Out to the Ballgame

We finished celebrating Aurora's birthday weekend with a day out at the ballpark, watching the Round Rock Express beat Memphis opening weekend. Round Rock has a great stadium for kids, with an awesome FUN ZONE located right next to the main lawn. Aurora jumped on the bungee, Clark went down the slide a dozen times, and we may have played more than we actually watched baseball, but everybody had a good time.

After a crazy weekend of lightning and hail storms, it was downright HOT on Sunday. Today my parents had lunch with Nancy, and tomorrow everybody's taking off; Nancy's flying back to Arizona and my folks are driving to Florida for a couple months. Ahh well, it certainly has been a lovely weekend. A big thanks to everybody who came out, sent gifts, and made it all so special.

Art Party!

Aurora has had her party planned for months. She wanted an art party, and that's exactly what she got! We booked the party room at Michaels and had Aurora's best friends and family out to celebrate. We decorated aprons, painted canvases and made necklaces. The girls had a blast!

If only these letters spelled something... each girl painted a picture with their first initial blocked out with tape. I think they turned out neat! Most of the girls painted rainbows, which perfectly matched the cupcakes Aurora and I made this morning. We baked awesome little 6-layer rainbow cupcakes before the party, which were a hit. That was probably my favorite part of the day. The party was great, and having dinner at Mesa Rosa with the whole family was delicious, the gifts were fun and the birthday girl felt very special. She loved it all!

Happy, Happy Birthday to my sweet little girl. You can stop growing now!!!

$10 and a 10K

Aurora's girl scout troop went camping this weekend but we bowed out. We've just had too much going on, and honestly - I didn't want to leave the boys. Luckily, Aurora had so much fun she didn't seem to mind. Our neighbor's finished building their awesome tree house, she played lots of Minecraft with her daddy, and we went to the bank and opened savings accounts for both kids! April is youth savings month and the littles got some cool prizes and incentives for opening new accounts, including a t-shirt and their first $10 deposit, free. Then we went to the Cap10K expo to pick up my race bib and took a nice walk before today's muggy, rainy, foggy 6.1 mile run.

Chuck and I went out to dinner last night (SUSHI!) and dad told me he expected me to finish the 10K in under an hour. Aside from the wet weather, crazy crowds and an incredibly hilly course, I haven't been training much since the half marathon. I finished in 1:05 (and according to my map, covered 6.35 miles) and I must say, I am happy with that! I may just spend the rest of the day sitting on the couch eating blondie bars...

Flat Aurora

Aurora's first grade class just learned about Flat Stanley and each student made their own flat self to be sent away on an adventure. Flat Aurora was so bright and colorful that I could tell she would love a trip to New Orleans, so we sent her off to my Aunt Susanna & Uncle Johnny. From the looks of it they showed her a great time! She explored Tulane University (where Susanna works) and went to the Congo Square Rhythms Festival at Armstrong Park.

I'm sure that by now Flat Aurora has made her way back to Valley View Elementary and is telling all her flat classmates about her time in Louisiana. If only the REAL Aurora could make the same trip! I'd really love to go visit, but with two small children a 2-hour road trip seems to be about all we have in us these days. Ah well, many thanks to Susanna & Johnny for taking such great care of our baby Flat Aurora! Feel free to send your flat selves to Austin anytime!

Easter Eggs

Another day, another blog post. I told you April was going to be big but you probably didn't expect it to be BLOGGING EVERYDAY big! This morning the kids woke up to eggs hidden all around the living room, then I made bunny-shaped pancakes and we put on our Sunday best for a day out with my folks. First up was brunch, crafts, an egg hunt and a nice service at church. After a little lunch and food shopping, we were off to a friend's house for a party. They had an awesome egg hunt (you counted that right - the kids had THREE Easter egg hunts and I must've eaten 5 meals), as well as a petting zoo and a magician. The soft little bunnies in the petting zoo were the only bunnies we saw this year. I considered take them to the mall for a picture with EB, but honestly, people in bunny suits are creepy. Real bunnies are where it's at!

Clark's a pretty chill egg collector, but Aurora worked it! The kids dyed eggs and got awesome baskets yesterday thanks to Grandma and Grandpa. What else could anybody ask for?

