Friday, January 31, 2014

I am Thirty!

Wow! It was a fantastic day.  To say I feel incredibly blessed, would be an understatement!  I received so many text, phone calls, messages, cards, and generous gifts it's hard to actually believe!!

Reid did a wonderful job of making me feel extra loved.  He paid attention to every little detail, from making sure the dishwasher was unloaded to taking me out to dinner.  I didn't lift a finger all day.  AND, we didn't let the snow stop us one bit.

I actually like the snow, it's so pretty!  I just wish it would be a little warmer so we could play in it a bit more.

Tiffany sent me a Heytell on my birthday eve, asking what I was up to on the last night of my 20s.  I hadn't even really thought about it that way, until she mentioned it.  I thought it was pretty appropriate that I spent it doing Yoga.  With all the quietness and breathing it was a neat way to say good bye to my 20s and welcome my 30s, with open arms! 

She dropped off a little surprise to be enjoyed the morning of my birthday.

I love that she got me a princess balloon, as she knows the girls so well. She made sure to write in 30th! :)  Of course I waited to open the gift until the actual day.

My morning started with my sweet little two year old walking in to sing me Happy Birthday, with her raspy morning voice and crazy hair to match it.  I was sure to record the song later in the day so I could always remember it.



Sally soon joined us and gave me extra Birthday snuggles! We enjoyed a low key morning with hot coffee, cards and gifts!

My card from the girls and Daddy!


Tiff mentioned I should open her present first thing.

Her gift was so creative and filled will all of my favorites!!

Donut holes, how cute is that?!

LOVE this tumbler she made, it is so me!! It was filled with more of my favorite candy and gift cards to my favorite places.  THANK YOU!!! You know me so well!
We got ready for the day! Daddy shoveled the snow away so we could still fulfill our plans of a late morning date at Mall Of America!!

I got a new winter coat using a gift card I received from George!! Thank you!

Then we headed to Noodles to cash in on my free Birthday bowl!

They listened and got along so well ALL day!! So in love with these two!!

My girls!!
I received a generous gift card to Nordstrom Rack from my Mom, so I went browsing in there for a while!  I found a lot of really great things, but didn't want to use it just to use it, so I think I'm going to hold on to that gift card until I really need something. Thanks Mom!


Before we headed home for naps we stopped at Caribou to cash in on my free coffee!  The girls got to write on the chalkboard while we waited.  Sally wrote "I love my mommy and daddy!"  Libby wrote, "me too" ;)


Daddy did a great job listening and he bought me a new winter hat, exactly what I was looking for, but could never find!!
After naps Joey and Emily came over to babysit for us!! A while ago, Joey had sent me a text that he and Emily would come over so Reid and I could go to dinner on my birthday! Thank you so much guys, we appreciate you and the girls had a lot of fun!!

Emily brought BEAUTIFUL Flowers (My favorite kind too!) and delicious homemade cookies!!
Reid and I went out for Sushi at the West End!


What an AMAZING Husband I have! Love you, Honey!
We decided to be rebellious and we stopped at the Fro-Yo place to put in my purse to sneak in to our movie!! YUM!!  We went and saw American Hustle!  It was very good, thanks Jenny for the recommendation!

See? Beyond loved and a freaking amazing day!!

The fun doesn't stop there, either.  Tonight we are going to the T-Wolves game and watching from a suite that Reid's cousin bought, who happens to be the head coach of the Grizzlies!!

AND tomorrow night, Reid has organized a big birthday bash for me with all of my friends and family!! So excited to Par-Tay!!

Thank you again for all of the love and very kind words sent my way, it truly means the world to me!!

Welcome 30s, I'm excited to see what you have in store for me!!

 
Nice one, Reid!
My heart is FULL!
Happy Friday, Happy Last Day of January, Happy Weekend, Happy Everything!!

Wednesday, January 29, 2014

A really great day

Yesterday was a really great day.  The girls got along very well and played quite nicely so I could clean the house.  They built forts and tunnels, made Valentine's, played dress up, danced and even helped dust!

They took great naps and woke up happy!  We decided to sip some hot chocolate, dress up like monkeys and dance!

Sally gets to dress herself on Tuesdays and Thursdays :)





I even got a little break in the bedtime routine, as I attended my first parish council meeting and Daddy was at class.  Thank you Suh!

Sally was very excited for school today.  They were taking a field trip to Stages Theater in Hopkins to watch The Mitten! The teachers said it was excellent!

Mommy and Libby had a successful morning of doing a load of laundry, dropping a big load off at Goodwill, a quick Target run, the bank and my favorite, a car wash!!

