Birthday and Mother's Day

For my birthday this year I really wanted to just have a fun night out with our friends.  I decided I wanted to go see this fun 80's cover band called the Spazmatics. They play every Wednesday downtown at the Cedar Street Courtyard.  Matt and Abbey were nice enough to let us high jack wonderful Wednesday.  So we all met downtown for dinner at Moonshine and then went to see the Spazmatics play.  It was a great night and I had a blast! Then for mother's day I had a great weekend at home with the boys.  Mark made me eggs benedict and bought me beautiful flowers.  It was very relaxing. 

 Ang sent me these pretty flowers for my bday.

 Harper, Abbey, Christa and Kim.

 Jason, Dusty and Mark.

 Matt and Kinsey.

This was my amazing mother's day gift that Brody made me at school. I love it!

 Flowers from Mark.

Peonies are my favorite :)

Bounce House Fun

Every time I go to the mall we pass by the bouncy house place and Brody is always dieing to go.  Well we finally decided to give it a shot.  Both boys really like it.  I can't believe how big the bounce houses were.  There were slides and tunnels and all sorts of things.  It's such a great place when it's too hot to play outside or too cold.  There is also a carousel in that Connor spotted and really wanted to go on so we did that too.  It was a very fun weekend!

Brody coming down one of the slides.

He loved the shark one!

Connor venturing in to see what it's all about. 

Riding the carousel.

I had my hand full :)

Easter and Family Visit

So my family came to visit for Easter weekend.  Connor was teething and got an ear infection so he was pretty much just a mess the entire visit :(  We had lots of fun just cooking and hanging out.  Everyone kind of took an night and fixed a fabulous meal.  Shane made stuffed cornish hens, mom and dad made lamb and we did dungeness crabs.  The boys loved all the family at the house and having lots of people to play with.  Syd and Shane bought a car while they were here. And we got to go wedding dress shopping for Kelley.  She thinks she found her dress, I can't post pictures but it is stunning!  For Easter we died eggs and did a little hunt at the house.  Later that day we went to the Tuckers house for an Easter party.  The kids had so much fun. It was cute to watch them all hunt for eggs.  Brody was obsessed with finding eggs with m&m's in them. Both boys loved their Easter baskets and all the goodies inside.  Connor had fun making a HUGE mess with all the Easter grass, I think we will ask the Easter Bunny to leave that out next year :)  It was a fun trip and definitely went by too quickly.  Can't wait for everyone to be together again for the backyard bash!

All the boys at the doctors office.

Connor loved all the Easter grass!

The Easter bunny brought Brody goggles.

Connor absolutely loves his bunny!

Grandma reading the boys one of the new books the Easter Bunny brought.

 Mommy and Brody hunting for eggs.

The Kraatz Family.

Brody stuffing candy into his pockets.

Eric, dad and Syd watching all the kiddos hunt for eggs.

Another egg filled with m&m's!

Lots of fun.

The Allen's.  Love Ky making the kissy face.

All the kids checking out their loot.

Connor hanging with grandma.

Backyard Makeover

So it's been three years and they have finally built houses behind us.  On Judy and Joel's last visit we started talking about making some changes to the backyard to help give us a little more privacy now that we have neighbors behind us.  We actually hired someone to come out on Thursday and remove some of the lawn and move the sprinklers.  Then Joel and his brother Rob flew in for the weekend to help us with this big project.  They arrived Friday afternoon and we decided to just spend time with the kids and have a little fun before diving into all the hard work.  We went to Chuy's for dinner which was fun and delicious.  Saturday morning we started bright and early.  There were lots of trips to home depot.  Our biggest obstacle ended up being some enormous rocks we ran into while digging all the holes for the plants.  We finished most of the work on Saturday.  We planted 3 trees and 6 bushes.  The trees are called Cleveland Pears.  They don't grow fruit but have really pretty white flowers in the spring and then turn red in the fall.  The bushes are wax myrtles and will grow into a hedge.  We also got a few little projects around the house done.  Overall it was a VERY productive weekend and the yard looks amazing.   Thanks Joel and Rob for all of your help!!!!

Here is the yard with the grass removed.

This lizard was quite interested in what was going on.

Ouch, got a little too much sun! 

All of our supplies being delivered.

Everything for the makeover.

NM martini's at Chuy's.

The boys loved playing with grandpa and uncle Rob.

Rob watching a movie with the boys.

The new backyard.  I can't get it all in one picture but like I said there are 3 trees, one in each corner and one in the middle and then 6 bushes.

Lady Gaga

On Wednesday I went to the Lady Gaga concert with a couple of friends from our neighborhood.  We bought the tickets six months ago and just thought it would be fun to go and have a girls night.  We left early and went to Sushi for dinner and then headed to the concert.  It was lots of fun.  She was really good.  There were lots of interesting characters at the concert.  I could have just sat and people watched all night long.  After the concert we decided to go downtown for a few drinks.  We ended up having a really fun girls night! We need to plan another one soon :)

Marie, Diana and me.

My crazy shoes I decided to wear. I brought a back up pair and they ended up giving me a blister go figure.

Our giant margaritas.

At our seats.

 All of our crazy shoes, we are lucky we didn't break our ankles.

This guy was sitting in front of us and he was crazy!

 These girls went all out!

 Gaga taking the stage. 

 Thanks girls for a great night!

Harper Claire Niemann

Matt and Abbey added a new addition to their family on Friday.  Harper Clair arrived around 11:30am and was 7 pounds 7 ounces and 19 1/4 inches long.   Both mom and baby are doing great.  We drove down on Saturday to meet her.  She is so tiny!  I always forget how little new borns can be.  Both the boys did great during our visit in the hospital.  Brody was very excited to see Kinsey, she is currently one of his favorite friends :) I was terrible and didn't take a single picture.  Luckily Matt texted us a pic when she arrived.  Congrats Matt and Abbey we are so happy for you!

Crawfish Boil

Matt and Shane had their annual crawfish boil a few weekends ago.  As usual it was lots of fun and really yummy.  Brody had lots of fun playing with all the kids and Connor slept most of the time but when he was awake he was trying his hardest to keep up with his big brother.   I forgot to take a camera but got a few pics with my iphone.

 Brody checking out the mud bugs!

Some stone crabs decided to crash the party.

Brody and Kinsey(aka his girlfriend).