As seen in . . .

Boden! It's been my new J.Crew (Dedra and Amy, you know what I mean) - I keep their catalogs to drool over and try to find/make my own knock-offs when possible.

I saw these shirts and knew I could make similar ones. I was excited to make these because I rarely find cute boy things to make!

Show me the $$

C'mon UCONN! I've never been good at math (hello, that's why I'm in marketing!) but I do believe if UCONN wins next weekend, I can win Ed's office bracket. (I have them beating Villanova in the championship.)

At least for one week, everyone participating will see "wildcat" standing #1 and that makes me happy!

Plant Killers

And we couldn't be happier.

I know, it's sad to kill a perfectly healthy plant, but the Russian Sage I had planted a couple summers ago just got ginormous and took over the flowerbed (I wish I had a picture of it electronically). After a couple summers of trying to trim it back to look good, I got tired of it and started digging it out last fall. But of course it wasn't that easy. The roots were super deep and the stems were so thick it was even hard to cut back, so it's been an ugly ball of stems for awhile now.

After we went for a walk and Ed played baseball with the boys tonight, I had a burst of motivation and started working on it again - and the boys were eager to help me.

I couldn't believe it when we succeeded. So we were dorks and each took a picture with it - we were SO proud of ourselves. We even did a victory dance. Ha!

I have big (tomato) plans for that spot now!

Sweet Treats

Brady and I made cookies after naptime today. We dyed Sugar Cookie dough into 3 different colors and then rolled them into stripes to try and make them look like Easter eggs - and sandwiched them together with white frosting.

They turned out pretty good - although I'm beginning to realize that most of the time if sweets/candy don't involve chocolate Brady doesn't love it. He took a couple bites and then was more than happy to give the rest to Brett (Little britches might not only be "mama's boy" but also have his mama's sweet tooth). It was quite humorous to hear Brett volunteer to eat it after he had polished his off.

Good times

It was "girl's day" Saturday - Dedra and Amy came up and we went shopping! Something we do together at least once a year and I need it/them. I would NEVER spend that much time shopping if I weren't with them - I guess I'm just not a good shopper but I really like my purchases and totally enjoyed their company (even though that night they went through my closet and laughed at the clothes I still have from high school and yes, Dedra reminded us that next year will be our 15-year anniversary. yikes!).

I DO love finding a cute pair of shoes though :)



We came home and ate Mexican with Ed and the boys and Quint & Susan. Looking at Quint & Susan's Hawaii honeymoon pictures made me ready for summer (and a vacation!).

Good times!

March Madness

Tonight we went to the Sprint Center and watched a couple of the teams playing in the 1st round of the NCAA tourney here in KC practice. It was fun to feel like part of the March Madness - now I'm ready to fill out my bracket!

Oklahoma was the first team we watched -

My favorite part was at the end of their practice they started shooting half-court shots (frontwards and backwards) and Blake Griffin dunked it (at the kids' request).

And then we watched Michigan practice, but at this point I was more interested in the people around me, the scoreboards, etc.

There were quite a few people there, but everyone was asked to sit in the same section. It was pretty cool - when each team came out to practice they would change the scoreboards to show the team they would be playing and flash their logo/mascot along the big middle one.

Happy St. Pat's Day!

Hope you're wearing green! I can't wait to hear about Brady's St. Pat's Day party - they were making/bringing all kinds of green foods and he's been very excited about the possibility of little green men hiding around his classroom. Sandy is off today, so Brett and I have thoroughly enjoyed hanging out (what a BEAUTIFUL day!).

After dropping Brady off, we had to go get some more jelly beans!

And do a little painting -

A little big of digging and tricycle riding (I know, no green! but that's what happens when you don't get out of your pajamas until naptime! :) -

And tonight we're going to go on our first bike ride of the year (all of us). Hooray for 80 degrees!! At least I can say I felt like I was on spring break for one day . . . . . .

Weekend

Home Depot Kids Clinic - Race cars and track

St. Patrick's Day Float - LOUD rock band right in front of our house (the boys loved it :)

(Our neighbor's) little black dog visited our house for the day - and even made it inside a couple times! little weasel . . . . . .

Sunday dinner on new picnic table -

and dessert!

TGIF!