Life's simple joys!
We have lots of fun things planned for the remainder of the week too!  Daddy took tomorrow off to kick off the birthday celebrations!  Should be fun!

Happy not below zero, the sun is shining, day!!  Hump DAAAAAAAY!

Monday, January 27, 2014

Surprises

Well my husband worked up a pretty great surprise for me on Saturday. An early birthday present

I told him all I wanted for my birthday was to get my rings resized.  Let's be honest, I'm not exactly the same size I was at the age 24 before having two beautiful, big, baby girls :) 

Little did I know he had been in the works of a surprise since the end of December.

Last week we dropped the rings off to get resized and little did I know, when we went to pick them up on Saturday there was quite a bit more than just my resized rings.



I was handed a bag that held a nicely wrapped box.



Hmmm, that's weird, I thought, I would have thought they would have just handed my rings back to me, like I did when I gave them to them.

When I opened the box I discovered that Reid had bought me a matching band to go on the other side of my engagement ring!! 

Something we had talked about getting as a push present #2, but never really pulled the trigger on.

Needless to say, I cried of course, and was very very happy and surprised!

"Happy Birthday, Jackie, we love you so much and appreciate you and you deserve it!"

Awe Shucks, I picked a good one!

Then on Sunday I was checking out at Target and the lady apparently forgot to ring up a big container of train mix {Sunny Cranberry--it's very good, you should try it!}.  The guy who was after me said, don't worry about it, just add it to my bill, no worries! So sweet, and generous.  Now it's my turn to pay it forward!

I also was granted some peace and quiet Saturday morning while Daddy took the girls for their donut run!

A great book, I highly recommend it!
and a little more last night of watching the Grammy's while Reid played a game with Sally and Libby went to bed.

Thank you Kathy and Mike for the awesome cupcake princess game, she loves it!!


Last night when we were eating dinner Reid got a text that his Grad School class for tonight was cancelled!! SAWEEET!!  It gave me a little piece of mind knowing that I'd be able to make it through today, should Sally's preschool get called off.  At least we weren't sick and Daddy would be  home for dinner.

But THEN, Sally's school DIDN'T get called off.  They let the parents decide.  They figured none of the children have to wait outside for a bus, all students are dropped off and they don't start until 9am.  It was a nice break, especially because she doesn't have school on Friday because the teachers are attending some conference.

Luckily Kari and Haddie were needing out too, so we went to the mall to get some exercise and chit-chat in.  This time the mall visit was more for Mommy than Libby.  It's good to have some adult interaction throughout the week!

"Are you sure our moms aren't crazy?!"
  They wouldn't both smile at the same time
First Haddie did

Then L did

This was kind of the best we could get :)

Happy Monday, Y'all! It's gonna be a good week!

Friday, January 24, 2014

TGIF

We're only a little bit crazy today :)  Thank you for the wonderful blog comments, FB messages, and text yesterday.  It complimented my theory that I surround myself with positive people. Thank you!

I do have one more picture that summarizes yesterday, it's quite funny {Nana might not think so ;)},but if you've been around 2 year olds you know how one minute they are laughing and then you look at them wrong and this happens:

No caption necessary
We picked up our bad attitudes threw them out in the cold.  We watched for our mail carrier to make her some hot chocolate.  Seriously, I think we can all agree that the mail can wait a day so they don't have to be out in this ridiculously cold weather.  Megan, we appreciate you, thank you!!

Sally insisted that Mommy have matching messy buns as well.  Fresh out of the oven chocolate chip cookies makes everything better too


So does dressing up in leotards and tutus and dancing to loud teenybopper music



We all got out of the house today, which was lovely!  Sally to school and Mommy and Libby to the mall to just walk.  No stroller.  I let L take the lead.  We went up and down the "magic stairs," played hide and seek, made friends with the everyday Mall Walkers, threw pennies in the fountain and walked down the block before picking Sally up from school.

Wishing for an early Spring

Hasn't quite mastered the Selfie

Little Monkey happy to be outside

We've got this!
Today is only a little tease with the warmer temps.  The brutal cold will be back, but at least we have a low key weekend ahead of us with a Daddy who's ready to play with his girls!

Happy Weekend, hang in there, you've got this!  Happy Everything!

We've got chocolate chip cookies and milk waiting for snack. Toodles!

Thursday, January 23, 2014

Random Thoughts

Warning:: This post might not make any sense, but I'm just going to go with it.

I woke up this morning feeling totally normal.  It'll be a good day with my girls.  I actually got to sleep last night.  Libby wasn't up every second of every hour coughing her lungs out.

