life in march

Piano practice with Colby is a major patience tester, but he's making progress, so we're keeping at it!  

He especially loves this game at piano lessons. Sister Duff calls out a note and he slaps the matching card. 

Storybook Character Day at school.  I don't think she had a particular character in mind, but wanted to dress like a pirate.

Colby loves his time at Little Hearts, but most mornings he still tells me that he wants to stay home with me. It's really sweet, but I try to remind him that this is good practice for next year, when he'll go to school 5 days a week instead of only 2!

We went for dentist appointments this month, The kids both did great, but they recommended that I take Brooke for a consult due to some crowding issues. 

We had more amazing weather, which meant park time with my crazies...

Silly Sock Day at preschool. He pretty much looked like Rainbow Bright, but he was proud of the combination he put together. 

Another park date with ward friends at Play Grand Adventures...

Colby convinced me that I wasn't too big to climb to the top of this giant stacking cube structure.  It wasn't easy hoisting myself through the narrow holes and levels, but I made it and my little guy was SO happy about it. 

Colby and I rewarded ourselves with some In-N-Out one day after being at the car dealership for nearly 3 hours.  All to get a new key programmed, which I'm pretty sure took about 10 minutes.  I was super irritated about the whole thing, but when I was laying next to Colby that night, he said that was his rose of the day, haha. I'm glad he could look for the good!

Our sweet friend Maddy gifted Brooke her old boots and you better believe Brooke planned the perfect outfit for school on Monday even though they are at least a size too big.  She wore them for the next few days, so these might be her new favorite kicks. 

We love living across from the street from the park, but especially when our friends text us that they are over there playing. We brought cookies to share and Kiley snapped this cute picture of the kids :)

More preschool fun...

Doing a little Easter shopping at Target...

Picture Day for this handsome dude.  He is growing so quickly and I wish time would slow down!!

I took Brooke to her consult this week with an orthodontist regarding the crowding.  She was nervous, but it was a totally positive experience and we'll check back in a few months.  

Nothing like piling mulch on the slide and then sliding into it, haha.  Both kids said our time at the park was a definite rose for the day.  Can't beat bubbles, tag, and digging with new friends. 

I left from soccer one day to meet friends for lunch, but came home to this cute crew working on fixing our tree rings. The tree roots were pushing up large sections of the tree rings, and after receiving a quote for $1,200 to fix the problem areas, Kevin decided that we could tackle the issue ourselves. Once all the pieces were removed, we mixed up concrete and stuck it all back together. We patched up small sections around the rest of our garden boxes as well, and for now, that's good enough :)

More piano practicing...

While the kids were spending the night at Grandma and Papa's house, I was able to take my friend Andreia out for a birthday lunch. It was the best 3 hours together!

Kevin and I also went on a sushi date while the kids were away.  I'm not normally a huge fan, but Kevin has been wanting to try a new restaurant by our house and I decided to branch out and give it another try.  My favorite was the Tempura Philly Roll, even though I was super scared of the eel sauce.  Then we tried a Crunchy California Roll, which was super yummy, until I looked up what masago was.  I most definitely removed those fish eggs off the next piece I ate, haha. 

Brooke absolutely loves the dress my mom sent, and asked if she could bring her parasol to church.  I allowed the gloves and purse, but had to draw the line somewhere :) But she sure looked cute!

This girl is a BIG fan of twirl dresses...

I was also really glad that she let me do a cute hairstyle to go with the new dress.

This little girl has a huge piece of my heart.

As do these boys...

Sunday dinner at Lynn Creek.  Kevin prepared everything while we were driving home from a baptism and it was the best family time.  Brooke even brought birdseed to set out for some lucky birdies.  The only bad part of the night was stepping in dog poop right as we were loading up the car. 

We had a very wet month and went puddle stomping after school one day.  At each corner, the kids alternated deciding which way to turn.  That lasted for a solid 45 minutes before we finally made it back to the house. 

After picking Colby up from school, we stopped at Calloways for some new plants.  Colby had definite ideas about which flowers he wanted, gave me lots of pointers on new pots, and convinced me to buy new gardening gloves for him and Brooke.  But my favorite moment was when we were walking hand in hand through the nursery. He randomly said, "Thanks for my beautiful lunch, Mom. It was delicious."  He can say the sweetest things and I immediately stopped to hug and squeeze my precious boy. 

The gym was occupied during part of Brooke's activity on Wednesday night, but that didn't stop Colby from practicing his basketball shots outside.  And we eventually moved indoors to the real hoop.

Colby and I worked on a little "porch refresh" with the plants we picked up at Calloways.  When I asked if he remembered the name of the plant he picked, he said,"Um, petunia?" Not quite, but that does sound awfully similar to begonia :)

Brooke wore new shorts to school one day and as we walked to the car that afternoon I asked why she had tucked her flowy shirt in.  She immediately responded with, "because you couldn't really see my shorts." She's my little fashionista and wore that fanny pack almost every day this week.

We drove to Flower Mound after school to see family that was in town visiting.  Jerry's brother Roy and his wife Celine were visiting from California.  Their daughter Katelin and her family had driven down from Oklahoma as well, so it was a mini reunion :)

On Saturday, the kids had their biggest cheering squad and loved every minute of it! 

Then we headed out for Mexican food...

Played in Grandma and Papa's backyard...

And had a tea party with little Julia...

When your kids match the flowers and you make them take pictures :)

Sunday snuggles are our jam!!  As soon as we change clothes, Kevin usually jumps right into our bed and calls for "mandatory snuggles."  It's something we all love :)

As I sat cutting a huge stack of paper tags, I noticed Brooke watching me from where she was playing Barbies.  A few minutes later she went and grabbed scissors and came to help me.  I was touched that she saw a need and filled it!  The ones she cut aren't perfect, but her intention WAS and I loved working with my girl.  Colby later joined us and cut scraps :) I also realized that I printed way too many pages since I hadn't accounted for the fact that each sheet had three sets of tags, but at least I realized before cutting them all out. 

This is Colby's friend, Ember.  Two little peas in a pod :)  Colby loves his after-school park dates with Ember and his reacher recently told me how much these two love each other. She said they are constantly coordinating play dates and fun stuff to do together, haha. I really like her mom, so it works out for everyone involved. 

I've been going through all of Brooke's baby clothes and about died when I pulled out the newborn outfits.  They were SO small.  I dressed her dolls in some of the outfits as a surprise and she was in love.  Slept with those baby dolls for a week straight.

I came home from a church event last week to find this hanging on my bed.  Brooke does the sweetest things...

Kevin and I finally made it to the dermatologist!  I wanted to ask about the bump on my head (which is nothing, apparently), the skin tag near my eye (a hydrosystoma, also not a concern), and a sun spot on my shoulder.  All of my issues turned out to be nothing, but I was glad to ask about them.  

Kevin had a little mole-type growth on his shoulder that was concerning to the doctor.  She numbed the area and took a biopsy to check things out.  The biopsy came back as carcinoma, so he had to go back and get a larger area cut out. It took months for that thing to fully heal, but all looks good now and I'm just happy he got it taken care of.  He also had something frozen off his scalp.

And this is how exciting things get when you're nearly 40, haha!!