Pinecone Queen

It was so nice outside at our house last night. After dinner the girls and I spent some time in the yard. Charlotte got fussy so I gave her a bath, put her to bed and Stella and I returned outside for a little bit longer. Stella LOVES the pinecones in our front tree. Here are some pictures of her gathering her new treasures. This kept her occupied for about 45 more minutes while I did some yard work.

Good Morning Daddy!

The girls miss daddy while he is in California this week!

For the Love of Perennials

Being frugal and having less and less time to spend in the yard, I just LOVE perennial flowers/plants. I am so excited that the ones I bought and planted last year are returning and looking great! I have 3 or 4 at the base of our front porch (shown below). Some are daisies that will not bloom until later in the summer, but the green is so nice for now.I also purchased two clematis from Lowe's last summer on clearance. They are doing well and beginning to creep up both sides of the garage:Below are some mums that I also got on clearance late last summer. I think they were early bloomers and no one wanted them. The flowers didn't last long. However, my father-in-law planted them on a visit and they are coming back much stronger than expected. Well worth the $3/plant!! I have 4 of them planted in our front island and the green it added looks great. I hope that they do bloom later this summer/early this fall.

Let the Transition Begin

The girls start at a new daycare this week...I hope it goes well!

Tales of the Lilac Bush

2006: We had brought part of Andy's grandmother's lilac bush with us to Birmingham. When we moved from B'ham back to Cincinnati in '06 Andy dug it up and we brought it with us! We planted it on my mom's farm since we didn't have a house yet. 2009: It bloomed for the first time since being transplanted. It was still at my mom's.2010: Last weekend we transplanted it once again to our house and it has really grown over the last few years! Here's hoping it survives...

I Wear My Sunglasses at Night

The girls found their sunglasses while we were getting ready for dinner:

Senior Pictures

My brother did not want to sit through a 1-2 hour photo shoot for his Senior Pictures. So my mom asked me to snap a few photos in the backyard. 15 minutes and 50 photos later and here's what I have. I even let him be Mr. Serious in a few. They are casual, but they are HIM!

Happy Birthday Mikey!

We celebrated my baby brother's 18th birthday this weekend. So hard to believe he's graduating from high school next month and heading to Purdue!

Laundry Surprises

Now that the weather is warmer, Stella is outside even more. Last week I found a few pebbles in the washer after I'd done a load of laundry. Then one day after "school" Stella told me she had some treasures in her pocket and showed me another rock collection she had managed to gather. Over the weekend I was cleaning out her closet and picked up the shorts shown above. I heard a rattle and checked the pockets...more rocks. Looks like I'll definitely be checking her pockets now before throwing things in the washer!

Bake Night

Stella was my assistant in the kitchen last night. She finally got to put to use one of her Easter Bunny treats - her new apron set. We made the Peanut Butter Pie and the Peanut Butter-Toffee Cheesecake Brownies together. She was apprehensive about the mixer (2 screaming meltdowns before it was even turned on due to it being "loud and scary"), but finally she let me turn it on while she held onto me with a death grip and then thought it was hilarious and kept saying, "make it faster!" Good grief. She enjoyed licking the bowl and making daddy jealous since that used to be his role in the baking in our house! You can see at the bottom that she kept checking on the oven to see how the brownies were doing. It was a fun night!

The Dinner That Will Kill the Kids

Today, I'm NOT blogging about my own kids...but someone else's. Andy and I have 3 couple friends that each have a child that is severely allergic to peanuts and/or tree nuts. These families make their homes peanut-free...no PB&J (come on, soy nut sandwiches are NOT PB&Js), no Reese cups (or eggs at Easter), no Snickers bars, no carry-out Chinese, limited restaurant choices, etc.

So Andy and I decided to bring these couples together once a year for what we lovingly like to call "The Dinner That Will Kill Your Kids". Obviously, they must get a sitter to attend. So tomorrow night is another one of the annual dinners where we will be serving egg rolls, potstickers, peanuts, pad thai, Reeses, peanut butter pie and peanut butter cheesecake brownies. Heck, I'll offer up the jar of Jif and a spoon if that puts a smile on one of their faces (and I'm NOT known to share my PB). These people will be so sick of peanuts/peanut butter that it should hold them over until next year.

We'll hose them down and send them home...hopefully on a peanut high!

Wagon Ride

I thought it would be cute to get a picture of all of the cousins in Louisville last weekend. Who was I kidding trying to get 4 kids to look and smile at the same time while playing outside? Here were some attempts!

All Aboard!

My nephew is on Spring Break this week so this morning I met my sister and her kids at EnterTRAINment Junction. None of us had ever been there even though it's so close to my house. The kids had a great time - particularly Adam who is a Thomas the Train loyal fan. Charlotte loved running around so much that I never did get a picture of her since she was always on the move.

Scooter Girl

Stella is a LUCKY girl. Surprisingly she did not make one fuss when we left the scooter in Louisville with the cousins (the actual owner). However, Andy and I had a revelation - did we have one of those scooters in our basement??? His boss had given us some hand-me-down bikes, etc. from her kids and we thought there was a scooter included, but remembered it being bigger. So he dug around the crawl space last night and found our own tiny 3-wheeled Princess scooter! Stella had fun tonight on our patio practicing on it in a matching t-shirt. And the helmet is all her idea. She thinks it is the coolest thing to wear...for now. What you can't really see is the pile of dandelions she has put into the basket - her treasures from the wooded area of our yard.

Sunny Days!

We went to Louisville over the weekend. The girls had fun playing with their cousin's toys outside. Charlotte tried hard to be a "big girl" and get on the scooter as well.

Breaking Out the Bike Trailer

We figured we better start practicing with the bike trailer before vacation! Charlotte had not been in it yet. She survived the short trip around the block, but wasn't thrilled.