My goodness it's cold in here, so we added some blankets and scarves to go with our jammies and we snuggled for a bit longer than usual.

See?  Totally normal, no one about to lose their damn mind

But then I don't know what happened.  I just kind of snapped.  I couldn't take one more kid coughing in my face.  Or asking for more juice, or this wasn't the kind of cereal I wanted. 

Oh Mom, you just poured the milk in your cereal?  You probably should have waited for that because now I have to go to the bathroom, like right.now.  You're cereal is going to be soggy by the time you get to eat it, you know.

Mom, can I have a napkin? Mom, can I have a Kleenex?

Really, they weren't doing anything wrong. It's just, it's just, it's just that it's the DEAD of winter and we're stuck inside because it's 500 degrees below zero AGAIN and everyone and their brother has a cough or a fever or the pukes or the poops or a bad attitude.

See totally losing my damn mind.

My Mom and I have this weird connection.  She always seems to know the exact second I'm about to lose my mind {or lost it, in this case}.  It's happened too many times to keep track of.  This morning she sent a text asking if everyone was healthy and I went off.  "Mom, I'm going batshit crazy..."

I gave myself a 5 minute time out. I text Delores "How many days until the pool opens?" I liked her response: "We are one day closer."

Grandpa read my mind because he sent me a text totally out of the blue "Only 56 days until Spring!"

Lesson? surround yourself by positive people.  I'm usually a glass half full kind of gal, but we all have our days, and today is my day. 

It won't take me long, I'll be back, probably even before Daddy gets home and all will be well and he'll have no clue what the poor girls have been through today.

I did apologize to them, the girls.  "Girls, Mommy's sorry she kind of lost her mind during breakfast this morning.  I didn't mean to snap and shout at you."  It's good to let them know we're not all perfect. 

I'm not sure if I should be more worried though, because they didn't really know what I was talking about.  Either there was more going on in my head than out my mouth, or this is a common occurrence and they're used to it??

Staying home ain't for wimps I tell ya.  It's not all rainbows and unicorns like some people think.  Yes, it has MANY perks,  but it's tough stuff.  I'm not saying one is harder or easier than the other. I love where I'm at and I wouldn't trade it for the world, but that doesn't mean it's easy.

 Oh that's right, I was going to quote an awesome explanation of this. Hold on a sec, let me go get that for you: {here's the whole post}

"How was my day?

The question would linger in the air for a moment while I stared at Craig and the baby shoved her hand in my mouth like they do –  while the oldest screamed MOMMY I NEED HELP POOING from the bathroom and the middle one cried in the corner because I NEVER EVER EVER let her drink the dishwasher detergent. NOT EVER EVEN ONCE, MOMMY!!! And I’d look down at my spaghetti stained pajama top, unwashed hair, and gorgeous baby on my hip – and my eyes would wander around the room, pausing to notice the toys peppering the floor and the kids’ stunning new art on the fridge . . .

And I’d want to say:

How was my day? Today has been a lifetime. It was the best of times and the worst of times. There were moments when my heart was so full I thought I might explode, and there were other moments when my senses were under such intense assault that I was CERTAIN I’d explode. I was both lonely and absolutely desperate to be alone. I was saturated- just BOMBARDED with touch and then the second I put down this baby I yearned to smell her sweet skin again. I was simultaneously bored out of my skull and completely overwhelmed with so much to do. Today was too much and not enough. It was loud and silent. It was brutal and beautiful. I was at my very best today and then, just a moment later, at my very worst. At 3:30 today I decided that we should adopt four more children, and then at 3:35 I decided that we should give up the kids we already have for adoption. Husband – when your day is completely and totally dependent upon the moods and needs and schedules of tiny, messy, beautiful rug rats your day is ALL OF THE THINGS and NONE OF THE THINGS, sometimes within the same three minute period. But I’m not complaining. This is not a complaint, so don’t try to FIX IT. I wouldn’t have my day Any.Other.Way. I’m just saying- it’s a hell of a hard thing to explain- an entire day with lots of babies."

It's worth clicking that link and reading the rest of her post.  She nailed it!!

So, I'm having one of those days.

Also, MN parents should get some sort of award.  My sister has said it before, just the getting ready to get out the door.  But seriously, how amazing would it be to go for an afternoon walk to the park?! I know I know, I love MN and I really do even love MN Winter, but there are just some days when we've had enough and the grass is always greener on the other side.  Especially when in the back of your mind, is it really only 56 days until Spring, because I'm pretty sure last year that wasn't the case.

Okay, one quick story and then I'll be all rainbows and unicorns again. 

