WELCOME BACK SPRING!!!

Oh spring...welcome back! We have missed you so!! We spent today preparing for you... In your honor, most favored season, we hung clothes on the line and spent all day outside in the dirt. So long winter. You have overstayed your welcome and now we must say goodbye!

What a glorious day!!! We went to the library. We went out to lunch. We went to Lowes. I love going to Lowes. Oh the possibilities. Then we came home and got to work. The first thing Michael did was put the clothesline back up...and I promptly put clothes on it. I LOVE MY CLOTHESLINE. Our sheets smell so good. I can't wait to go to bed.

We mixed all of our compost into our garden spaces. What a rich pile of goodness our decayed fruits, vegetables and yard waste turned out to be. All I have to say is save your money buying some fancy composter. Just throw it all in a pile in the corner of the yard and turn it occasionally with a shovel. Perfect. There were so many worms in our compost. Our garden is going to be very, very happy this year!

Katelyn was in HEAVEN today. All of the dirt and worms. She searched for worms all day. We found the biggest worm I've ever seen! Here's Katelyn with a wheelbarrow of our compost. She said, "I love decay." That's our girl!!

Katelyn just kept moving from patch of dirt to patch of dirt. She's going to be sad when things are actually planted there and she's not allowed to play in it.

Is this not a picture of complete contentment?? She was happy as can be. We were outside for hours today and Katelyn loved it. You should have seen the bath tub tonight after Katelyn got out of it.

Romping through the dirt. It took this child 30 seconds to fall asleep tonight. :)

And then of course she was hungry and needed a snack. She ate like a horse today. She had a snack right after she ate her whole plate of dinner. If you ask her what her favorite things to do are she'll tell you, "Eat and play." What a life!

We were super productive today and our soil is ready for some planting. We got broccoli and cabbage plants to get the back corner started and I'll plant lettuce and maybe some spinach seeds back there too.

My tulips and hyacinths started coming up along the side fence so I was clearing out dead leaves and grass that was all around them and I got motivated to cut out a whole little flower bed. I'm going to plant some annuals after the spring flowers are done and edge it all with some kind of rock or stone.

The spring flowers are coming up. It won't be long now.

I resigned from my job this week! With Michael's new position we are able to have me home with Katelyn now. I'm SO excited to have more time with her...more time to do the things around the house that never seem to get done. More time to garden and can. More time to invest in my family. I'm more excited about this spring and summer than I've ever been. God has been so faithful to provide all that we need and I am counting my blessings a whole lot these days.

Silly dance

I made up a silly song with words that aren't really words and moved Katelyn's arms around really fast. She thought it was hillarious! She kept saying, "Again, again, faster, faster." She is full of silliness.

She just danced and giggled.

We got a pizza tonight and we all played and read books.

I know the day will come when Katelyn will not think I'm as hillarious as she does now. That will be a sad day...

...but for now we'll just dance and sing "Hooka macka shacka wacka fa la la."

Out and about

One evening while we were out taking a walk, we discovered that wedged in between our subdivision and the next subdivision up the road there's a house with a couple of horses out back. We named this horse Buddy and Katelyn loves to go visit him and feed him grass. Since it was beautiful out today we decided to let her ride her tricycle around the block and go up and visit Buddy.

He walked right up to the fence as soon as we got there and Katelyn was happy for sure!

Of course we have to conquer the rock! That's my sassy girl.

When we got home she was wiped out so a few books and then off to bed.

We're working on counting to 100. She's getting pretty good. Smarty pants.

Happy Birthday To Me!

Today's my birthday...and I had a great day! Michael and Katelyn made a strawberry dream cake for me yesterday and today they worked on frosting it. (so cute!) Michael made homemade frosting and everything. The cake turned out really awesome. Everyone loved it! Not only was it delicious but seriously, how sweet are these two to bake me a cake. Michael discovered just how fun it is to bake with Katelyn. :) The first strawberry she was going to put on went right into her mouth. Hee hee.

...so then she got a little more direction.

I'm so blessed!

...and then she lost interest altogether and just started licking the spatula.

It was beautiful again today. This is a perfect Katelyn shot. In the dirt with her skirt, tights and rain boots on. I told her that her boots were on the wrong feet but she just told me she liked them that way as she ran out the door. :)

Of course Katelyn helped me blow out the candles.

We had a cookout with friends and family and look at all my beautiful flowers. I LOVE THEM!!!!

Thank you all for making this such a great birthday. I feel really loved!!! I have a feeling this is going to be a GREAT year!!

Could it be...spring?

It was a beautiful day today. I was super thankful because last weekend was cold and rainy and we even had snow on Wednesday! But today the sun was shining and it was sixty degrees out. So we headed right out to the park. Katelyn was SO EXCITED to run, play and climb all over everything! She kept darting from one thing to another. She couldn't decide where to start.

Oh happy day!

This park in Georgetown just up the road from our house (10-12 miles) is one of our favorite places to play.

Katelyn made a friend at the park and these two were two little peas in a pod. She played so well with this little girl. They had a great big time and loved exploring together.

Of course they found the little creek.

They were flying like birds and chasing the geese. It was really fun to watch them.

