This Past Weekend...

Last weekend we had so much fun! It was super busy but we had a lot of quality time with family and friends. It started off with having our 8 year old nephew Reed over for a sleepover. We decided that instead of buying gifts for our nieces and nephews, once they got old enough we would take them out to someplace special of their choosing or have them overnight and let them pick the food and activities. Life just gets busier and busier and now that we have a child of our own we don't spend a lot of one on one time with our nieces/nephews so this makes for a great opportunity to do just that. It was really special just hanging out with him....he chose eating pizza & Sprite for supper, competing with Brad on the Wii, playing outside, watching the movie Planet 51, getting cookies n cream ice cream for snack, and sleeping in the living room on the floor with me. Happy 8th Birthday Reed-O...we loved having you all to ourselves!

In the morning when my brother came to pick up Reed, Carley couldn't resist the chance to play with her little Ella:)

Later that morning we headed out to Frederick Meijer Gardens in GR to check out the butterfly exhibit with the Lucas'. Although it was super warm and crowded, the kiddos had fun spotting all the butterflies.

Curt, Jamie, and Alden

Ella wanted to chase Alden instead of the butterflies:)

What a cute picture of all the kids:) We followed up our morning with lunch with the Lucas' at Malarky's on the East Beltline - very cool place to go - I highly recommend it!

That night my family gathered together for my Grandpa's 85th Birthday party. It was neat to be able to see everyone get to together to celebrate his life...he has a blended family due to his second marriage and they were all there as well...it was a huge group! At the end of the night we had a slideshow made up of all pictures of him and his family...I think it meant a lot to him to have us all there and to see all those pictures highlighting his life...it was a great way to end the night. (Good job Daysha!)

We rounded off the weekend with babysitting for my other nieces and nephews. Again, we just plain do not get to spend much alone time with them and to have them over was such fun!

The beloved Uncle Brad reading the kids stories to Kennedy, Kolter, and Kooper.

Kolter and I

The two little buddies before bedtime...Ella and Kolter

What night would be complete without a snack!

Signs of Spring

This past week the signs of spring were all around me. Although more snow is inevitable, I made sure not to take for granted the fleeting beautiful weather. These were the signs of spring around my house...

We have a three season porch that is not really able to be used in the winter months but we spent a lot of time out there since the sun warmed it right up...here is just a sweet pic of Ella and Brad reading together on the porch.

A little "spring cleaning" from my little helper (we are not above child labor...JK)

Ella proud of her job well done:)

Playing at the park once again...can't get enough of the ducks & geese...she wanted to run right in:)

Helping Mom clean up the yard since this is the first time that we really didn't have any snow on the ground since we moved in.

Playing in the yard...
Learning boundaries...what fun!

Boy, I have to say I am pretty pumped that my girl loves to help around the house...I wonder how long until that wears off:)

Our first flowers to bloom...I have no idea what is planted in our yard so it will be fun seeing what pops up as spring draws closer.

At it again!

We even got to share a lovely morning outside with our Lily-pie!

Our little rock collector!

She spent seriously part of an afternoon just filling up her bucket with rocks from the landscaping and moving them from one pail to another all around the front yard...so cute to see her little imagination at work.

At our house a true sign of spring is seeing Cadbury creme eggs...but they don't last long. Brad and I absolutly love them and we have discovered that Ella definately has good taste as well. Even though she only gets a little sample of mine, I can safely say that the eggs will continue to be a staple at our house in springtime for many years to come:)

It was a wonderful week of sunshine and I pray more weather like this is soon to come again!

A Morning at the Beach

Yesterday Ella and I were bored and so decided last minute to go play at the beach. I wanted to play with her outside since it was like 60 degrees but everywhere outside seemed to be muddy and yuck so I figured the beach would be a good place to run around. She had a lot of fun watching the birds, digging in the sand, and swinging on the swings. I had a sweet and simple morning with my little love.