My Libby, she's a stubborn one just like her Mama.  Yesterday morning, as we were trying to get out the door to bring Sally to school, kind of took the cake. 

She REFUSED to let me help her put her socks on.  Have you ever tried putting socks on a toddler?  It's not easy {are there awards for that too?} Have you ever seen a toddler with their little chubby, still trying to figure out how to correctly use them, hands try and put on socks?  It's ain't easy for them {Ain't nobody got time for that!}

The clock is ticking the patience dwindling. 

In the middle, stubborn toddler was encouraged to walk outside without shoes or socks on {I'm all about natural consequences!} to see that yes, her MOTHER IS RIGHT!!  She quickly learned how cold it was, but still REFUSED to let her mother help with said socks and boots. 

So mother and calmly waiting first born, close the door and head to the car while stubborn toddler finishes her damn tantrum.  A minute later I went up to find Toddler ready to let mother help put her socks and boots and hat and coat and mittens on so we could finally go bring calm big sister to school.

"Libby no make good choices. Libby do it sometimes, Libby need help sometimes."  Libs, you might also want to add that your mom is always right, just trust her.

Alright, time for Rainbows and Unicorns:

This morning the Pandora Gods were on my side and kept our spirits high with awesome Disney songs. 

We painted and took breaks to dance, like really dance, to the good songs.

Here are a few of our current favorites. 





In a week I turn 30.  My golden birthday, actually.  I keep trying to tell myself that this is a big deal.  In the morning on the treadmill I think "Only ___days until I have to enter 30 for my age."  But you know what? I'm kind of looking forward to it.  I've never been one to really care about my age.  I think I see it more as, my age is finally catching up with where I'm at in life....according to our society that is.  I mean, I'm 30, I'm happily married and have been for 5 1/2 years. I have 2 children, one of which is 4 1/2 and I stay home, and have been for 4 years! I'm surrounded by positive, loving and supportive family and friends.

So 30, yeah, I'm going to be 30 and I'll wear it like a badge of honor :)  {See, I'm a glass half full kind of girl}

Sally learned some important life lessons the other morning, it was a proud parent moment.  She donated her very own piggy bank money to help feed children in Haiti. 

After she collected her money and went to brush her teeth she came back out.  "Mom, I'm not sure I want to give that much of my money away."

"Okay Honey, you don't have to, let's talk about it for a minute.  Do you still have money left in your piggy bank?"

S: Yeah, kind of a lot

M: What is the money you're giving away for?

S: Ummm, for kids who don't have food to eat like me and Libby do.

M: The ever so important pause to let them process on their own.

S: Nevermind, they need food and I still have money.  It's okay, we can leave it.  Can I maybe give more on Friday again?

M: proud, teary-eyed mother. "Yes, sweet girl, we can give more on Friday."


Happy Glass Half Full Kind of Day!

Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Last Year--We Can DO IT!!

Daddy started back up with class tonight.  Each day is his last.  One year from now he will be D-O-N-E.  We're only a little bit excited and anxious.  We.Can.Do.It!!!

We're still laying low and battling whatever it is that each one of us has.  I was a little nervous last night as I started going down hill starting around 2pm.  Luckily Daddy was able to come home a little earlier {before 5!!} and I was sleeping by 7:30.  I guess, that was all I needed as I felt much better today!  Would not have been fun, feeling the way I did and knowing that Reid would be at class, so there would be no break.

Hope you all are staying healthy!

We've enjoyed the laziness and have watched too many movies!  We finally watched the Tinker Bell movie, very cute!

Did you know Fairies are born when a baby laughs for the first time? :)

It's amazing how resilient little ones are to being sick!  You can also tell the minute Tylenol has kicked in and the second it has wore off!

I just like you, Mommy!
just keep swimming, just keep swimming, just keep swimming...

Monday, January 20, 2014

FRESH AIR!!!

We got outside this afternoon and it felt so good.  We almost didn't, we're all battling something.  Maybe a cold,  maybe the influenza, who can really tell.  At any rate the Vitamin D sure felt great!!

We met up with our friends Shawn and Kayla Saturday night.  It sure was great to catch up.  They were so sweet and bought two pink princess crown cookies at their local bakery.  The girls LOVED them!


 We can't wait to come and meet Dexter soon!!


Daddy got it the worst so he wasn't up for lots of activity, but he did come out to snap some pictures.

Working on making a snowman. 

"Do you wanna Build a Snowman?!"-Frozen {if you haven't seen it, you must!}

Meet Olivia, Olaf's Sister {again, you must seen Frozen :)}

Libby's turn to read a book


Happy MLK Day! Happy Lazy Day Monday!! Have a great week!