Happy 9th Birthday, Fletcher!

Fletcher turned 9 on Saturday and we had a great time celebrating him.  He was so excited to enjoy his Spring Break birthday.

Fletcher loves to cook, camp, be outside, play video games, grocery shop, wake up early and stay home.  He makes friends wherever he goes and animals love him.  He can start up a conversation with anyone.  Fletcher is doing wonderful in school and we are really proud of him!  His favorite gift: his own drink fridge & snack station for the kid zone!

I'll do another post on his mini fridge set up, but let's just say he was THRILLED.

He was sweet and let Leo help him open some gifts.

A Messi soccer jersey made him smile.

WOW!

Survival first aid kit was a hit.

And he got some really fun games.  Stay tuned for all the game links on my Friday post!

We're so proud of this sweet guy!  Trying new things.

He loves coding and robots and technology.

Wishing him a really wonderful year ahead!

Friday Favorites

Happy Friday, friends!  We had a lot of St. Patrick's Day fun this week.  We're just hours away from Spring Break and I can't wait!  We had a fun week with lots of favorite moments.  The highlights were:

1. When you love Notre Dame, St. Patrick's Day is the easiest holiday to pull together.  Walmart came through for us with the cutest clover gear.

2. St. Patrick's Day in kindergarten was so much fun.  We made Fruit Loop rainbows, played pass the gold coin, wore green and did lots of rainbow art.

3. We can't quit laughing about this.  Leo got a gold coin in his rainbow treat cup.  I was shocked when he said his gold coin was disgusting.  Then I realized he ate the wrapper AND the chocolate.  No wonder he didn't like it.  Silly guy!  I guess I should have told him to unwrap and then eat his gold coin.

4. My favorite Irish guy.  We have no trouble finding green and clovers to wear in March.

5. I made rainbow jello.  My favorite tradition.  12 layers of rainbow jello goodness.  Nevermind the fact that it takes HOURS to make.  20 minutes per layer.  It's worth it.

6. I invited my parents over for St. Patrick's Day dinner.  My mom decided that I shouldn't have to cook after teaching all day so they brought dinner with them.  So sweet and so yummy.

7. I LOVE seeing this guy at chapel.  It's precious to see him with his class.  He usually says "Hello, Mrs. Jordan!" hahaha

8. Fletcher started soccer with all of his school buddies this week.  Our school offers tons of rec sports options and he's loving being able to hang out with his friends outside of school.  None of our kids have ever wanted to play soccer before so we learned about all the gear and got him set up for the season.

9. Sweet notes from my kindergarteners will always be a highlight of my week.

10. Another thing I love about our school - we get to celebrate kid's birthdays!  Families can send in treats, favor bags, etc to celebrate their kids.  We missed that in public schools.  Look at these cute favor bags Fletcher is giving to his class - Hubba Bubba + WWJD bracelets.  Plus I'm sending in chocolate chip cookies.

11. Nosey 24/7.  Extra whiskery.

You'll likely never see Pearl if you came to my house, but when it's just us at home, she's very friendly.  You can usually find her sitting on top of whatever you are currently doing.

12. We dropped Olive to hang out with friends and I took Fletcher to run some errands.  He LOVES samples at Sams, trying new flavors of his favorite foods and enjoys any quality time together.  The weather was gross, but the company was sweet.  He always makes fast friends with the cashiers and sample ladies.

13. Tuxedo cats are nuts.  Mr. Mittens can be found tight rope walking our garage door tracks.

14. Rainbow treat cups for our kids and our neighbor friends.  I look forward to making these every year.

15. Spring pictures!  Olive and I woke up extra early to make sure everything was just right for picture day.  The boys don't have this level of care for picture day.

Linking up with Momfessionals

I hope you had a great week!  I'm taking a few days off for Spring Break.  Maybe the whole week!?  See you back here soon :)

Enjoy the View

My kids are about to turn 12, 9 and 5 which leaves me feeling so sentimental about how quickly the years are flying by.  I'm working hard to slow down and enjoy the view as much as possible.  That seems to be the easiest at bedtime and on the weekends.

