it is sunny here and around 55 degrees. Thankfully, Benjamin is feeling much better than the last time I wrote and no one else got sick! 

This week the weather was gorgeous on Wednesday and Thursday. Highs in the low 70s. Wednesday, I packed my lunch for after work and ate at the park in between getting off of work and before I had to pick kids up from school.

 

Thursday, Bill picked me up from work and we repeated lunch at the park as a date before we had to pick kids up from school. Bill got us Jersey Mike's tuna subs for lunch. It was pretty yummy. 

Friday, I had to go to my first in-service day. We learned about how to use a fire extinguisher from the fire department and then were to head to our schools to clean. Instead of cleaning, I headed to my school logged on and did some new employee online trainings that I needed to complete before the end of the month (taking quizzes over things like sexual harassment, child nutrition, etc.). After I came home, I took the kids to Wolf Run to walk their storybook trail. It was a nice walk, even if the trail coming back is mainly uphill and I was struggling with my chest hurting. I still can't do inclines, but it is what it is. 

Yesterday it was raining off and on all day, and I just felt blah. Didn't really want to do anything, couldn't concentrate enough to read or anything. It was just a blah day. Bill and the boys spent most of the day watching March Madness basketball. 

Today, I have gotten a few things done. The kids and I went to mass and I taught PSR. I finished up my online training. I folded 5 loads of laundry that were in baskets. I have March Madness on for the boys. I started more laundry. And all of that laundry has been put away. I actually need to finish up this post and go flip the laundry. My goal is to have most of it done as this week is going to be crazy. It is inventory week at Bill's work so his work schedule is crazy and I will feel better going into the week if the house is clean and ready to go. 

What are you guys up to today? Have you welcomed Spring into your house? Have you been watching March Madness basketball?