Happy Birthday, Ellie! 8 years old!

Happy Birthday to our girl, Ellie!  8 years old today!  I was lucky enough to spend the day with her (since it is also President's Day and the schools are closed).  She opened one present before John went to work, one present at lunchtime and the rest after dinner.  What a lucky girl!

I unintentionally played a trick on her, though.  The present she chose to bring to lunch (Ellie picked to have lunch at Five Guys - Yum!) was wrapped in pink paper.  Before we left for the restaurant, I saw her examining the box very carefully.  She could see through the paper and see that it was a Spiderman toy.  Now, it was not a Spiderman toy.  Anyone that knows Ellie, knows she would NOT like a Spiderman toy.  In fact, it was two shirts from her favorite store that I had put inside of the Spiderman box.  I just needed a box!  No trick was intended...but, I let her go on thinking that she was getting a Spiderman toy as a gift.  You'll see the picture below of her at the restaurant.  The picture was taken before she realized that there were shirts in the box.  She is smiling like she is okay with the Spiderman toy, isn't she?  What a good sport.

Ellie's birthday kicks off our whirlwind of birthdays at our house.  Next is Austin, then me, then John all in about a month and a half.

Happy Birthday, Ellie!  We love you!

2 points!

Austin had his last basketball game this past Saturday.  They ended their season undefeated!  Austin scored two points at the game and I was lucky enough to get it on film!  Austin is #5 on the red team....  He starts with Upward Basketball next month.

Candy Shop

Ellie does not want me telling anyone this story...but, I can't help it, so here goes:

This morning I thought I would help Ellie put her lunch and snack in her backpack.  She usually does that each morning, but things were a bit crazy and I figured I could get it done faster this particular morning.  As I was putting her lunch and snack in, I noticed that a pocket of her backpack seemed a bit full of something.  I opened the velcro flap and pulled out this...

Ellie saw what I was doing and seemed a bit "caught" and a bit mad at me for finding her secret stash.  She said "that's my candy shop - give it to me!"

I have no idea why she calls it her "candy shop".  I asked her if she was selling the candy and she said "no".  I asked her if she ate the candy and she said "not all the time".  By the looks of it, she recently ate some Whoppers!

Here is her picture right after I found the candy...

Kitchen...almost done!

We are happy to say that the kitchen backsplash is now done!  We also removed the wallpaper and I have painted the wall.  I had planned on changing the red wall of the bay window to a dark brown, but now am not sure.  I might keep the red.

I can't say we are done because I have a bit more painting to do in the family room.  Home improvement projects are never-ending!

One last entry...wouldn't you know

So Santa, John and I bought Austin lots of presents this year...and what is he playing with at 10:00am on Christmas morning????  cardboard, scissors and tape - he does love to make things.  Check out his Christmas loot and then what he had more fun playing with...

Merry Christmas!

Here's a few pictures of our 2011 Christmas...

Bathroom floor

John is becoming an expert at tiling.  His second tiling project is now completed.  See the pictures below.  We are both loving the improvement to our bathroom.  Next project is for him to tile our kitchen backsplash...hopefully tomorrow!