January, February and March Extras!

Catching up with some pictures from my phone from January, February and March ~

Dash finds a toasty spot and dreams of warm days in the sun...

 and Lily found a cushy spot on the couch:

The YMCA put on the Father-Daughter dance on February 20th.  Andrew had to work, but Mads found a great date - Grandpa Jeff!  Both reported that it was a fun night!

 Dash and Tater are definitely buds!

 I thought this was a pretty neat sight when I was leaving for a night shift.  Dash's silhouette as I drove away:

I am the luckiest mom in the world!  Who else has an Abe Lincoln and a Super Pickle on her fridge?!  :)

Northside had their annual Skate Night again on March 26th.  Such a fun time!  Next year I will be able to skate along with the kids... I couldn't quite do it this year as Nate still needed some assistance and I didn't trust myself to be able to catch him from falling if I too was on skates!

 Mads was off skating with friends:

 Mads and her besties!

 Tater and I have had quite an interesting transition into Spring.  Nate got sick with a cold and stayed sick for over two weeks.  He passed it to me and then I think I passed it back.  He was on the mend and then started coughing again so much that I took him into the doctor.  Official diagnosis bronchitis with double ear infection!  One of the days Nate was recuperating on the couch Dash cuddled up with some extra love:

Nathan's brain has been EXPLODING recently!  He's able to read and with that comes his ability to do word searches!  He completed his first word search on his own while we were out to dinner March 31st!

 Good work bud!

Spring Break Recap!

Spring Break didn't turn out to be the relaxing week that we all thought it would be.  Andrew ended up not being able to take the week off of work and I worked 50 hours that week as well.  Don't worry,  though, we were able to sneak in some fun!

Monday, March 16th was the most gorgeous day of the week and that was the day all of us were able to make a trip to Madison to visit the Zoo!

The giant turtle (or tortoise - not sure which!) is the coolest!!

 Well, this one is fake...  

 The rhinos!  I don't think I've ever seen them outside!

 All the animals were moving around that afternoon!  Here's the tiger:

 The seals:

The lion!

 and one lonely penguin!  (his friends were hiding behind the wall)

 These two penguins were busy running amok!

 Must've been too cold for the flamingos, but Mads and Nate were ready to step in on their behalf!

Before heading home from Madison we made a stop for some cupcakes at Gigi's Cupcakes - they even had a gluten free option for Tater!

That evening the kids were able to shed their coats and play outside in short sleeves!   Look - we found the monkeys!

The rest of the week was more low key, but here are some highlights:

Mads lost her first top tooth - front and center!  The hole is GIGANTIC!!

We were invited to a birthday party on March 21st.  Since it was out of town it involved a hotel stay!  Andrew was working that day, so it was the kids and I.  Hotel Selfie!  :)

The next morning (Sunday) the kids and I headed out to an unknown location to meet Daddy.  The kids didn't know where we were headed!  We found Daddy in the Dells!

We spent the morning at Mt. Olympus waterpark and then headed to MooseJaw for lunch:

We did some outlet mall shopping and then checked into our cabin at Christmas Mountain.  The kids thought the spiral staircase was the absolute coolest!

We spent the night Sunday and early the next morning started getting the phone calls that school was delayed, then canceled because Monroe got a bajillion inches of snow.  We weren't concerned... we had already planned to keep Mads out of school that day, but it ended up being a freebie for her!

We did some swimming in the Christmas Mountain pool and then started our trek home, which truly was a trek in all those inches of snow!  

To think that we started out Spring break in T-Shirts at the zoo and finished it with a Snow Day off of school!