Um, Spring?? Hello?

So the weather this "spring" has definitely been crappy.  There's no two ways about it!  For the past few weeks we have been in an extremely annoying weather pattern where it decides to warm up to the 60s on the weekends and then gets cold (40s) and rainy all week long.  We're still waiting for a good stretch of warm weather around here-- we had ONE day that got into the 70s a few weeks ago, and it was such a tease!

Our trees still remain brown, and it's like the branches are too afraid of the cold, windy, rainy weather to sprout any leaves on them (understandably, I guess).  But the grass definitely knows it is spring, and has turned green and has been growing.  J has been asking since, oh, last fall if Daddy could mow again.  It has been a looooooong winter, people!  So, yesterday warmed up into the 50s, and Adam decided to bite the bullet and do the first mowing of the year (much to Jeremiah's delight!).  If you remember last year, you remember that the first mowing of the lawn ranks right up there with Christmas and birthday for Jeremiah.  This year, he was a little more subdued, but he IS a big 3 year old now (also, holy cow, see how much he has grown up in a year!?!?!?  Sheesh!!!).  Also, notice the difference in clothing-- last year was March 25 with shorts, shirt, and sun hat.  This year was April 20 with fleece, hat, and mittens.  Sigh.

So today was actually decent and in the 6os.  Adam is starting up his summer softball league again (actually, he should be 3 weeks into it already-- but what did it do the first 2 weeks?  RAINED.  So maybe this week he'll actually have a game?  Maybe.)  So anyway, he and some of his teammates got together to practice today, so J and I joined them at the park.  And of course, Daddy is playing softball now, so guess who is SUPER into baseball and bats and balls and baseball hats?  This guy (wearing "Awesome Sweatshirt" once again, of course):

Look at that green grass!

We look forward to someday joining Daddy at the park again for some of his games...... maybe, if spring ever actually decides to stick around for good!

And also, just had to add this picture, even though I put it on FB yesterday.

I printed off these handwriting sheets with J's name and also numbers 1-10 and the ABC's and put them in plastic sleeves.  He practices writing his name with dry-erase markers, and it wipes right off with a kleenex.  He thinks it is so cool to do his "homework" and he gets so excited after he writes a letter!  Makes me so happy and proud! :)

Easter!

We had a wonderful Easter weekend here in Ankeny!  We thought about traveling to see family this weekend, but since my school scheduled professional development on Good Friday, it made it too difficult to do that.  It's always much nicer to travel somewhere when you have a 3 (or more) day weekend to make it worthwhile!  So no such luck this time, but that's okay-- we seem to be establishing some of our own little Easter family traditions (as we stayed home last year, too).

We went to the Good Friday service at our church, and it was awesome.  Jeremiah sat with us in church, and did amazingly well!  We took communion and he walked up with Mommy and Daddy and watched us do that, which was very special. His eyes were wide with wonder! As he said to Grandpa and Meema on Skype yesterday, "I was disappointed I couldn't have bread, too." (What the heck?  Since when does he use big words like "disappointed?"  I think that was the same day he told Adam he should get a carmel macchiato from Starbucks.... this kid.  Seriously.).  Friday was a gorgeous 60 degrees!  Spring might be on its way, folks!

Of course, Saturday was colder and rainy (but hey, rainy is better than snowy!!!).  We were planning to go to an Easter Egg Hunt with our daycare provider, which was put on by their church.  We were not sure if it would still be held, as it was pretty rainy all morning.  But about 30 min. before the hunt was supposed to start, the rain stopped!  So J got to enjoy the Egg Hunt with his friends Grady and Maddy.

A little bit excited!

J and Maddy

Found one!  No, two!

The eggs were hidden in plain sight.... perfect for the preschool crowd!

Showing off his treasure!

Counting his eggs-- he got 15!

On Sunday, we went to our church's Easter service, which was again, wonderful!  J got all dressed up for the occasion!

So handsome!

When J woke up in the morning, he got to search for his Easter basket!  Last year we did a little egg hunt with J outside, but this year we decided not to.  The weather was not as nice this year, AND between an Easter basket from Grandpa and Meema Wiers, an Easter basket from Grandpa and Meema Wissink, lots of candy-filled eggs from his daycare Easter party, AND candy-filled eggs from the hunt on Saturday we have ended up with more candy than Halloween!!!!  So, we called it good and let him hunt for his Easter basket instead (my apologies for any motion sickness caused by that video..... and also for what sounds like a helicopter in the background.  I have no idea what that is.)  Silly Easter Bunny hid J's basket in Molly's cage!

After church, we hit up Ruby Tuesday's for brunch (which we did last year, as well).  Jeremiah is a big fan of the all-you-can-eat bacon and ham. :)

Dork.

My 2 favorite guys!

