Alright. I've been severely neglecting this blog lately and I apologize. Especially as it relates to Project 365. Let me give you the back story so I can try to redeem myself a little bit... In February I was hospitalized with a nasty kidney infection. When I say nasty I mean four days in the hospital nasty. No fun. Tip of the day: Don't be a hero. If something really hurts and then starts hurting worse, don't wait it out hoping it'll go away. GO TO THE DOCTOR! Then, when I got home I was welcomed by a house full of sick people. Of course, as I've mentioned in previous blog posts, my immune system surrenders immediately to any and all of my children's colds. It was a fun few weeks. I was definitely reaching for my meds instead of my camera for a while. But obviously others suffer far worse than my little stint, so I'm done playing the sympathy card. Now on to the present and getting you up to speed...
We attended a karate graduation ceremony for Dominic Forte, owner of Forte's American Karate in Wyoming, back in February at the Minneapolis Convention Center. He was graduating from a 5th degree to a 6th degree black belt. It was a great ceremony and a fun show put on by other students and graduating black belts. If anyone's ever been interested in taking karate classes these guys are the real deal. Super dedicated and awesome instructors. I left the ceremony wanting to try out a few moves. It was also the Motorcycle Show that weekend though, so I have a feeling approaching anyone in that crowd wouldn't have ended well for me.
Evie's first birthday party. Longing for the days you could eat cake by the fistful!
Our one and only ice fishing outing this year. Note to self: More ice fishing next year. I love it and the kids love playing in the minnow bucket if nothing else. Explanation on a couple of the pictures... Top right: Why yes, I do love fish that much. Bottom right: Ryan telling grandpa some fishing stories.
Our days of spelling out words in front of our children so they don't know what we're talking about are over. That was a sad day when it officially ended. Especially considering the word I had spelled in the presence of my daughter. She brings home flashcards from school to work on word recognition. One night she asked if we could do "princess words". I asked her what that meant and she said, "it's working on words but I can wear my crown". My little lady just needed to jazz it up a bit.
Some randoms... my niece, Paige, enjoying the rare opportunity of having the toy room all to herself. The hat was her idea. Such a fashionista. Sydney, following me around like the paparazzi, giving me a taste of my own medicine. Both kids, watching cartoons from the comforts of their laundry baskets. May their creativity always flourish!
We visited the train depot museum in Duluth, which houses a great railroad museum filled with old train cars and collections of railroad artifacts. I'm not sure whether my kids or my husband were having more fun exploring the old train cars. One of them was a mail car with rows and rows of mail slots, labeled by city. One of the slots was labeled "Land of Oz" and wrapped just underneath it read Pine City, which I found fitting considering my mother-in-law is from Pine City and is a huge Wizard of Oz fan. So this one's for her.
Every spring we have a temporary lake in our front yard while the snow is melting. I love it for several reasons, 1. I can live out my dream of owning lakefront property, 2. it means the end of winter is in sight, and 3. I'm a kid at heart and will never tire of putting on my rubber boots, breaking up the brittle ice (what a fabulous sound that is!) and getting a little muddy.
Why wouldn't she wear a skirt four-wheeling around the yard? Isn't that what girls do?
For those of you keeping track, obviously I'm missing a day week or two between February and today. That's alright with me. At least I'm back in the game!
