Family Fun

Friday night we went out for dinner with Kent's family at El Azteca. I cannot express to you how happy I am that my kids loooooove Mexican food. Because you all know how much I love it. 9 out of 10 times if we're going out to eat- that's where we go. The waiters all know the kids by name. Kylee has been dazzling them with her Spanish for about as long as she has been able to speak and Kael has mastered his ordering, "queso grande por favor" which he usually asks for before we can even get seated!

Tammy and Rob came back to town this weekend and on Saturday morning the 5 girls (Kylee was not to be left out) went to Babies R Us to help Mandy pick out her crib and check out her registry. It was so fun looking at baby stuff again. I can't wait until May! The other day Kylee was asking Mandy about the baby in her tummy and then Kylee said, "What kind of shirt is she wearing in there?" Clearly Kylee is concerned about how this new cousin of hers will dress!

After shopping we headed back to Mom and Dad's for lunch and my Grandma and Grandpa were in town to celebrate my dad's birthday too. We spent the afternoon lounging around, watching movies, playing Wii-exactly the way a winter Saturday with family should be spent. We are so lucky to have our families so close by. Kael mostly spent the day with his "Best Buddy" Rob. Kael loves his Uncle Rob so much- luckily KC isn't very far away but I know Kael wishes we could see them much more often! (me too!)

Sunday I taught Kael's class at church and I am continually amazed at how much these kindergarteners "get it". All of the kids in my group had memorized their bible verses but more importantly they completely understood what it meant. Kael loves to tell Kylee "Keep doing what you should do so you don't miss out on something good" which is what we're talking about this month. The Prairie Ridge kids curriculum rocks!

Kent is wonderful- he spent the afternoon putting together Kylee's 200 piece doll house then taking the kids ice skating so I could enjoy some girl time. I spent the afternoon making Valentine cookies with one of my friends. I'm so disappointed in myself that I don't have pictures to share because they are beautiful! And yummy!

Here is Kylee enjoying her dollhouse. She told me she had to "fancy it up a little bit". Yes, she actually said that. So she covered it with stickers and painted it. Fancy Nancy's got nothin' on Kylee.

My favorite thing today: *Disclaimer: I really really really hesitate to admit this, let alone let it fall under the category of one of my favorite things. After fielding a barrage of cult-like "welcome" and "so glad you could finally join us" messages on Facebook, I have to say it is nice to be able to catch up with friends that I haven't seen in awhile. Notice, I did not say "spend hours a day reading profiles and looking at pictures of people I might not even talk to in real life". :) But I do like posting pictures of my own cute family!

Snow Day!

It is our first official "Snow Day" here at the Patterson household and we are loving it! By 10:30 we had made chocolate chip cookies, played some serious Wii, made a Key Lime pie (my first one I've made since I proclaimed my love of them after vacation- I'll wait to hear Kent's verdict before I post a picture of it) and played at least an hours' worth of hide and seek! Shortly thereafter we met my mom and sister for lunch then home to have some Valentine- making fun. Did I mention I love snow days? Just yesterday I was so anxious for summer I went out and bought our pool passes for the summer. But as I sit here by the fireplace watching The Princess and the Frog with two of my favorite people, I can't help but think I sure would take a couple more snow days before summer rolls in. :)


Valentine's Day is sneaking right up on us and I vowed to be on the ball this year so I started looking around early. I was really motivated to find something, especially for Kael, that wouldn't require him to sign his name 100 times over. I will never forget last year's valentines- Kael was going to 2 preschools (long story- one was 3 days a week then he also qualified for another preschool that he went to on the other two days) which left him with the task of signing at least forty valentines. He sat there struggling to write his name (he wasn't quite 5 yet and fine motor skills are plain and simply very hard work for him) and I watched him get more and more frustrated with each valentine. I just kept thinking, "This is supposed to be fun!". Can you imagine how thrilled I was when I found these?




Cute, right? If you know me at all you know I do NOT have a creative bone in my body. Art-sy projects are not my thing (although I really wish they were!) so that's a testament to how easy these were. I just took a picture of each of the kids with their fists stretched out, added a cute border and some text. Then I cut a slit in the top and bottom of the fist in the picture and stuck a Tootsie Pop in. All said and done it took me and the kids less than an hour and about ten bucks to finish these babies!

Home Sweet Home

We had an amazing trip to Key Largo. We sure didn't miss the snow but we absolutely missed our kids! We had been talking about going on a trip for a long time and finally booked a trip. We didn't want to be gone for too long so a short flight to Florida seemed perfect....and it was. :)

I had myself so excited before the trip (and busy! I didn't realize how much I do in a day until I actually wrote out the kids' schedules. School drop-off and pick-up information and times, specials schedules, medicine amounts, contact information- I had pages and pages of notes! My mom handled it like a pro!) that I honestly hadn't had time to think about how much I'd miss the kids.