J and Mommy (nice stripes from the blinds on our faces!)

We took a nice walk when we got home from lunch (temp was in the 50s, but the wind was CHILLY!)  And after J's nap we got to talk to Grandpa and Meema Wiers on Skype.  Overall, it was a nice family weekend at home celebrating Easter and our risen Savior!

Tumble Tots!

Jeremiah had his first Tumble Tots experience this evening!  I wanted to sign him up for some kind of activity through the City of Ankeny for the summer, and pretty much the only option for 3 year olds was Tumble Tots (and actually he is only old enough for "Parent/Child Tumble Tots", so Mommy gets to "tumble" too!  Woohoo.).  Not our first choice (Adam is ready for him to start flag football!), but cousin Josie does Tumble Tots, so it must be fun!

So, in signing Jeremiah up, I realized that the summer sessions were not going to work very well with our schedule and trip in June, so the only session that worked started this week already!  And it goes into mid-May, I believe.  So, from now until then you will find us at Tumble Tots from 5:30-6:15 on Tuesday evenings.

Jeremiah really had fun, and it sure tired him out!  Kinda tired me out, too, honestly.  Here he is, our little tumbler!

A little somersault help from Mommy.

We did it!

Crab walk.  "I can't do this, Mommy."

An old pro on the balance beam!

A pep talk from Mommy before attempting a straddle roll. (I'm as clueless as he is...)

Log rolls.  This we know how to do!  It's just hard to go straight down the mat!

Trampoline-- the definite highlight! "I'm really boinging, Mommy!"

Oops. "I got eaten by a shark, Mommy."

So, that was week 1!  And Subway for dinner afterwards made it the perfect evening! :)

"Spring" Break 2013

Well.  This spring break did not turn out at ALL like I expected it to!  You'd think by now I would understand that things don't usually go the way I expect/want them to.  What can I say?  I'm a slow learner.

I had a nice little list of fun things to do with Jeremiah this week while I was on spring break and he was home from daycare for the week.  We were going to go to the library, maybe the Science Center, possibly the zoo if the temp got above 40 (which it didn't, of course), go play at the mall, and go to Backyard Adventures.  Of course, all our activities needed to be inside since Iowa does not realize that it is spring yet (Come on!  This is getting ridiculous!).

Last weekend we did get out to the mall, and let Jeremiah ride the little coin-operated carousel (believe it or not, I chose for him to do this rather than play in the germ-filled play area with tons of wild and crazy kids.  Ha!  Little did I know what was to come a few days later!).

Fun times!

We also did get out for a walk over the weekend, too, as it DID get above 40 degrees.

On Monday, I was excited to get our week started with a fun activity!  We headed out to Backyard Adventures, which is a place that sells those really nice and expensive wooden swingsets and playsets.  No, we did not go to buy one.  But, they do open up there showroom during the week for Open Play for $5 a kid!  Perfect!  Well, it would have been more fun if it was OUTside, but this was the best we could do!

J played on this one the most!  Up the ladder, down the slide... repeat, repeat, repeat.

He also thought it was cool that they had adirondack chairs!  He said, "What kind of chairs are THESE, Mommy?"  Again, would have been nicer to sit in them relaxing out in the warm sun.... but oh well.

J doesn't care about the weather!

And that's pretty much where the fun ended.

The vomiting started on Monday night, and J spent Tuesday hanging out on the couch (we have watched more than our share of Disney Jr. this week, people!).

Concerned big sister Molly kept watch over sick Jeremiah.

He did eat some food and kept it down on Tuesday.  We went to the Doctor where it was confirmed that he did indeed have a stomach virus (Boo.  I was hoping it was a cold and he just had a lot of drainage!).  I was still cautiously optimistic, as he had kept food down during the day!  And then in the evening he vomited again. :(  And then over night he vomited 3 more times! (2 nights of being up multiple times getting vomit laundry going = fun!).

Wednesday was the worst.  Jeremiah just laid on the couch ALL DAY.  No energy, barely even answered my questions! :(  SO hard for mommy to see, and really there was nothing I could do about it, besides push fluids to prevent dehydration (which we avoided, thankfully.  But I was worried.).

This is not normal.

But, the vomiting stopped, so that was good.  He ate 4 whole goldfish crackers that evening, and kept them down!  Yay!

Thursday he was still iffy.  In the morning he ate some toast but then got pretty tired and laid around all morning.

Still not normal.

 But, after a 3.5 hour nap, he showed a bit more spunk!

A little more normal.

Vomiting is totally gone and diarrhea has reared its ugly head!  (Sorry if that's TMI).  I was told by the nurse at Mercy that with this stomach virus, we could be dealing with this diarrhea for 5-10 days!!!  Fabulous.  But, I guess it's not vomiting, so I'll take it.