Aurora declared it the Best Easter Ever and asked if we could do the exact same thing next year. I told her we probably could, though Clark conked out pretty hard in the car and had a super fussy evening after missing his regular nap. Then Aurora lost a tooth! And I went for a run and gave Chuck a chance to spend some quality time with his over-tired, sugared-up kiddos. I say, if you're not going to bed completely exhausted, you're doing it wrong. Happy Easter!

Bunny Run

Okay, so this is not exactly an Easter post. Today Grandma & Grandpa watched the littles while Chuck and I went on a ziplining adventure! I got the tickets for Christmas and today was the perfect day to go - cool and overcast without a drop of rain. We got to pick silly helmets to wear and it's hard to see, but Chuck was an aviator and I was a BUNNY. And, our first zipline was called the Bunny Run, so... maybe this is an Easter post after all.

There were 10 ziplines and one was 900 feet across and 100 feet high! It was seriously exhilarating, but not quite as scary as I expected. Chuck took a video so you can see... we may have been going up to 25 mph but it was easy! What an awesome adventure.

Clarkie's Good Friday

I've had so many opportunities to hang out with just Aurora - you know, spring break, during Clark's nap times, all those years before he was born - but it's very rare that I get to spend time alone with Clark. Today daycare was closed for Good Friday but Valley View decided it would be a makeup day for that "inclement weather" we had a few weeks back. Clark would've been content watching TV all day long, but we ended up spending a good part the morning with Will & Ruby at Rolly Pollies.

Aurora's been here a ton of times, but little Clarkie rarely does anything like this (and when he does, he's usually being dragged along to a big kid's birthday party). He had such a good time playing at his own pace with his own little friends. Afterwards, we went to the library and read books together for a half an hour before heading to Aurora's school for lunch. We brought food for Aurora's teacher (and ourselves) and it was super fun!

Clark actually got a little upset when we left without her, but Aurora took the bus home a couple hours later and my folks came over around the same time. Even though we only had a few hours alone together, it was such a nice morning for both of us and I thought Clark deserved his own blog post. I hope you had a good Good Friday, too! 

No Fooling

We may be the most boring April Fools Day family of all time. No jokes at home, no jokes at work, and no reports of jokes at school. Well, Aurora did get me once... this morning while we were getting ready, she asked if we had any bacon and told me she'd like to have that for breakfast. She fooled me alright! I'll tell you something that's no joke - school pictures just came in and OH MY GOODNESS we have the cutest kids of all time!

No need to vote for your favorites because I'm pretty much buying them all!

Peanut Butter Cookies

It's springtime in Texas and we're back to taking neighborhood walks. Last week we went for a walk while cookies were in the oven and I asked Chuck to take them out, but he didn't hear the buzzer so we came home to burnt, inedible sadness. Today we decided to give it another shot and he redeemed himself! I got the oven ready and we went for a walk with Grandma, Grandpa, Vivi & Lizzy, and came home to perfect peanut butter cookies.

Clark didn't actually walk, but he enjoyed taking turns being held by each of us (and he loved the cookies). This weekend my folks watched the littles so Chuck and I could get our taxes done. Not a whole lot else to report, but the next few weeks are going to be packed full of awesome. So, my dear (few) loyal readers - stay tuned! April's gonna be big.

Fairytales

Spring Break may be coming to an end and the sunshine may have been short lived, but I'd say we made the most of our week off together. In fact, I'd call it a fairytale week with a storybook ending. On Wednesday we went to the library for Alice the Armadillo's Adventures (a play and puppet show), then headed to the Harry Ransom Center for an amazing interactive exhibit on all things Alice in Wonderland. Both activities were awesome and Grandma & Grandpa came along for the fun.

The next day we had high tea followed by pedicures and the new Cinderella movie in the theater. Such a sweet day with my sweet little girl.

Yesterday the rain ruined part of our plans but we still had a nice day shopping and playing with my folks. Today Clark got in on the fairytale action as Aurora and I took him to the Scottish Rite Theatre for the first time to see Jack and the Bean Stalk!

He really did great. He sat up front on the carpet with his sister (Aurora was always afraid to sit up front without me when she was his age) and he thought the creepy giant was awesome. He's a big fan of the book and does a pretty cute "Fe Fi Fo Fum." One of the stars of the show just happened to be the same woman who played Alice the Armadillo at the library and we had a nice chat with her afterwards. The rain has me a little bummed now but I have to say, taking Spring Break off is pretty much the best thing ever. I'm already planning our next week off this summer!