It's the last day of April. Last day.
It's not Wednesday. It's Sunday. But here's what we've been up to (besides school and baseball and dance).
WHAT WE'RE EATING
Well, lately we eat either a really quick meal (like tacos) before running out the door to the ballpark, or I pack a picnic (like wraps, fresh fruits, veggies and pretzels) to take with us to the ballpark. Last night was the first real night I'd spent in my kitchen in several days. I made a zucchini pie, and it was delicious and all things spring and summer are made of! A couple of weeks ago, I made Ina Garten's Spring Green Risotto.
WHAT I'M REMINISCING ABOUT
This time of year always makes me more sentimental than usual. There's something about dance recitals and graduations and end-of-the-school-year activities that just makes me a puddle.
Last week was awards week and parent observation at dance. Hannah Kate is about to take the stage for her 6th dance recital. I teared up watching her last week. Miss Courtney and Mrs. Katherine did a phenomenal job choreographing the dances this year. I know I saw this every year, but I think this year is going to be my favorite. Here are her last five years of dance pictures.
I don't even know what to say about Ellie. She might dance on the big stage at the recital this year. And she just might not. I really thought the whole "if you want to take gymnastics, you have to dance your heart out at the recital" would do the trick this year. But after parent observation, I'm not so sure. Let's just say she wasn't exactly dancing like Student of the Month! The studio awards certificates for one and two years of dance. They award trophies beginning in year three. At year five, they award a trophy and a charm and then charms for each year thereafter. So Hannah Kate now has three trophies and two charms. Ellie really wanted a trophy this year so I had to explain the whole thing over again. And you know what she said? "Well, then I'm going to do dance again next year so I can get a TROPHY and then I'll do gymnastics." As I type this, she's doing hand stands and back flips across the family room.
We have two weeks of school left and a few finals, and I'll have a 7th grader, 4th grader and kindergartener. Not to mention my oldest nephew is graduating. High school. Yes.
There's lots of reminiscing these days.
WHAT I'M LOVING
Oh goodness, I haven't thought about this one. I'm definitely loving that we have only two weeks of school and dance left! I'm also loving my new vitamins. It's the small things, you know?!
WHAT WE'VE BEEN UP TO
Church. School. Ball. Dance. REPEAT.
We also took a quick, last-minute trip to Georgia during spring break. More about that later.
WHAT I'M DREADING
Nothing.
WHAT I'M WORKING ON
Well, this is a loaded question. We have a lot of projects going on around here. We have three pretty major home improvements projects we're trying to tackle. I was giddy when the kids and I drove up in the driveway last weekend after our Georgia trip to see my husband working on one of them. He finished yesterday. So two major projects and lots of minor ones left!
I decided to go ahead and plant a spring garden. Ellie and I put the plants in the ground about a month ago. We were in Georgia for only a few days, and I was shocked when I got back and saw my garden. It exploded! But, to be honest, my squash, zucchini and tomato plants are gorgeous, but there are hardly any blooms on them. So I don't know if my harvest is going to be as plentiful as my plants. I was later planting the eggplant and okra so those are just now beginning to take off. I had a couple of strawberry plants that insisted on coming up and are still baring a strawberry here and there so I haven't yet had the heart to pull them up. I just planted some sunflower seeds and watermelons around them. And I just put a couple of cucumber plants in the ground on Friday. I'd like to plant some peppers, but that may or may not happen.
I'm planning our summer vacation. We're doing something different this year, and I'm super excited about it. We might try to fit in a weekend at the beach, but we're going to head north this year on a road trip.
I'll share more about this later, too, but my best friend growing up sent me a very special gift a couple of weeks ago. Several years ago, she did extensive genealogy research for her family. After my Grandmother passed away last November, she began the processing of researching MY family. She compiled an organized all of the information she found into a beautiful binder with pages of explanations regarding how to go about genealogy research and how to organize the material. I can't even adequately describe here what she did. But my next major project is continuing the Scott family research (Grandmother's family) and then creating binders for my Connell, Cannafax and Hand family lines. The amount of time that goes into something like this is tremendous so I've not had time lately to work on it like I want to, but that's going to be my major summer project.
Other than that, we're working really hard to finish this school year with excellence.
So, yep, there's a lot going on right now.
WHAT I'M EXCITED ABOUT
I'm excited about lots of things! But at the top of the list is that Scott family genealogy binder I just mentioned. I'm also getting excited about summer. I say "getting" because I really have to convince myself (you know, self-talk) that the oppressive south Louisiana heat and humidity won't last forever and that fall will eventually come. I'm excited about our summer reading list and our road trip (I know . . . I'm such a nerd!). I'm excited about all the little projects going on around here.
WHAT I'M WATCHING / READING
I wish! I haven't had time since the first week of April to read a book! Well, Mason and I are currently reading Watershed Down, but I haven't read anything else besides magazines lately. The last book I read was Edenbrooke. It was a quick, sweet little read. So, needless to say, I have a huge stack of books just waiting to be read once we're done with dance and baseball and school.
And besides baseball games and dance, I'm not watching much of anything these days!
WHAT I'M LISTENING TO
So someone asked me the other day if my kids were always so quiet. I mean, I CAN'T EVEN! That's just not a word that comes to mind when I think about Mason, Hannah Kate and Ellie. From the time they wake until the time they sleep, they are talking. All three of them. Non-stop. All. the. time. All the time!
WHAT I'M DOING THIS WEEKEND
Well, now that the weekend is over . . . our original plans fell through so that meant we stayed home and continued working around the house. Seth finished our first major project. I transplanted all of my Grandmother's lilies because we had to pull up our crepe myrtle tree. Yes. Seth hooked a chain to it and pulled it out with his truck. Bye Myrtle! It was an unfortunate situation created by Asian Ambrosia Boring Beetles. Google that. I also did some touch-up painting. We had dinner-on-the-grounds after church this morning so I spent a good deal of time in the kitchen preparing my dishes for that. So it wasn't necessarily what I'd call a fun weekend, but it was a necessary weekend, and I think we're all pretty excited at what all we accomplished.
WHAT I'M LOOKING FORWARD TO NEXT MONTH
Now this is a loaded question! I can't even look at my May calendar right now. It's absolutely crazy! But we have A LOT to look forward to!
We have a couple of weekend trips planned . . . the girls' dance recitals (that would be plural because, yet again, they are not in the same recital so we'll be doing two recitals) . . . graduations . . . Spring Celebratio (Mason and Hannah Kate have both worked so hard on their Scripture memory passages this semester) . . . more baseball games . . .
WHAT ELSE IS NEW
I think, for now, we'll just leave it at that!