YAY!

My daffodils will soon be here!

Every year it seems that one day there is snow on the ground and then the next day I wake up and the whole world is in full bloom already. I always forget to take time to notice the little signs of the coming of spring - tiny buds on the trees, the first honey bee, green sprouts breaking through the dirt. So this year I've made it a point to give my full attention to my surroundings as we come out of the deep slumber of winter and rise to the sweetness that is spring. So far in the past weeks, I've noticed 2 lady bugs, a few flies and 1 bee. As I type, I'm looking at the brown buds on my favorite tree that will soon give way to beautiful purple flowers and eventually lush green leaves. I can hardly wait for the full bloom of spring, but for now I'm really enjoying all the small indications that spring is just around the corner. Yippee!

Yesterday was the perfect day to be the first official day of spring - warm and sunny. We bought a couple kites and headed to the park...

From a boy's point of view...

I will admit - when I found out I was having 2 boys, I cried for a full day. But that's because I didn't know how special and fun it is to raise little boys. Plop my boys in the middle of the woods with some rocks, trees, dirt and maybe a little pond and they will keep themselves happy and busy for hours. The way they awe and wonder at the world never ceases to amaze me.

Looking for bugs in a tree stump.

I love catching Matt and Jordi in the middle of a deep conversation like this. So sweet. :-)


They were so proud of themselves for crossing this log - grinning from ear to ear at the end.



A treasure to a little boy does not consist of money, gems or jewelry. He will find far greater pleasure in the wonder of a rock, pebble, stick or beetle.
-- Author Unknown

Happy 29th to me!

I celebrated my 29th birthday on March 5th (and for the entire week following :-D). As usual, Jeremy spoiled me this year. Among other sweet things he did for me, he spent a couple hours making me a giant German Chocolate cake from scratch. Seriously, it's THE BEST cake that will ever have the pleasure of meeting your taste buds. No. Joke. Unfortunately I don't have a picture. Just trust me that it was fabulous.

This is not THE cake (yes I had 2 birthday cakes - I just couldn't decide!)

I took the day off work on Friday the 5th. My mom, dad and I took the boys to the Cinci Museum Center. In the evening, my mom and I did a little shopping, and then Luke and Lindsey met all of us at Red Robin for dinner. Luke and Lindsey stayed over Friday night and then on Saturday, we went to 2nd St. Market, fed the ducks at Lincoln Park and went bowling. We finished off the evening with a fantabulous fondue dinner.

Some pics of the blessed event...


How precious is this little girl?! My sister's new puppy, Ginger. The boys LOVE her.

A Budding Picasso

OK so I'm invoking my maternal right to brag on my children. :-D


My just barely 3 year-old Jordi drew these two rockets - fire coming out of them and everything. He explained that he also drew a ladder going up them so the people could climb up and get inside. So impressive!

He signed his life away...

Jeremy and I celebrated a momentous occasion last week - Jeremy finally signed his contract to join an OB/GYN practice here in Dayton! We are SO excited. :-D The practice consists of two OB/GYN's (Jeremy and another guy) and 3 midwives. The midwives take care of all the routine OB work, including all regular deliveries; while Jeremy and his partner manage only the high-risk OB patients and C-sections, so then they get to focus most of their time on surgery. This is the perfect setup for Jeremy because his favorite part of his job is surgery and he is really talented at it.
His office time will be split between 2 offices - one in Vandalia which is about 25-30 min from home and the other here in Centerville which is no more than a 5 minute drive (most of the time he'll be at that Centerville one). On days that he is in the office, he'll be working either 9am - 5pm or 7am - 3pm (sweet!).
Jeremy will take call 1 weekend a month and during the week he'll be on call every other evening, although he'll only be called in if there is a C-section or forceps delivery, so it'll be pretty cushy. I'm SO excited to finally have a husband who is home on the weekends!
As for the contract, our favorite part is that they are paying off 3/4 of our student loans. What a huge blessing! Another cool thing is that Jeremy graduates in the middle of June but he doesn't start his new job until August 2. That means we'll have a whole 6 weeks to just chill together and play. Have I mentioned yet that I'm so excited about all of this?!
So here we are for another 4 years, or who knows how long. If this job is as perfect as we think it is, then we may be here for a while, which is fine by us! We feel so blessed to have been given such an awesome opportunity and really look forward to years ahead. It has been such a long haul and we're so grateful to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Signing that contract has finally made us feel that there really is an end in sight - I just want to fast-forward through the next 3 1/2 months!

Sledding and Snowmen

I really don't like winter, I'm not a fan of snow and I hate being cold (why do I live in Ohio rather than Florida? A mystery...). You can imagine how thrilled I was when I suggested to Jeremy that we take the boys sledding and he enthusiastically agreed that it was a great idea. Boo-hoo.

To my pleasant surprise, it was actually a total blast. We had so much fun taking the boys sledding for the first time.

I might add that it was ridiculously difficult to find sledding essentials in mid-February. We went to three different stores looking for sleds, gloves and boots. One might logically think that you could find those items in the dead of winter in the midwest, but rather we found sunscreen, flip-flops and bikinis. Of course. Silly me... Eventually we found some items on clearance at a mountain-man store (the boys' gloves were 5 sizes too big, but they worked) and we borrowed some sleds from my cousin. In the end, fun was had by all!

Another snowy first was the boys' first snowman. Matthew lasted out in the snow for about 5 min before saying, "Mommy, should we have hot chocolate?" I'm pretty sure the only reason he dares to venture into the cold is because he knows he'll get some hot chocolate afterwards (he's definitely my son). Jordan was in it for the long haul and helped Daddy finish building Frosty. The snowman's name is Frosty, but the boys kept calling him Crusty. Oh, and the next day, the boys were freaking out because the birds were out there eating Frosty's eyes. "Mommy, stop those birds! They're eating Crusty's eyes out!" It was hilarious.

#48...Check!

#48 Learn to make Vickie's homemade bread - completed 03/01/10

Last week Jeremy's mom was in town and, while she was here, she taught me how to make her homemade bread. And mm, mm, mm...boy, is it delicious. Growing up, Jeremy had homemade bread weekly. I advised him that this won't be a regular occurence (I don't really like to cook all that much, although I do enjoy baking somewhat), but I do love the smell of fresh bread emanating my home. Anyway, it'll be a fun treat to make every once in a while. :-) So, it's another item to knock off my list, yay!

Thanks, Vickie, for sharing your secret and thanks for a fun time while you were here!

My 101 in 1001