Where are you Spring?

I haven't blogged in a while due to the winter blues. You know the feeling of not wanting to do anything that you really don't have to. It was the flu then more snow, but it is starting to get warmer which is making me even more restless. I am ready to be out with the family in the sun! Right now we have lots of rain, but that's better than snow right now. I know that the sun will come out one day and I won't be stuck in the house with the kids. So, I've been doing a bit of spring cleaning and rearranging the furniture a little.

Once I get started, I just want to throw everything away! Especially all the kids' toys that Jimmy and I trip on daily! I have already put half of Kai's toys into little plastic shoe boxes and stored them in the closet, but he still has so many little pieces all over the house...legos. We got him smaller pieces now that he is bigger. We even got him a special roll away tub to store them in, but for some reason there are never any legos in the bin!

Kai will be three soon and I am trying to plan a small party for him with a couple of little friends. It should be fun. I'm looking forward to it. Planning for the kids is the easy part, but it's the inclusion of adults that is the stressor...so my solution is to have it out of the house! I'm thinking he's old enough to go to Build-A-Bear. Plus he seems to be into snuggling with lovies at night now..which is interesting to me because as a baby he never really cared to play with things like that. He wasn't a hands on baby, but he loved to be read and sung to.

Bella on the other hand, is what you imagine a baby to be: drooling and mouthing anything she can get her hands on. She has a little dolly, which we have named 'Flora' because she has flowers all over her dress. Flora goes everywhere with us! I am so in love with my little girl, I don't know how many times a day I tell her that she is so adorable and loved! I don't know when I'll have another little one again, so I am enjoying every minute of my baby.

Jimmy just had a birthday last week and we had a pretty fun day dining out at restaurants that we normally wouldn't get to go to because of the kids. For lunch we went to Mambo Grill, it's a Latin restaurant and we love the ribs there! For dessert we made early reservations at Blackbird (a really posh restaurant with yummy food) and had one plate of every dessert on the menu...mmmm..yummy! What a great experience there, even though it was only for the desserts, the staff was great and the kids behaved even better! We were going to go to the adjoining restaurant Avec, but we were so full we had to pass it up, but they have the tastiest chorizo stuffed dates, duck confit, and so much more...oh my mouth is watering just thinking about it. I give those restaurants five forks up!

(*Tip of the week* I believe you should be able to take the whole family anywhere, even fancy restaurants that normally wouldn't have small diners. You just have to give them a call, tell them you would really like to dine there with children in tow. Most places will accommodate especially if you are going in the moment they open for dinner service. Lunch time is even a better time to go, because the service is faster.)

The not so fun part is when we went to our car to go home and we discovered that it had been towed!!! That would explain why there were no other cars parked at those meters...I guess we are a little bit country still about the parking in the city.

We got our car back the same night, but poor Jimmy had to spend the rest of his birthday running around town to make it happen. Next time we'll take a cab!

Whew...so much to catch ya'll up on, but that is about it for now. I will be back on here more regularly now that the blues are fading.

before, during and after the sickness

The week before we all got sick, my niece Gabbie sent us Flat Stanley.



Flat Stanley had breakfast with the kids, went to work with Jimmy and played in the snow. I didn't send him back to Texas with my letter so I hope that will be alright. Kai had fun playing with him. I thought that it was a clever project! I sometimes wish that I was Flat Stanley so that I could mail myself in an envelope to visit friends and family that are far away.

During the flu, I lost my taste for coffee! I didn't want it and still don't. I'm all about juice. That's all I could drink, water just didn't taste right. The kids are better, still congested, but better. They are super kids. This was the first time Kai got really sick. We've never seen him so sluggish and quiet! He is now back to bouncing off the walls and talking my ear off. Little Cassia is full of smiles and ever so playful and talkative, too.
How could I forget, I burned my hand pretty bad one day trying to get super hot soup out of the microwave! I reached for the bowl and dropped it because it was too hot, but not without spilling the contents onto my hand! My first reaction was to wash it off with cold water and keep it there (that's all I could do to make it feel better until Jimmy came home to help me). Then Jimmy tells me not to put it in water, but what was I suppose to do? We didn't have any burn spray until he came home with it and whenever my hand didn't have anything cool on it it was burning up! Anyway, burn spray, triple antibiotic and days later my hand is fine. It looks a bit strange and discolored, but fine.

Now, looking out the window one would think that it is 60 degrees or something outside, being March and all, but noooo it's still in the 30's! The snow is supposes to start again tonight and for the next few days!!! I've had enough of the white stuff and ready to get outside with the kids and go to the parks and farmer's markets.

Spring, spring...where are you?