Dear Kiddos,
Right after I made the last post about it getting hot, a cold front blew in and brought another week of awesome partly cloudy days. I also feel like the teachers have lightened the load of school work by quite a lot, so we've been trying to spend as much time outside as possible.
There were a few days when it was windy enough to fly kites. After putting it off for days, we were finally able to satisfy you girls' appetite for kite flying.
We've also spent lots of time outside doing chalk art.
Sometimes, Hailey, you would ask me to draw something, and then you would add the finishing touches on.
I gave 3D art a shot and my first attempt turned out pretty good. I felt like I was drawing a lot of rainbows and unicorns, so I decided to draw a Pokemon character for Nathan.
One afternoon while the girls were busy doing something, Nathan, you wondered into the kitchen to ask me if you could help. Now, it's been awhile since you've wanted to do anything in the kitchen, so I thought about your current skill set and decided that you were ready to brown beef. Besides the one pop of spatter close to your face, I'd say it was pretty successful. Now, you think you can cook any kind of meat. (The other day you said you can cook the chicken because "I now know how to cook meat!") My young grasshopper, not all meat is created equally. Just because you've mastered browning beef, does not mean you can roast a whole chicken.
We've gone on several bike rides (I sometimes wear my rollerblades and not skates because I've been too lazy to put new bearings in my outdoor wheels).
When you are throwing a tantrum, which you are starting to do more often these days...it's actually more like demanding, "I -- want --- ________!", I find that it is best to distract you with a task, like shucking corn, or peeling garlic. Hannah used to love to peel garlic. Hailey, you like to peel it, but you stay interested in garlic for only a few cloves. When you were peeling the corn, you would peel each leaf off carefully and when the corn became exposed, you would excitedly run over to me yelling, "look mommy! Corn!" I'd hand you a new one and you'd happily run back to your station for some more shucking.
One morning we got our work done quickly so we decided to go on a long walk through the trails in our neighborhood. We stopped at times to create some art.
And Hannah, you and your bestie would take photos of each other along the way. It was adorable. (For those of you wondering, we made a decision early on to let you continue your multiple playdates a day) You two have become super close and truthfully, your bestie has become a part of our family. Her mom jokingly says that she is like Kimmie Gimbler from Full House (a TV show we used to watch as kids).
Hailey you wanted to take some pictures of the flowers too, so here are the ones that you took.
Along our hike, we found some ripe blackberries ready for pickin'.
After attempting to pick the blackberries one time, you decided that they were too squishy. I probably also gave a very scary vibe when I yelled, "no, no, no!" as you reached for the thorny vine.
These were quickly gobbled up at lunch time.
That also was the day our 3 cubic yards of mulch got delivered to our house. We mulched our front, back and side yards and had a bunch of left over mulch. So, with permission, we also mulched our neighbor's front yard (they are both in the medical field and are very busy, understandably). You guys helped a bunch and we paid you for your work. At the end of the day, I just plopped down on the driveway to rest. Hailey then proceeded to outline chalk my body.
We ordered a box of food from farm to table and so with a lot of veggies that I usually don't buy, I decided to try making a salad for everyone. Historically, salad and Havlir kids don't mix well. The verdict: 2 out of 3 of you ate it. Hailey, you took a look at the red leaf lettuce, and then you shot me a look as if I was trying to poison you. You gingerly licked it and threw it at me, utterly disgusted.
The roasted okra went over really well and towards the end of the dinner, you big kids were fighting over the last bits.
Hannah, you were super excited about your ice cream looking like some sort of bird that you made me take a picture of it.
Oh, and that dress of yours is your absolute favorite outfit in the whole wide world. It's the first thing you will wear after I do laundry. In fact, I'm pretty sure you may have dug it out of the hamper so that you can wear it again (at least once). To wear that dress brings you so much joy. I'm not going to deprive that from you.
We've been doing so much home improvement projects lately. I may make a funny post about them, like the book, "If you give a mouse a cookie." but after power washing the front door, I decided that our 11 year old door mat, was still in good shape, but just looked old and dirty. So, I power-washed the welcome mat and we re-painted it.
I think it turned out pretty good, right?
I think the following pictures were taken as another ploy to get you out of a tantrum. I don't remember what, but you ended up helping me make chicken thunder, you 3's self-proclaimed favorite food of all time.
This year's mother's day was probably the coolest one. It all started out with breakfast in bed. Hannah and Nathan brought me a delicious meal of waffles, eggs and bacon. The cold brew coffee had the perfect amount of milk in it (along with some coffee grounds, but that's Ok.)
After a leisurely, uninterrupted meal by myself, I was showered with gifts and cards.
In the afternoon, we have been playing Pokemon Go. It does not take much convincing for anyone to go outside for a walk these days. There has been several cool events taking place and we were each able to catch a MewToo and a Ho-Oh...which is super exciting for us, I mean, you guys.
The rest of the day involved little to no cooking on my part. In fact, for dinner, I was able to push Hailey on the swing outside while the kids cooked dinner inside.
I was even able to draw this robot on our freshly power-washed driveway!
I snuck inside to check the progress and I was pleased with what I saw.
At a quarter to 6, I was summoned inside and seated outside on the patio. My plate was already at my seat along with an empty glass (I was instructed that I should pour myself, which was a wise move on the part of the waitstaff).
For dessert, you guys gave me a selection and when I said, "surprise me" you two ran inside to prepare some sort of wild concoction. I'm not going to lie, but Daddy and I exchanged some funny glances towards each other in reaction to the weird noises coming from the kitchen. At some point, there was banging, followed by screaming, followed by some more banging and then it fell silent.
Moments later, you guys presented me with this:
I am so blessed by the 3 of you. You see the best of me and the worst of me and you all love me unconditionally. I love you too (so much!!!)
Tonight, we were able to Skype with grandma and grandpa. Grandma read you all a couple of stories before bed. I know you all miss them and I'm sure they miss you too.
Well, that's about it for this week! Until next week,
Love,
Mommy
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