Couldn't be more ready for a weekend! Brady has a bday party tomorrow afternoon (and I'm going to the store to make the March scrapbook page), but other than that it's a pretty free 2 days.

I DO have a couple things I'd like to cross off my list:

• get elastic so I can finish the pajama pants I'm TRYING to make


• get grass seed so we can watch grass grow in a pot (idea inspired from Brady's classroom - he's the "plant helper" this week and loves to show me his grass in the mornings)


• make these with the kiddos - did you know March is the most difficult time of year for birds and the best time to feed them in your yard? I saw that in an email recently and was surprised. I already wanted to make these, but now I feel it might really help.

Happy weekend!

Yum!

I recently checked this book out at the library and have slowly been going through it and trying the recipes. There are a ton of good ones.



Last night we tried the Peanut Butter Apple Dip - so good!

8 oz. (1 block) cream cheese
1 cup peanut butter
1 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup milk
Just blend together well and dip your apples.

Must Do Today

I promised Brady I'd find out how the Easter Bunny was chosen to be THE Easter Bunny so I'm going to pick this book up at the library on the way home -

License Plate Bookends

These are pretty cool bookends. I'm not sure if I want to bend the license plate from my silver mustang (it's in a special box in the basement :) - I'll have to see if Ed has the license plate from his 'ol red Toyota. Those would make for some memorable bookends!

Big things are happening . . .

So far in the last month, Brady has:

• lost his first tooth


• learned to snap his fingers


• and tie his shoe!

Joining the Stars!

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I haven't watched the last couple seasons of Dancing with the Stars, but I'm psyched about this year's contestants and really excited for it to start tonight. Jewell and Nancy O'dell got hurt and withdrew from the competition and I just found out today Melissa (from the last Bachelor - the girl he proposed to first) and Holly (from my favorite show, the "Girls Next Door":) are replacing them.



It's getting even better - yeah!!

Tub Time

Our weekend didn't start as planned. Brady had been complaining about his bottom hurting for about a day and school had called Friday afternoon to say he was still complaining about it. So Brady and I headed to Urgent Care when I got home Friday. Unfortunately it looked like most of city was there too. We waited 3 hours before getting to see the doctor (I totally understand we were not nearly as serious as some of the cases) and he was diagnosed with a yeast infection. She said warm baths, anti-fungal creme and Benadryl would help us get through it. I feel so sorry for him because it's driving him crazy.

Yesterday he took 4 baths, so we've had some quality tub time. . . . . .

And to give you something more interesting to look at :), here's a scrapbook page I finished this weekend. I asked Brady to draw a picture of himself in January (when he turned 5) and I asked him some questions about his favorite things.

First comes love . . . .

After Brady and I drop Brett off at Sandy's, we always have some interesting conversations. Here's a snippet from this morning -

Out of the blue Brady says, "I don't even know how to live with a girl."

Me: "What do you mean? Like daddy and mommy?"

Brady: "How do you find a girl?"

Me: "Well, a lot of time during college or when people get jobs, they meet people they get along with better than others. . . . . ., but even before that sometimes boys like girls and they become their girlfriends."

Brady: "My girlfriends would be Carissa and Perry. Actually Carissa and I would get along best because she's a K-State fan too."

Too funny!

I support Obama

I support Obama and it's so fun to hear my kids say his name

Quilted

We picked it up last night. The quilter did a great job and put stars and lassos randomly throughout. Brady loves to tell Brett "mom made this for me" and I'm proud to hear him say it :) Now I just need to make one for little britches. Oh . . . and bind this one so it's really complete.



See the star?

Happy Bday!

Right now Dr. Seuss books are on the top of Brady's favorite books list. They are celebrating 105 years of Dr. Seuss at school today so he should love it!

Happy Bday Dr. Seuss!

Snow day

Brett really wanted to get out and play in the snow today. So Ed and the boys got bundled up after lunch and shoveled the driveway, threw snowballs and made a snowman. They had a good time!





My poor flowers. . . . .

17 hours

He was tired. . . .seriously tired. This boy took a nap at 2:30 yesterday afternoon and didn't wake up until 7:15 this morning. And he woke up with a smile on his face and HUNGRY. I was so glad, I was beginning to get worried.



His stomach hadn't felt right the last couple of days and he hadn't been able to sleep well Friday night. Sleep appears to have been the best medicine.