Time On My Hands

With the gang at the beach, I had the house to myself!!!  This has to be a every mother's dream at some point in her life.  It is seriously one of my favorite things.  It usually comes in 2 hour increments on Saturday mornings when David takes the kids to the gym.  Having a completely clean house for even 10 minutes is so gratifying. 

Thanks to my amazing hubby, an entire weekend to myself happens a couple times a year.  My To Do list is always 10,000 projects long of things I want to get done, but never have enough time (or energy) to accomplish them when I'm dealing with the day to day demands of little children.  I was so excited and so ready for this weekend.  The biggest challenge is figuring out where to start.  

After work on Thursday I got my hair cut, then arrived home to a quiet, empty house.  I think I squealed with delight, then headed straight for the kid's rooms.  What a perfect time to wash their sheets!  This led to cleaning out all the random toys, socks and books from under their beds, which lead to rearranging and reorganizing all the toys and books in the entire house. 

By the time I was finished our bookcases looked like this:

Isn't it beautiful?!  It made me happy to look at it all weekend. 

After my massive book and toy project I decided to paint our master bathroom.  It was the last room standing in terms of rooms to be painted in the house.  I wasn't quite sure I wanted to tackle this project as there were still 9,999 other things I wanted to do but I decided I should just get it done, and I did.  And it felt really good to get it done. 

For the record, I did have some fun too.  I met up with a friend and her baby in North Seattle, went to a bar with another friend on Saturday night (I can not remember the last time I was at a bar on a Saturday night!) and hiked up Poo Poo Point with yet another friend on Sunday morning.  It was wonderful!

And it was really lovely to have the gang back on Sunday.  While I enjoyed every minute I had to myself, I missed all the chaos and was so happy to have them back.  For all the naysayers who said my bookshelves would be in disarray after 5 minutes, they still look pretty darn good one week later!

Beach Time

David took the kids to the beach house last weekend.  They had planned to go the weekend before, but with 75 mph winds in the forecast they postponed until last weekend.  I think they made a good choice as they had beautiful weather and were able to be outside a lot.

Ready to hit the beach.  Love these little faces!

In addition to being outside, they enjoyed celebrating Grandpa Bill's 70th birthday!  Happy Birthday Bill!  Ryan also learned to sew with Grandma Karen's help.  She shared the below photo of him working on his Seahawks pillow case. 

They all had a fantastic time, and there were tons of tears shed when Ryan had to say goodbye to Robbie, Grandma's dog.  Under no circumstances does this mean we are getting a dog, even though both Ryan and David tried to work that angle with me. 

Puzzle Pile-up

Among all the messes that I have to clean up, this is BY FAR the worst of them all.  It makes me completely cuckoo.  I have no idea how she manages to accomplish this without us knowing.  And why on earth does she find dumping all the puzzle pieces into one pile so entertaining.  I will never understand.  As I've said 1 billion times since she's been born, "It's a good thing she's cute".    

Elementary Musical

All four of the First Grade classes at Ryan's school put on a musical the day before Valentine's Day.  I just love these things.  It's so fun/hysterical watching all the little kids in action.

Their music teacher does a fantastic job getting 80 first graders to stay in sync.  It's so impressive.

David got these shots of Ryan as I had two girls piled on my lap.  I just love what he captured.

The stage.

Walking in.

Looking...

And he found us!

Having fun with his friends. 

Happy Valentine's Day!

We hope your Valentine's Day is filled with as much love and joy as these three bring to us.

Wishing and Hoping

If only SHE could go in.  You have to be 3 to take individual swim lessons, so it will be her turn soon enough.

Swim Lessons

We Love Snow

We had a beautiful snowy day today.  The kids loved it as always. 

Ryan played in the snow most of the day, taking only hot chocolate breaks in between outside sessions.

Our little snow princess.  Her outfits crack me up.

Gathering up her snow balls for the big snow ball fight. 

Beautiful Bloom

There is nothing better to brighten a cold winter day.

The Curl

Natalie's hair has been bone of contention for months now.  David thinks we need to cut it so it's not in her eyes, but I really don't want to.  I won't disagree that some days it is in her face (and she won't keep a clip in), but then there are days like this where it falls perfectly out of her face in a perfect little curl.

If only I could get it to do that everyday.

Miss Natalie is really into play-doh right now, too.  She loves making her own cookies, and boy are they delicious!

A Super Celebration

What a day!  What a celebration for the Seahawks!  Downtown Seattle was packed with over 700,000 fans.  It was a spectacular, chaotic site and we were so happy to be a part of it.  We didn't hesitate to take Ryan out of school for this memorable day, and were thrilled my parents could join in the fun too!

I left for work early so waited patiently as the other 4 made their way downtown.  The girls were so content to stay with Miss Hanni in the warm, cozy house.  Traffic, public transportation and everything else you can think of was crazy.  I was in awe of the amount of people that packed into Seattle.

After waiting and waiting and more waiting for the bus that never came, the fearless foursome decided to drive themselves into the city.  David graciously dropped Ryan and my parents off near the stadium where they met up with me, then he tried to park the car.  He eventually joined us in the stadium, after walking from Portland.  Ok.  Not really, but close!

After witnessing the crowds on the parade route, we decided to escape into the stadium with the tickets Bill gifted us with.  Thank You, Bill!  The free tickets were selling for $200 on the street.  So crazy!  We feel so grateful we had the opportunity to be a part of the celebration inside Centurylink Field.  It was awesome!  It was cold, too, but so worth it.

My favorite part was watching the Lombardi Trophy arrive in Seattle.  I loved seeing it in person.  Such a site!  Ryan's favorite part was watching ALL the players from 99 to 3 be introduced.

What a wonderful celebration for our Championship team.  Go Hawks!

My little 3 and big 3!

While waiting for the bus, David and Ryan had a photo op with the Mayor of Issaquah!

Getting impatient at the bus stop.

So happy to be on the road with snacks!

A beautiful day for a parade.

Grandpa Ken and Ryan with their destination in the background.

Waiting and watching the parade on the big screen while trying to stay warm.

Snuggling to stay warm.

We are ready for our team to arrive!  Go Hawks!

Finally!  The Lombardi Trophy has arrived...along with Russell Wilson!

The Super Bowl Champions!!!!

Vikings fans beware.  We may have converted them!

 

Taking it all in.

Seahawks Super Bowl

With the flu running through the house we decided to have a low-key Super Bowl.  It was just us and my parents.  And OOOHHH was it amazing!  I soaked up as much as the pregame as I could and we all cheered like crazy fools throughout the entire game.  I can't believe other people around the country thought it was boring and lopsided.  What are they talking about?

I'm still soaking up as much as I can.  What an awesome season.

Way to go Hawks!