My sister, her family and my brother are all in town for the week.  My brother-in-law, Shane was taking a picture of Annie and Colson and look what he caught on her shirt.  We were apart of the craze of solar eclipse onlookers, even if we were all already jammied up.  Thanks go to the reflection of his ipad for accidentally catching this one.  Of course this picture was taking as everyone else was looking through the pinhole camera and Annie and Colson were, well, being Annie and Colson.

Sorry, I’m a sucker for awesomeness, even it is hokey out the wazoo.  I’m a teacher, hokey is what I do!  Hudson’s school had a Science Night and they had Man vs. Beast.  The kids had so much fun.  They only made it to one building and came home with loads of stuff in their bag, not to mention the stuff they learned and those super awesome hats.  Let’s be honest, who doesn’t need an unusually large set of teeth labeled?!

We had another great day at Disneyland.  Gracie was the only one looking cute in the pictures so she gets the spotlight above.    And no, we didn’t go on my birthday.  I see you eyeing the button.  My disneyland pass was stolen and as I was trying to get a new one, the lady at the counter got a little button crazy(birthday button, 1st visit button, honorary citizen button, happily ever after button…do you get the idea?). This was even after I insisted that it wasn’t my birthday and that this was in fact NOT Gracie’s first visit(We are at least at visit 15 for her).  I finally just smiled, took the stack and assumed she had a button quota she had to fill.  Regardless, it was the day we have all been waiting for.  Guess who was finally tall enough for Indiana Jones?!  Oh and Annie owned it!  Buoyed by her new found confidence, her love for Space Mountain was once again kindled – becoming awesome in her eyes once more.

 Hunting Easter Eggs

 I had issues this year about finding cute baskets so I pulled down ones I already had and let the kids decorate them.  They were elated, and that’s all that matters.  Anyway, we had our 4th Annual Egg Hunt and had such a fabulous time!  Once again we find food, friends and fun.

I have a 4 Poster Canopy that Will bought me our first Christmas together.  I woke yesterday to a scratchity, scratching sound.  Several scratches later I realize that they are coming from the floor by my bed and they sound quite damaging.  Rolling over to the edge, I see Annie with needle-nose pliers scraping lines down the side of my bed.  My audible gasp and stern look said it all as Annie dropped the evidence and rolled under my bed.  I know 30 years from now, I will be making the bed and lovingly trace over those scratches thinking about Annie and how much I loved having her little, squealing self at home in all her pigtailed glory and sassiness.

In other thoughts, I was contemplating my less than immaculate house yesterday and had a happy little thought to myself.  I have 18 years to spend as much time with my kids as possible, teach them, guide them and hopefully help them become self-sustaining, spiritually strong, intelligent adults.  Then I have the next 20-30 years after that…or I suppose more to keep a house and have all the “me” time I want.  I’m wondering if by then a clean house won’t  seem all that important anyway and I might even reminisce about the tiny little socks left under the couch or all of the legos, Barbies and books I pull out of the kids beds long after I have put them to sleep and I will miss the craziness and the mess.