I snapped this picture on Sunday.

A real life moment in time.  

A very familiar for a Sunday afternoon.

The kids were working on birthday wish lists.  Olive was helping Leo.  Fletcher was doing his own and they were all scouting out some fun gifts for their Spring birthdays.  They were having the best time.

Kevin was getting caught up on work and watching golf.  And taking the big kids out for coffee.

I was folding a zillion loads of laundry, doing dishes, doing our calendar for the week, planning our menu, ordering groceries and working on my own kindergarten plans.  We had divided up plenty of chores all day long to get ourselves ready for the week.

Leo's dreamy weekend day includes wearing pjs as much as possible.

I'm trying hard to enjoy the view.  Be where my feet are.  Be thankful for the chores and tasks that come my way to take care of the people that I love most.

Olive loves to remind me of how tall she's getting, how I will be planning her high school graduation party six years from now and it won't be long before she's driving.  I'm not quite ready for all of that so I'm praying I will be when those big milestones hit.

I am so excited for what's to come for all of us.  

But I would like to hit the parenting slow-mo button and enjoy the view a little more each day.

St Patrick's Day Rainbow Candy Cups

Happy St. Patrick's Day!  I'm so lucky that you enjoy reading my blog.  Thanks for stopping by today and always :)

Making these rainbows in a cup is one of my favorite St. Patrick's Day traditions!  I made them for my own kids, our neighbors and friends.  I had the kids deliver them and they were a big hit.

The Sweet Tart rainbow ropes turned rainbow are my favorite part.  They you can find chocoalte gold coins, mini marshmallows, Skittles, Sour Patch Kids, mini marshmallows, Andes mints and any other rainbow candy I could find.

I hope you have a wonderful day!  I'm doing some really fun rainbow, spring activities with my class this week :)

Friday Faves

Happy Friday, friends!  I hope you've had a good week.  I'm ready for the weekend.  Our week in one list.

Springing forward felt 90% awful and 10% lovely.

Spring Break (for Kevin).

Stomach bug.

Sick Days.

Half Day.

Backyard swinging, soccer, golf and seeing neighbors again.

My favorite moments of the week were:

1. We went to see our high school's spring musical Cinderella and it was great.  Of course these two talked me into running some fun errands afterwards - Bath and Body Works, 5 Below & Sams.

2. Our first cookout of the season!  We headed over to a friend's house for burgers & cookies.

3. Soaking up the sunshine.  Mr. Mittens can be found moving from one sunny spot to another all day long.  None of us are happy about leaving home in the dark in the morning, but the sunshine in the evenings has been nice.

4. Stuffed animal day in PreK!  Leo brought his moose to school and did some book reading by flashlight.

5. We picked up some new things for the kids for Spring sports.

6. This s'mores mix from Sams is sooooo good!  I gifted it to a friend and I put it in my kid's lunch boxes this week.

7. Sweet coworkers are the very best.

8. Fletcher had a few sick days at home this week.  We Facetimed at lunch where he was so excited to show me his heart potato chip.

9. Late night art project prepping for my kindergarteners.  I try to have them do as much as possible, but sometimes I help.  They traced and colored and I cut out their cute little hand prints.

10. We met Kevin's mom at Barnes and Noble so the kids could pick out a few new books for Spring.  I even found a few things for my classroom.  My kids are really into puppets so this Mr. Mittens look alike puppet was a must.  The kids each found several new books to enjoy.  Leo also found a few things to put on his birthday wish list.

11. Funny cat.  We find him in the strangest places.

Have the best weekend!

I'll see you back here on Monday :)

Bring Your Own Board Party

I got invited to a really fun neighborhood party the other night - Bring your own board to share!  We texted our board menus in advance to make sure there was a variety of boards.  It was such a yummy night with friends.

I picked a dessert board - 3 kinds of cookies, chocolate dipped berries & pretzels.

I had never dipped blackberries before - they were a big hit.

We were all so proud of our boards and had the best time chatting & grazing on the boards.

I'd 10/10 recommend this for a fun girl's night.