While we were in the Keys we were having a such great time so I didn't think have time to think about being away from Kael and Kylee. But on the flight home I said to Kent that I was so happy we weren't gone for much longer because I was starting to miss the kids. When we landed in Des Moines last night we were surprised and thrilled to see the kids waiting for us! Kylee took off running for us as soon as she spotted us and hugged me so tightly- her face absolutely beaming. I love that about Kylee- you will always know exactly where you stand with her. She says with her eyes what most people waste time putting into words. And when she feels something she is not afraid to show it. Anyone else at the airport last night witnessing our little reunion would have probably guessed that we hadn't seen the kids in months! Kael was in a great mood and seemed happy to see us. I know they had a great time with Grandma and Grandpa but it was a great feeling to see the kids were as excited to see us as we were to see them!

Top: Kent swears he had his "Best Restaurant Meal Ever" at The Old Tavernier Restaurant. It was seafood pasta- I don't even really like seafood and I have to admit that it was amazing! Middle: About to board a ship to go fishing out in the ocean. The fishing was fine but seeing all the fancy houses along the way was fun for me! Bottom: Paradise found

What I'm into today: home, the kids, and my wonderful husband for taking me on such a great trip. He knew I would come home relaxed and refreshed!

Oh, and Key Lime Pie. I'm definitely into Key Lime Pie. Preferably on the beach while watching the sunset like I am in the following picture. :) We stopped a couple times for pie while we were down there and picked up some mix to make a pie here at home. I can't wait to try it!

TGI Friday afternoon

You know yesterday when I said hot chocolate can cure anything? Well, it doesn't cure ear infections. When I picked Kylee up yesterday from school she just looked sad. She ran to me and dramatically declared, "Mommy I missed you so!" Which is always fun to hear, but ususally Kylee loves being at school so I knew something was up. As soon as she hugged me I realized she was running a fever. I quickly secured her a doctor's appointment that afternoon.

We had to pick Kael up early from school to make it to the appointment and he was psyched. He came out all smiles and said, "Guess what, Mom? A voice came over the loudspeaker in our room and said 'Kael Patterson to the office please'- can you believe they called my name?!" I forget what a big deal it is to get your name called out over the loudspeaker in elementary school. I think he felt a little famous.

So we got Kylee some antibiotics and she napped on and off all afternoon which made her wake up uncharacteristically early this morning. When Kent was leaving for work he said, "Bye Kylee I hope you feel better today!" and she smiled with bright eyes and said, "Thank you, Daddy- I'm actually feeling better already!" Kent and I agree that Kylee is the Best Sick Person Ever. She is never grumpy or anything when she's sick.

Since we were up early we decided to make some muffins. I am totally loving Fiber 1 blueberry muffins right now. We always make them with applesauce and egg whites so they're decently healthy. Unless you eat 4 of them like Kael does. I am dreading our grocery bill when he's a teenager. It boggles my mind how much he can already eat as a 5 year old!

I started the dishwasher after breakfast and instantly heard a loud rush of water somewhere. Not good. It was coming from the pipe under our sink and it was literally GUSHING water everywhere. This is not how my Friday morning was supposed to start!!! Luckily the plumber was available to come out and got it taken care of quickly.

So that's why this post is titled TGI Friday afternoon. Not just Friday. Because it was Friday when Kylee was up at 5:30 with a fever and it was Friday when water was leaking all over my kitchen. But now it is Friday afternoon and it is one of my babysitting kid's birthdays. Kylee and I baked her a double-layer funfetti cake complete with heart sprinkles (I was super excited to use my new cake pedastal- see below), blew up some balloons, hung birthday signs and now it officially feels like a Friday should.

When all the kids were here after school we had such a fun "birthday party". One of my boys swore it was the best cake he had ever eaten! Kudos to Kylee. She is such a good little baker. My girls had been begging me to let them drink coffee (sometimes during the winter when I'm so cold I make a pot of coffee for myself in the afternoon while the kids are snacking and they want some too!) and I asked their mom if it would be OK for the party if I made them some decaf coffee drinks. So we had some Caramel Macchiato's, (complete with whipped cream and chocolate drizzle- if you're gonna go, go all out, right?) with our birthday cake this afternoon. YUM! Birthdays are fun for little kids so I love to make a big deal out of their special day!

What I'm into today: Fiber 1 blueberry muffins and my 6-in-1 cake pedastal, trifle bowl, punch bowl, chip and dip server, relish tray and pie plate! You can kind of see it (with remants of our cake) behind the coffee mugs. Is it ok to admit that half the reason I wanted to bake a cake today was so I could FINALLY use this 6-in-1 thing that I had gotten for Christmas?!

Winter day

As far as I'm concerned, winter could just hurry up and be done already! Kylee brightened my winter blahs by making these cute and colorful coffee filter snowflakes!

Kylee has had a pretty bad cough the last couple days. Lucky for me she's still at the age where hot chocolate can cure almost anything. :) She declared today that she was not well enough to go to school. I totally pulled out the line, "Well if you're not well enough to go to school then you're not well enough to go to tumbling tonight!". A classic Mom phrase, right? And it worked.