That brings us to today.  If you would like to know what went on in the morning, you will have to ask Adam.  Where was I, you ask?????  At the SPA!  Yes, my hubby rocks and bought me a half-day spa day and I had it scheduled for today.  It was lovely!  A one-hour massage, pedi, mani, shampoo and haircut!  Much needed and much appreciated, that is for sure!  So, this is what I did this morning. :)

Pedi and yoga pants-- it's spring break in Iowa!

Too bad they are covered with socks now because it is freezing. :(

J took another loooooong 3 hour nap today, and has started to show more and more spunk and activity, so we are definitely on the mend!  Minus the diarrhea.

We were supposed to head up to Sioux Center tomorrow for Adam's cousin's wedding, but made the tough decision to stay home and make sure J is all healed up before next week.  He obviously needs his rest right now to recover, and we're being very careful about what he's eating, too.  And who wants to deal with a diarrhea diaper in the car or at a wedding?  Not us.

We are bummed, though.  We would have been able to see lots of Adam's family, and we even had a hotel room booked, thanks to my awesome friend Stephanie!  J was so looking forward to a dip in the pool AND a tour of the Dykshorn Dairy!  Oh well, maybe sometime later this spring when the weather is more SPRING-like.  So we will spend a low-key weekend at home, gearing up for a another work/school/daycare week.  Deep breath.  Only 11.5 weeks left of school (holy cow that seems LOOOOONG.  That's what happens when you tack all your snow days on the end of the year!  Boo.).  Maybe sometime in that 11.5 weeks we'll actually get some spring weather?????

Overall, it was not the week I expected, but honestly, it is good that it happened when it did.  I was able to be home with J and take care of him and cuddle him without having to worry about taking days off of school and sub plans.  And we are just glad that J is starting to act more and more like himself and entertaining us with his silly antics.  Hope everyone else's spring break was just as FAB as ours was! :)

Snow Day Shmo Day

Yuck.  A snow day in March!  Quite a bummer in many ways--

1.  If I get to spend the day with Jeremiah, I would MUCH rather it be in June when the weather is nice instead of now!
2.  It is conference week at my school-- and seeing as no one was expecting this random crazy snow day today, we all have report cards  etc. left at school that need out attention before conferences tomorrow!
3.  This makes snow day #5 for us.... which means our original last day of school should have been May 29.... and now our last day will (**hopefully**) be June 5 (June 6 for teachers).  That's a whole week of summer vacation GONE!  Boo.  And before all of you people who think teachers have it so easy because we get 3 months off in the summer blah blah blah remind me of that, think about June 7-August 14.  Not exactly 3 months. 

I'm done complaining now.  Really.

On the upside, I DID get to stay home and hang out with my favorite little guy today.  The time change has affected him for sure-- he slept until 7:20 this morning and later than that yesterday!  This is huge-- he's normally ready to rise and shine by 6:30 am!  Part of that is probably because of his daycare schedule, I'm sure.  But he has also not fallen asleep until 8:30/9:00!  That's going to have to change, since tomorrow he'll have to be back to his normal wake-up time of 6:20.

Lucky J-- Monday is trash day!  Garbage trucks AND snowplows-- yay!

An early morning football game-- complete with J's "football hat."

Digging with noodles-- always a favorite!  And Molly watches closely for dropped noodles.

Then of course we needed to do a "truck wash!"

Then we had to shovel, of course!  J is in charge of wiping off the yard lights...

 Whew!  And that was all before 10 am! :)  We've done a little of this, too:

 I guess another upside is that when I have a snow day, I actually have the time (and energy!) to cook a decent meal.  A delicious vegetable beef soup (thanks, Pinterest!) was on the menu tonight!

This makes up for the fact that tomorrow night we'll be grabbing a quick McD's between school and conferences.... right?

After dinner we took a quick trip to the library to pick out some new books and do some puzzles and play with trains!

All in all, a pretty good snow day, I suppose.  Really, how can I complain at all about getting to stay home with this guy???

3 Year Pics!

I put a few of these on FB, but by all the "likes" and comments, it is obvious that Jeremiah's fans want more! :)  So, here you go!

Tough Guy.

He's 3.  He'd like to be 5, but his mommy is glad he's only 3.

Love this once cause he's laughing!

Never fear-- Giraffey made an appearance, too!

As did the excavator.

Another "senior picture" pose :)

Don't you just want to kiss those cheeks?

Doesn't this look like a head-shot for modeling or something??

I just love him!

Bright eyes!

I was amazed at how well Jeremiah sat, listened, and followed directions during this photo shoot!  There were SO many good pictures to choose from.  And you know what?  The pictures were taken at Target!  I had gotten a coupon e-mailed to me for J's birthday, so took advantage of that.  So glad I did!  Now to get the wrapped canvas on the wall and the pics put into frames....