loving the mommy thing: May 2011

Okay, so I maybe have a little bit of catching up to do, maybe. Just a little. I really have no good excuse other than the old stand by's...busy with school, baseball, soccer, work, yard, laundry, cleaning, dishes, playing, TV watching...

Anyway, here are the highlights of the last few weeks (month):

-Easter went off without a hitch. We dyed eggs with our good friends again, and every ones' fingers were a different shade of pastel. That rascally Easter Bunny left clues and eggs all over our house on Easter morning leading to Easter baskets filled with candy and books and crayons and toys. What a fun Easter bunny we have.

Austin and Aubrey at church.

It is hard to believe that this was them two short years ago...

-Spring sports are going well. Soccer is almost over (thank the Good Lord). We have one game left which we will play tomorrow. Austin has really enjoyed it, and gets better every game. And has even gotten a few goals, to which no other parent could rival the level of screaming this mom did for him. For our last practice we had a "family game"; parents against kids. I would like to say that as parents, we took the higher ground and let the kids win even though it really was no challenge and we could have beat them with our hands tied behind our backs, but in reality, we got our out of shape butts whooped up on. I can't really recall the end score (6-2ish), all I know is that there was a lot of sweating, swearing, and standing around on the parents' part. I am thinking that the "family game" would be better played at the beginning of the season...maybe I wouldn't have yelled so much at Austin during the games if I had know how hard it is to play soccer. Maybe.

-Baseball is going well. Austin continues to amaze me with his talent and love of the game. We are 4 and 2. We got some 'new to us' players this year, a few of which have never played the game, seen a baseball, held a glove, watched a game, heard of baseball. And who may or may not be legally blind. I am not kidding. It has been an adventure to say the least...

-We have been doing a crazy amount of yard work (crazy amount for us, minimal for other home owners) and are in the middle of a project in the front yard. It all started when a friend of mine thought it would be really cool to come and tear out our holly bushes after I had mentioned that I hate them. So she came with a truck, and a rope and her parents, thinking we could just tie the rope around them and pull them out. Needless to say, after broken ropes and tire marks in the yard, and a lot of digging, chopping and more swearing, the holly bushes are indeed (finally) out. And in their absence are 9, count them 9 (!) huge holes where the gargantuan stumps were, and a big patch of dirt we hope to turn into a front patio. We now just have to find the time/energy/money to complete the project. This would be a fun project for most, but for us it has been a major ordeal. And in doing this little bit of outdoor work, I have been getting inspired and excited to do something to the backyard. So I have started making plans for back there, although it is a complete jungle and scares the be-jezuz out of me. And by jungle I mean something out of animal kingdom. For real...after a heavy rain this week we discovered our gutters were completely blocked up, so Brian decided it was time to clean out our gutters because it hadn't been done in a year or three. He went in the backyard to climb up onto the roof, and got sprayed by a skunk. A damn skunk! And...we have been told we have poison ivy back there. On the plus side of a completely untouched wild kingdom of a backyard, we have a birds nest with a momma bird and her eggs, which has been fun to watch. I am just waiting to go back there and find a snake, or an alligator or a bear. I daydream of HGTV coming in to rescue us from our backyard nightmare...

-We recently made our trip to the annual coin show. Brian's dad and his wife were in town for the event, so we got to spend some quality time with them hanging out, eating good food and buying coins. My son and husband are such nerds; they had a ball making lists of what to buy, how much they wanted to spend, and then spending all of Austin's money on pennies and nickles he needed for his collection. He got a good deal on his finds, mostly because he is so damn cute, and partly because he found the one Red Sox coin dealer who was willing to let him have coins for next to nothing.

So there you are, caught up on the Miller's again. I would like to say I promise it won't be this long before I post again, but who am I kidding. History repeats.