Mara's 9th birthday!

My sweet niece, Mara, turned nine yesterday. We were so excited to go and celebrate her and all of the love and joy and kindness she brings to the world. We had a family party before her friend party, with ladybug cupcakes. And she got some awesome presents...including a kick ball and bases! I was so jealous!

This picture below of Ivar and Svea cracks me up...I believe those are what we would call, forced smiles...

Uncle Mark was able to be there, all the way from St. Louis. It was really special that he could come! Apologies to Svea, who was not invited in the picture below. :)

And then Mara's friends came. We played stone, stone (my personal fav), pin the antennae on the ladybug, walked to the dairy queen, opened presents and played kick ball. It was an awesome party.

The girls were so tired from all the walking they fell asleep at this bus station. :) Happy Birthday Mara! You are an easy girl to celebrate! We love you so much and love your humor, creativity, passion and determination. Thanks for inviting me to your party and for picking Dairy Queen to celebrate! My first DQ of the season!

happy places

I'm posting these pictures tonight because it's been a while since we've seen sunshine. Yesterday we had snow and last night it started sticking to the ground. These pictures are my protest. When the snow began to accumulate on the ground, I was starting to feel, shall we say, heavy laden. So in a moment of self-preservation I loaded up the kids and took them to the cupcake shop. It was 5:15pm. We hadn't had supper. Rory was gone for the night. And Ivar was protesting that he didn't want to go to the cupcake shop. But Mama did. Mama needed to go to her happy place.

Last year I started frequenting the cupcake shop in February as a way to cope with the weather. This winter I knew I couldn't start cupcake season that early. So this year I waited until March for my first official "winter-getaway" trips. Cupcake Season will conclude just as soon as I can wear flip flops again.

And when the sun is warm again, and lighting up the earth, we'll count this recent discovery as my new happy place. A friend of mine brought us here last week to throw rocks and sticks. I think we'll be spending lots and lots of time here this at this park this summer, swapping the cupcakes for the creek.

up to the flyest kite!

That's how Ivar sings those lyrics: "let's go fly a kite! up to the flyest kite!" And we did that on Friday night. It was effortless kite flying conditions, went up on the first attempt and we just kept letting out the string. It was so fun and high and awesome. And then it was time to bring it back in. Which was tedious and time consuming and took two adults taking turns to get the job done. But it was so worth it.

Ivar and his train talk

Ivar and I had dentist appointments today. It was Ivar's first dentist visit and he did awesome. His teeth look great and he found the whole experience to be quite the adventure. I was grateful for an awesome hygienist and the super cool sunglasses he got to wear so the light wouldn't shine too bright in his eyes.

On the way home we saw a police car with its lights flashing up ahead. Ivar said, "Mom! Let's ride the rails and go see that police!" His Thomas the Train world seems to be seeping into more and more of his every day life. More examples:

A few nights ago he was laying at the bottom of the stairs before bedtime. I asked him he thought he'd make it up or if he wanted me to carry him to bed. He replied, "I'll make it. I've got just a little bit of fuel to pump my pistons." Oh man. I hope pump my pistons sticks around for a while.

We were with friends, playing at a creek and Elsie walked in and got her shoes all wet. It meant we cut our playtime short and left our friends a little early. Ivar's friend Lily had a perplexed look on her face as we left. Later Ivar said, "Oh remember at the water when Lily was cross?"  Cross! That's a common word in the Thomas books, but so funny to hear Ivar use it in context.

And finally, everything around here is coupled. Ivar was using the velcro on the kitchen chair cushions and told me, "I'm just coupling the pillow back to the chair, Mom."

thegrovestead.com

Well, we have quite the big announcement. We have added another blog to the family.

This new blog is sort of an information sharing blog. Whereas joyfullybecca has more to do with family and stories and people, thegrovestead.com will be one part what we're learning and one part record keeping. Think of it as a public little log book, documenting dates, projects, and lessons learned from year to year. Sort of the blog we have been hoping to stumble upon during the last eighteen months.

I'm really excited about it. Mostly because now it is my husband who is saying, "can we start that movie in twenty minutes? I just want to finish up this blog post real quick..."

So check it out. Be sure to click on the black tab bar...it's pretty fun how he has his posts organized, covering all the little projects happening on our ten acres.

Feel free to pass the link along to anyone you think might be interested in joining our adventures. And if you want new blog posts sent right to your email, you can enter your email address on the right hand column of the site. Happy reading! Click here to get to thegrovestead.com