The little girl's mom said they were at the park all the time...hopefully we'll run into them again.

After we played at the park we went to Chick fil A, grabbed lunch and took it out to Mike and Niki's (brother and sis-in-law's) house they just closed on this week to check it out. It's a great house in a great neighborhood. We're really excited for them!

Katelyn decided last week that she was done napping in the afternoon. The child went from 2 1/2 -3 hour naps every afternoon to nothing. Cold turkey. No warning. We're all grieving the loss of the nap. But she is going to bed really easily at night and sleeping for 11 hours solid! Tonight she was begging to go to bed...she was asleep by 7:45. :)

First day of work

Michael is starting his new job today so I made him take a "first day of work" picture. He was pretty sweet last night and this morning. He had all of the nervous energy of a kid going to school for the first time. Maybe we can take a picture like this every year to see how much taller he gets. :)

But seriously...we're really excited about his new job. It seems like it's going to be a great fit for him and it's pretty amazing that he got the first job he applied for and the whole process took about a month. What a blessing!!

Child of the earth

My favorite times with Katelyn have been times outside. Katelyn is without a doubt a child of the earth. She lights up when we go outside. She is always excited for an outdoors adventure.

This girl doesn't care if it's raining or snowing...sunny, windy, cold, warm...doesn't matter. Just let her do something outside. So obviously as the weather is starting to turn slowly to spring Katelyn is embracing it.

She's checking out the garden and wants to know when we can get to work. I have really good garden helpers around here!!

I love that Katelyn isn't afraid to get dirty. She wants to roll in the grass and throw it all over herself....

She's already asking when we'll have tomatoes in the garden. Poor kid has quite a wait for those!

Katelyn's job is bringing the compost bowl from the kitchen to the compost pile. She does a good job and is always happy to help.

She's a pretty sassy girl. She knows her mind for sure. Of course that has to be tempered at times but I really do love her personality. She's got spunk!

And here she is rolling on the ground again! (No we haven't had snow recently...I just found the picture and it cracks me up.)

She's turned into a great little bike rider.

Aunt Shirley sent easter egg sidewalk chalk and Katelyn loves it. (Thank you!!)

Such a fun girl. I'm so excited for all of the new outside memories we have to make this year!!
The anticipation of spring is glorious!

Katelyn loves rainbows, strawberry ice cream with sprinkles, cupcakes, hearts and dirt. :)

I love this girl!!! And it's really big love.

February in a nutshell

I just need to sum up February. It started out just fine. Then for two weeks our house was full of illness. And then the month ended fabulously!!

The beginning of February left us to our own antics because it was so cold. So one fun night started out with a Michael and Katelyn tinker toy creation.

Then Katelyn got crazy.

And the living room became a scene from Where the Wild Things Are. She decided it would be fun to run in circles dancing around the tinker toys while Michael and I whistled John Philips Sousa marching band music. Let me remind you...yes, we really are this cool.

Katelyn was thoroughly entertained for quite a while.

I love this girl.

Another milestone this month was a big girl bed. I know...she's three and a half. But she loved her crib. She NEVER tried to climb out of the thing so we weren't in any hurry for the big girl bed. But we finally decided that it was time for the switch. The funny thing is she still calls for us in the morning. She won't get out of the bed until we come in and get her. She's a girl who lives within her boundaries. :)

And this is what her room looks like with the new addition. See how I found a quilt that matched so I didn't have to do any other redecorating? Smart, right!!!

And then the illness came. On the same night Katelyn got the flu (fever, runny nose, coughing...miserable) and Michael got the stomach flu. Michael was down for three days and Katelyn was on the couch for a whole week. It was so sad...and her cough was just lousy. Katelyn has never had more than just the sniffles. In the last two years she's gone to the doctor for her two year old and three year old well visits....that's it. So it was hard to see this super active, healthy kid curled up on the couch for days. She lost three pounds that week (and she only weighed 37 to start off!) But she's better now and eating us out of house and home so I think all is well.

Katelyn has been starting to write letters. She was doing A, E, F, L, T. Then all of a sudden a few days ago she was at the table with her markers while Michael and I were cleaning up after dinner and she said, "Mommy, look. I wrote my name." I was expecting her to have written a few letters...but no, she really did write her name. All by herself. I'm going to frame it. :)

We went out to Red Robin the other night because I really wanted a hamburger. (Please note...I never say this. We eat red meat about once a month maybe.) Katelyn got a balloon. She held on to that thing all night and then was devastated the next morning when it was on the floor because the hellium had leaked out. She kept asking why it wouldn't fly and could I make it fly over and over.

For dinner tonight we made White Chicken Chili, cornbread and a salad. So yummy!!

And to wrap up February with a bang and kick March off with much celebration, Michael got a job as a project manager for a German company in Frankfort (20 miles from our house) that manufactures plastics for the automotive industry. (Background....Michael speaks fluent German, worked for 10 years as an automotive engineer and has been doing engineering consulting for a company that manufactures plastics for the last six months). Yep, it's that perfect. He starts on Monday.

So we had a bumpy patch but we are healthy and ready for spring to get here. We're starting to plan the garden. The seed catalogs are on hand.