My magnificent Mother's Day

I don't know if I could have planned a better day. I woke this morning to flowers and pancakes. I showered while sipping on a delicious Java Chip Frappuccino (heavenly). We went to church and left inspired. Lunch at home was lovely. The boys and I ran errands and shopped while the girls cleaned house (again, heavenly).

All of the wonderful goodies I was presented.





















The first page of Hayden's Mother's Day gift to me was so sweet. (The second page is equally as precious but I won't make you read it too.) What's really great is I KNOW how much he hates to write in cursive and he did it anyway.





















The real treat came tonight, however. A dear friend of mine had arranged for the children and I to have a meal at a local Italian restaurant. Reservations were made ahead of time and all we had to do was show up ready to eat...we fulfilled our duty with gusto. As we sat there waiting to order our meals, three orders of appetizers unexpectedly arrived. I had to quiet the squeals from our table.

The cheese sticks provided great entertainment.


















As you can see, Peyton certainly enjoyed her Fettuccine Alfredo.




















Almost as much as she loved lovin' on her brother.
















I had to get a little sugar too.















Beautiful girls that worked hard to make the day special. They even surprised me with more flowers.
















And just as we each claimed our stomachs were stuffed and we couldn't eat another bite, four huge desserts arrived. Had I known they were coming, I would have had my camera ready. As it turned out, my I'll-never-eat-again children somehow found room to inhale eat it all before I could get in a good picture. (I cannot lie. The Cappuccino Pie they we enjoyed is simply the ice cream pie version of the Starbuck's Java Chip Frappuccino I so dearly love and showered with this morning. So delicious.)

Thank you, dear friend, for the thoughtful gift. It was, much like the day I had with my children, simply wonderful.

Happy Mother's Day everyone!

I knew she was too quiet

"Okay, so you're probably not happy, huh Momma?"





















"I simply couldn't help myself; I so love orange markers."





















"You're not mad though, right?





















"Ha! I didn't think so!"

Why I must check little boy pockets each morning before school

(Thankfully the cell phones are old and not in service.)




















And this wasn't all of it.

Movies are always better with a friend

Even if you've both seen it a hundred times.

Playful and quite Pollock-like

To get this:














You've gotta do a little bit of this:



















A little bit of that:





















A little bit of this:















And a whole lot of that:





















Mix in a great friend and you've got yourself quite the masterpiece.

Dress: $21.99 Shoes: $4.99

Looking like an angel for your 8th grade banquet: Utterly priceless.

Stuart Little wasn't so little

Hayden's second grade class read Stuart Little 2 recently. They were assigned a book report that had to contain multiple paragraphs (gasp!) and had to be written in cursive (gasp! gasp!). It was a long week as he and I drudged through the frequent disagreements regarding how long a paragraph truly was (he said two sentences, I said more) and his insistence that having to write an entire book report in cursive is just a cruel trick teachers and mothers like to play on unsuspecting and clearly over-worked second graders.

There were tears involved.

Then there was the visual part of the report. He was assigned the task of creating a mobile that had to display objects that represented characters and/or ideas from the book and each object had to have a written description attached. The problem was, little brothers really like to help.

More tear involvement. *sigh*

But it got done. And not only did it get done, it got done well.

And look, no more tears.

To Too TWO!

This is the first of the next three posts depicting Peyton's big "I'm 2" celebrations. The other two posts are below this one.

This morning her siblings immediately tried to teach her how to show how old she is by using her fingers.

















"Ummmmm, I'm not so great at this. Wanna do something else?"


















"Pleeeeeeease."





















Fine, then I'll just eat my chocolate chip birthday muffin."





















We went on a big-girls-only birthday lunch. "No Peyton, don't eat the lemon."














"Sutton! You're so silly."














"Are all of these mine?!"





















"Okay...fine, I'll just eat the prettiest one. Happy birthday to me!"

More partying

The bumble bee cake and presents.












Mommy and the birthday girl.
















Finger. Licking.

















Good.













After opening lots of presents, one stood alone as a favorite.












...Her Tinkerbell potty seat.















And she promptly used it..TWICE.

















Happy Birthday to Mommy!

More parties

Lots of presents and cake.















Uncle Shawn enjoying the attention.

















Learning how to blow (and not touch.)

















Big sister Sutton explains.

















A teapot and groceries!

















New baby's got a new ride.

















"I'll fix it baby."