Brusters

Today was PJ day at our favorite ice cream parlor, Brusters. For lunch, we all dressed in our pjs (even Ryan) and visited Brusters for a free cone and some fun in the sun. What a beautiful day!

Colin is 9!

March 5, Colin turned 9 years old. Amazing! I am big on birthdays and even bigger on surprises, real surprises. So, Ryan and I worked together to pull off a huge surprise for Colin on his 9th birthday. Colin has been fascinated with limos for quite sometime now. For Christmas, Colin even asked Santa to rent a limo for him....AND, to take it even further, on Christmas morning, after discovering the trampoline in our backyard, Colin ran through the house and out of the front door to see if Santa had provided a limo for the day. When the birthday conversations began, we told Colin that we felt he should just have a few friends over and we would do a quiet night out for dinner at a restaurant of his choice. Behind the scenes, we talked to parents and explained what was actually going to happen and most importantly, we told them to keep mummmm to the children about the limo. It worked and it was priceless to see Colin's reaction to the big white Hummer limo that was parked in front of our house. The children played outside in our backyard until the limo arrived. When I saw it driving up, I said, "hey guys, our ride is here"....and, with that, the rest is history. You have never seen 9 children more excited in their lives. They all proclaimed it to be the best day of their lives, they shouted their love for Colin, they were all on Cloud 9. The best part came after the party, after everything had died down. Ryan went up first to tell Colin goodnight. He came down and said Colin had repeatedly told him thank you for the limo. Then I went up to say goodnight. I honestly did not think Colin was going to go to sleep. He was talking 90 miles a minute, asking me "did you see how the lights changed colors inside the limo?" and "I loved the flasher lights on the Hummer" and then he went on and on with the "remember this" and "remember that".....FINALLY, he smiled a big smile, hugged me tight and said "Thank you, mom, for the best birthday ever. I am never going to forget this day. The limo was awesome." It was a good day filled with fun for everyone!

Colin was ecstatic to receive money for his birthday. He has been learning in school about earning interest so he told Pryce that he plans to open up his own bank account with his birthday money. Colin proclaimed "I am going to have my birthday money make money for me while it sits in the bank. Then, when I am mom's age, I will be RICH!"

The Hummer limousine.

The boys chilling out and singing "We Will Rock You"

During dinner they surprised Colin with an ice cream sundae and then he had to save room for his Star Wars cake.

Mason-Kate took the afternoon in stride but mostly had this look on her face that said those boys haven't seen nothing yet!

No-Show-Snow-Day

Yep, it was a no show snow day here! After two full days of RAIN, just plain old rain, talks of snow began to emerge. The children got their hopes up, temperatures dropped, and school was cancelled while anxious adults watched the weather updates every hour. Ryan and I were two of those anxious adults wondering what the weather was going to do. Wouldn't you know that at noon, the weatherman stated that it was to snow in our town at 2:00, at 2:00 the weatherman stated it was to snow at 4:00, and so goes the rest of the day until 10:00pm when the weatherman said he was signing off, no snow! Oh well, much like the Gamecock fans say, we will try again next year. Despite the rain, we did enjoy a friend filled weekend. Friday, Pryce had his last basketball game of the season. Afterwards we ventured out to eat with his friend Molly and her family....they are a great family and HILARIOUS. The adults spent much of the evening laughing to the point that my stomach muscles ached and the children played happily beside us. Saturday was pretty much the same, except it was Colin whose last game was played and we had some friends over for dinner at our house that evening. My favorite moment of Saturday night was when I heard the piano playing and children singing along. I peeked into the living room and there was Colin playing the piano (no lights were on in the room except the piano light above his sheet music) and Gianna (a friend from church, age 9) was singing with him to the tune. They both were sitting side by side on the little piano bench made for one and singing their little hearts out. It was really cute.