Variety show

Here are a variety from the last few months

Easter - we had a nice relaxing day, woke up to see what the Easter bunny had brought (Frozen undies!) and then went to church followed by a nice lunch at Pat & Anita's.  

 Playing dress up with Ellie, the most patient dog in the world

 My mother's day presents!  The puzzle was what they made at school, and she was so excited for me to put it together so I could see what she had painted!

 She also made me this necklace with my name on it..."So if you lose it at work you'll know it's yours!"  Good thinking, girly.

 How blessed I am to be mommy to such an amazing girl!

 A few weeks ago we had 3 trees taken down in our backyard.  This one - you can't tell in this picture - was leaning quite a bit and would have landed right on the neighbor's garage one of these days.  The other was an ash and was starting to rot inside.  The 3rd was a little mulberry tree (bush?) that had just gotten too messy.  The berries drop and stain and just get everywhere.  I don't like taking trees down, and really don't like how it looks, but it had to be done.  Calvin's working on replanting most of the backyard, so once that back corner is done we'll get a new tree or two.  I already miss the shade!

 Jocelyn sure liked climbing on the trunks!

 Before the trees came down we took down the swing set.  It was 8 years old, and was getting to be unsafe to play on.  Jocelyn was so mad - she loves her swing set and sand box.  But we promised her that Bumpa & Daddy were going to make her a new one.  And did they ever!  This was their project over Memorial Day weekend.  It's so sturdy and big enough that I can stand up on the platform.  She loves it and it's already gotten a lot of use.  We'll put it back in the corner once the grass is grown in. 

 She's also been hard at work learning how to ride her bike without training wheels!  She officially is a no training wheels bike rider now.  Took her about a week and a half, which was great!  I wasn't sure my back would have taken many more trips around the block.  She was pretty wobbly, but then one day she just did it!  She's pretty good at starting by herself, and is now working on turning and remembering to stop at alleys and slow down at driveways.  It's a lot to think about all at once!  She's very proud of herself and I was proud of her attitude - she never once got frustrated or mad.

 She's going to be starting T-ball this summer, and is excited to start!  She's even fairly good at hitting without the tee, so I think she'll do fine.  She's been watching Kailee play softball for 5 years, so hopefully some of it's sunk in!

 The little stinker still loves a patchy (not that she ever uses it).  This is her baby doll one, and last week she decided she wanted to use it again!  She went and got this clip and some ribbon, and made a holder for it.  Creative little stink.  Then when I went to check on her when I went to bed, she had it in her mouth.  Yikes.  So, it's now hidden or she probably would sneak it in her room.  On a totally unrelated note, she did her hair in this picture!  I did the braids, but she put the pigtails in all by herself!  She's been very into doing her own hair, and can get a ponytail in and wrapped around twice!  I'm pretty sure I couldn't do that until I was 10.  She'll probably be braiding her own hair soon.

 This weekend we planted our garden and a few flowers.  I'm not sure why it went from winter to hot summer, but we won't complain.