Last night I was tucking Kael in and after we finished reading a book he turned and looked at me with his big brown eyes and said, "No te vayas mama". (Don't go Mom!) It was the sweetest thing (and so perfectly conjugated!) and I could absolutely not say no. Why is it so adorable when little kids speak Spanish? I've been trying a harder to speak more Spanish to my kids. While I am far from fluent, I do remember a few things from that Spanish major I acquired seemingly a lifetime ago. And I feel like I would be doing them a disservice if I didn't speak it to them at least a little. Kylee also will not let me leave her room at night until I give her at least ten "besitos". (little kisses) Cute!

What I'm into today: (this is a new little thing I'm going to put in at the end of each post...well at least until I run out of things that I'm into)

Sweater dresses and leggings- This is one trend that I hope will never go out of style. And if it does I'm just going to keep wearing it. When my kids and the kids I babysit were younger I was in jeans and a t-shirt almost every day around the house! Now that they're older I can totally justify dressing up a little bit more- plus the leggings are super comfy! And cute with the aforementioned slipper booties that I absolutely adore!

Homemade Hot Chocolate

*this makes a very large batch!

8 qt. box dry milk

1 lb. can Nestle Quik

12 oz. CoffeeMate (original)

1/2 c. powdered sugar

Mix all ingredients. Use 1/3 cup mixture to one cup of boiling water. Enjoy!

My favorite things

1. I am watching Parenthood right now and am not sure words can express how much I love this show! The kid in the show, Max, totally reminds me of Kael. Speaking of Kael, today I volunteered in his classroom and his real teacher had to step out of the room for a few minutes so I was reading a book to all the kids. Kael raised his hand and said, "Mom wouldn't it be cool if you were really my teacher sometime?" Aww.

2. My slipper booties. I get a pair or two for Christmas every year and I love, love, LOVE them so much. A freezing cold day like today makes me love them even more! I live in them.

3. The Pampered Chef Mix and Chop. This tool is seriously amazing and I wish I would have had one years ago! Literally grounds hamburger in minutes.

4. This snowman that Kael and Kylee built on Monday. Kael practically did all the rolling and constructing himself and Kylee added the face and hat. The wet snow made for a perfect snowman!

5. We visited Kevin this past weekend and saw his Lo-Ma girls basketball team beat Riverside! The kids had so much fun- Kevin had asked if the kids would stand on the floor with him during the National Anthem and I wasn't sure if they were going to do it but they did! The Jordans on their feet are courtesy of Uncle Kevin and Uncle Kyle. The fact that Kevin and Kyle give the kids Jordans for every birthday and Christmas absolutely lands on my favorite things list. Kylee wanted me to cuff her skinny jeans to showcase the shoes a little bit better.

I'm back!

I promised myself that when I started blogging a couple years ago I would not become one of those millions of people out there who have abandoned their blogs. People have been giving me a hard time about updating it, assuming I have gotten too busy or forgotten about it.

One of my last posts was that we were happy to announce we were expecting our third child. The following sentence has evidently taken me over a year to put together and publish: we lost the baby February 1. My heart goes out to anyone who has ever gone through a miscarriage because not a day goes by that I don't think about it.


Moving forward...

I'm not usually a resolution person. I can't remember the last time I even made a New Year's resolution but this year I have made an honest effort to be more, um, techie? Is that how you even spell it? We got a new laptop; Kent surprised me at Christmas with a new camera; and I, get ready for it, have even FINALLY joined the Facebook revolution. So, I figured if I'm going to be all technology-savvy I might as well update the blog.

Here's a quick update on the fam. (Let's get real- it's probably not going to be quick so if you're out there looking to kill time at work today, it's your lucky day! I'll fill your time with stories of the kids....)

Kent started working downtown with Ruan last March as their Liability Claims Adjuster. He really has loved this change and has also been studying for his Associate in Claims certification which is a series of four tests and he has already passed the first one!

Kael is in kindergartgen. Even as I type those words they seem unreal. Not only is he in kindergarten but he's halfway done! Ahh! He continues to amaze me every day with things he has learned and maybe just as amazing are some of the phrases he has picked up from some kids on the playground. Kindergarten boy humor is not always mom-approved.

Kylee is in preschool and continues to be a big helper to me around the house during the day. She could totally run the show if I wasn't here. She has really taken hold of an "I'm always right" attitude but the truth is that more often than not, she is. :) The world needs leaders I guess!
Currently she is doing a tumbling class that is so fun. We did a dance class a couple months ago that she seemed to also enjoy but I think tumbling is much more her pace.

I continue my fourth year of babysitting and can't believe how grown up all my kids are getting. Just the other day one of the girls I watch asked me if I wanted her cell phone number because "Miss Laura I have your number in my cell so you might as well have mine, right?" I love it. I absolutely love it.

Kent and I are headed to the Florida Keys later this week. We are really looking forward to an adult getaway and the kids are equally excited about sleepovers at Grandmas and Grandpas houses!

In other news, my sister Mandy is expecting (a girl!) and is due in early May. I am so excited to be an aunt!

Most of the recent pictures I have are of Christmas so I'll post just one picture from today. All the rain made for perfect snowman weather!