Spring is Here

The days are warmer, the sunset is later, and the trees are blooming! Don't get me wrong--I love winter and love the snow--we just never get a true "winter" here so I try to look forward to the changing seasons.

Last week I planted a bunch of grass seed and caught up on some yardwork. Brad helped me plant several bulbs of garlic, as well as some basil and cilantro seedlings in a greenhouse. Nick informed me yesterday that some squirrels had dug up the garlic so hopefully they will recover! Any rain we get is few and far between so I have to be diligent to water water water.

We haven't showed our house since our return from Seattle and it is hard not to get disheartened. I keep telling myself that it will pick up when the weather is nicer, when people get their taxes filed, when school is out.....it is out of my hands so it does no good to worry! Next month is our halfway point in the listing so we will drop the price to see if that helps.

As far as Plan B, we find out on April 1 if Bradley got into the local primary school.

Easter is just around the corner, and I did some festive designs on my nails to celebrate....

My mom is cooking a big Easter dinner with an egg hunt so I'm sure all of the little ones will have a blast! As Brad gets older it is so fun to watch him grow each holiday and see him enjoy it more and more!

This week was Spring break (for most) and the way I celebrated was by working extra! How fun. Hopefully the reward will be noticeable on my next payday :)

We are all looking forward to our Denver trip in May. I have been looking up fun family things to do and have found several that look neat. Ideas so far are the US Mint, a gold mine tour, and dinner at Casa Bonita. I'm sure we will also drive into the mountains, and I would love to go thru the historical Victorian towns that are around.

I seem to have been in a creative rut for awhile--yes I crocheted a ton of headwarmers/hats during the winter, but I have not scrapbooked for close to a year! I think I am overwhelmed by it because I have so much stuff that when I get it all out, I can't put it away till I am done. I have *briefly* considered getting out of my typical scrapbooking and starting to preserve our family photos in some other less hands-on way. I don't think I will revert to that until absolutely necessary, maybe when a second little one comes along....

Right now I am psyching myself up to go get a ton of photos developed and just knock it out. With Brad's fourth birthday on the horizon as well as him starting school--I will only get further behind! This has always been a fun hobby for me and I don't want it to become a burden by getting behind. We always find time for the things that are important to us!

Precious Moments

 Yes, we are home from Seattle. But first--I want to share some adorable pictures of my little boy and his cousin! He stayed with his grandparents while we were in Washington, and my MIL took them both to get portraits made. They turned out wonderful, and these are a few of my favorites....

 

So precious! His cousin Zoe is 5 months older than he is, and they will both be starting Pre-K this fall. They just love playing together.

Our trip to Seattle went good. We had a good time but not enough to do all of the things we wanted to. Our layover was in Denver and it almost got canceled due to a heavy snow storm. Hundreds of other flights to/from there were canceled throughout the day. Thankfully ours was late enough in the day that the storm had passed and they were able to clear the airport. Our flight landed in Seattle just after midnight, so we were VERY tired by the time we got to our hotel.

We got up early to catch breakfast, then packed up and headed north to Vancouver, BC! This was our 3rd time into Canada, but our first time actually driving there. We got thru the border with no trouble (although we still get nervous every time like we are doing something wrong) and had lunch in the city.

We somehow ended up in a huge Asian district and by the time we ate lunch we were pooped and wanted to head back to the hotel. It was a 2 hour drive each way so that took most of the day! For dinner we headed to our local fave--Red Mill burgers and each got a bleu cheese bacon burger. So yummy!

 

The next morning we grabbed breakfast in the lobby, then headed 2 hours south to see our family! Nick's aunt and uncle leave in a precious little town nestled in the pine trees and mountains. The views are amazing and they have a river right behind their house. They treated us to lunch and several cups of coffee! We stayed for most of the day then headed home.

 

 

 We had a gift card to a theater that we really needed to use (because that particular theater is not in Oklahoma but there were several around Seattle) so on our way home we stopped at a theater and arrived just 5 minutes after the movie we wanted see had started--Oz the Great and Powerful! We hoofed it up 4 sets of escalators to get to the 4th floor and got to see it in 3D. It was very good!

Unfortunately we stayed up way too late that night. We stopped somewhere and grabbed dinner and didn't get to bed until around 1am, then had to get up at 4am to catch our early flight. We were running a bit late to the airport and had to literally jog to our gate! They were halfway done boarding our plane when we got there. Our layover was very short and we had to quickly get to our next gate for the last flight. We landed safely and took a nice nap when we got home!

That evening we drove out to the inlaws' house to pick up Brad. My mom and stepdad met us down there, and we all had dinner together.

Now it's back to real life and work tomorrow!

Lots of Plans!

 Yay for my 400th blog! Thank you for reading.

Our return to Seattle is finally here! We leave tomorrow evening and are excited to get out of town for a few days. I went in to work early today and got off early so that we could all drive Brad down to his grandparents' for the weekend. He will have a blast playing with his cousin and getting spoiled. We will pick him up Tuesday evening after we get in.

This will be our first flight with Frontier Airlines. Hopefully it goes well because we have another trip with them booked for May! I found a great deal online that I could NOT pass up for a trip to Denver. For that trip we are taking our little one because the flights were so cheap! It is only a 1 1/2 hr flight with no layovers so I'm sure he will do fine. This will be Brad's first flight since we took him to Chicago when he was 1. I found a lovely hotel with free breakfast and internet, as well as an indoor heated pool and hot tub :)

We have had a few more showings on the house but still no offers yet. Our realtor said it should pick up after spring break. We are still not too worried about it--if it is meant to sell then we will get an offer!

We are still working on Plan B if we don't sell the house this summer. Earlier this week we went to the elementary school down the street to enroll Brad for preschool. We found out the "old" elementary school is now grades 3-5, and the BRAND new school right behind it is the Primary school for grades PreK-2. It is only two years old! That is the one that he would go to. There are 80 spots for PreK so they do a drawing for who gets a spot. We will find out April 1 if he is in.

In other news...I got all of my paperwork (and money) sent off for my application to be an RN in New York a couple of weeks ago. They said it could take up to 8 weeks for everything to go thru. I was a little worried because I had to trust 3 different places to fill out the appropriate forms and mail them all to the correct place in NY, and hope that everything came together under my file.

Long story short, I had some free time at work the other day so I decided to look online to see if I was listed as a licensed nurse in NY....and I was!!!!!! It said I became licensed as of March 4. I am super excited! I actually just got my official license and registration in the mail today. I don't have to renew it until Feb. 2016.

For our trip, our plans are pretty relaxed. We won't have any time to explore tomorrow--we land very late and I'm sure we will be exhausted. We are going to eat dinner in Denver at our layover, then just go to bed when we get to our hotel. Sunday we are planning on driving into Vancouver, Canada to check out the scenery! This will be our 3rd trip into Canada, but our first time driving there.

After that we will probably go into downtown Seattle back to Pike's Market for some snacks and souvenirs. We loved the market last time and wished we had more time there. On Monday we are driving south to see our family for a few hours, then after that we are heading west to the coastal town of Grayland to see a beautiful beach that we found last time. We leave very bright and early Tuesday morning and will be home Tuesday afternoon.

I know we will fall in love with Washington again because it is such a beautiful state. If only they were cheaper and had old Victorian houses! Next blog will have pics, so check back next week!