Thanks Steph!

My friend Stephanie has a wonderful website (http://srf99.wordpress.com/) and posts "pictures of the day".  She takes beautiful pictures and I especially loved one of her recent ones of a close up dandilion.  She kindly sent me the picture and I had it printed in 8×10 for our bedroom.  I love how soft the picture feels!  I found the PERFECT frame complete with matting at the thrift store for $3!!  Thanks Steph!!

 

  CONGRATS to Steph….she just defended her dissertation yesterday and will be officially Dr. Stephanie Fishel-Brown May 7th!  You rock Steph!

 

 

 

 

 

Our Garden

I have wanted a garden for a couple years now, and we finally got around to getting one up and running!  I am doing a container garden and am so excited about teaching Noah about gardening.  We are hoping that growing some of our own veggies will help him to start to like them more…..we’ll see how that goes.  Today we got our Spring veggies planted!  YAY!  Noah was a good helper (daddy was too) but did have trouble controlling himself around the dirt!  He really loves to throw it out of the pots, so we have to work on that in the next few months.

 

Daddy and Noah working on getting our pole up so we can hang our tomato and strawberry hanging baskets.

 

Mommy and Noah planting lots of Spring veggies!

 

Then we had to do a little watering.

 

We planted cauliflower, lettuce, spinach, strawberries, serrano peppers, and cilantro.  Tomorrow we will plant our peas and radishes. YUM!

 

The sunset tonight.  Beautiful!  Look at the tree in our front yard, it’s incredible!  It is so full of flowers and it smells so sweet!

Grandpa’s Hat

Noah has been wanting to play with Grandpa’s work hat, and I have been declining his requests….I just wasn’t ready to let him play with something of Grandpa’s.  Then the more I thought about it the more I realized that it’s a HARDHAT, what could he possibly do to hurt it!  I also know that dad would love for Noah to play with his hat.  So, I got it out and smiled at Noah wearing the hat.

 

Very Emotional Day

This weekend was a mixed bag of emotions for me.  Let me begin by telling you about a little girl.  Her name is Faith Pruden and she lives in our town.  She is six years old and was diagnosed with inoperable brain cancer on 2/19 – 10 days after dad died from brain cancer.  She has been given 6 months to live.  Our pastor talked about her a little on Sunday, and we all prayed for a miracle.  She has just finished 30 rounds of radiation, this will simply buy her some extra time.  It’s just like dad’s diagnosis.  Her family put together a "wish life" for Faith so that all of us that want to help can begin to grant her wishes in the time she has left.  Here’s some info about Faith: http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/faithpruden  and here is the link to her wish list: http://www.faithswishlist.com/faiths-wish-list/.  Last week I emailed Faith’s mom and offered a cupcake bouquet if she ever needed one.  She emailed me back and said they would love one for a big party for Faith on Sunday afternoon.  Of course I was thrilled to make it!

 

I made the bouquet and some "magic wand" chocolates and headed over to the party to drop them off.  I had such a rush of emotion once I got there that I could barely contain myself.  Faith was wheeled out in a wheelchair and looked really tired out.  It brought back all the memories of dad and how horrible he looked at the end.  I was a blubbering mess and only stuck around long enough to get some pictures.  I cried all the way home, pretty much that entire afternoon and evening too.  Even today I have been very emotional and really missing my dad.  My mom says maybe I’m not ready for this type of interaction yet, but I think it’s just the process of grieving and each time I let out my emotions I’m one step closer to being at peace. 

 

Here are some pics of yesterday. The cupcake bouquet and "magic wand" chocolates.

 

The event for Faith.  A Christmas party.

 

Noah enjoying the cupcake I saved out and make just for him!

A Taste of Spring

Noah and I took a long walk today to Inniswood Park and enjoyed the Spring beauty along the way!  Here’s a taste of Spring for you to enjoy too!

 

 

Inniswood Park.  Noah wanted to push the stroller "all by myself".  He had lunch in the treehouse!

Relay for Life Preparation!

In preparation for the walk we are doing May 8th to honor my dad, I designed T-shirts for Gary and I to wear.  They arrived today and I am so excited!  I can’t wait to wear mine to the gym tomorrow and have dad with me!!  Take a look….

 

My shirt…front and back

 

Gary’s shirt…front and back

 

 

The wonderful ladies at the gym agreed to let me put out a fundraising box for our walk.  I got busy and made one tonight.  I think it turned out cute….hopefully it will grab attention and help raise money for cancer research!

1st Dentist Trip!

Noah had his first dentist appointment today and did an incredible job!  He wasn’t afraid at all.  He got up in the seat and opened his mouth really big and told the doctor he was ready to show his "big open".  He told her that he needed her to brush his teeth for him.  We found a wonderful dentist about 5 mins from our house and every six months they have "kids day" (which was today) and it was GREAT!  No adults, just kids, so there were no drills and no other scary noises.  The theme for today was "Take me out to the ballgame" so the office was decorated and they had games, hot dogs, peanuts, and prizes.  Noah was thrilled to get a new "Mater" toothbrush, a toothbrusing timer, bubblegum floss, and a bag full of peanuts!

 

I have to admit, I had tears watching him in the dentist chair!  He’s getting to be such a big boy.

 

Showing off his clean teeth and new toothbrush!  The doctor came in to check after his teeth were cleaned, they all look good!! 

JESUS HAS RISEN! Happy Easter!

Noah woke up and walked around the house trying to find his Easter basket.  He found that the Easter Bunny hid it in his room! 

 

I found the Easter basket!

 

He decided the best way to open the plastic egg was with his chainsaw!  That’s a boy for you!

 

Exploring all his goodies!  He loved the new Spiderman watch.  He also got some Cars socks, playdoh, bubbles, and of course some candy!

 

Candy face!

 

 

Easter Egg Hunt

Noah had the annual Westerville Parks and Rec Easter Egg Hunt today.  It’s a great event organized by our wonderful parks and rec department and is very popular!  The "egg hunt" is basically hundreds of plastic eggs full of candy all over several large fields at a local park.  The kids are divided into age groups, so Noah was in the 2 and under group…..he was one of the "bigger" kids this year and did a great job gathering eggs!  Gary did a little "egg hunt training" with Noah before the actual event, so he was primed and ready for optimal egg collecting!   Needless to say, he ate LOTS of candy today, and will probably have more tomorrow….then the candy will mysteriously disappear!

 

Egg Hunt training session!

 

The BIG event!  Go Noah!

 

WOW!  Look at all those eggs.  You can see the joy in his face as we open the eggs and find CHOCOLATE!

 

After the egg hunt we hopped on our bikes and rode about 14 miles round trip to eat lunch!  We stopped at the Buckeye store to try and find Noah a hat…and found this, what do you think?

 

Noah went to bed a little bit ago and daddy and I got his FIRST Easter basket put together!  We can’t wait to see how he likes it!

Warm Weather….WOOHOO!

Today was the most beautiful day we’ve had yet this year!  It was warm and sunny and just lovely.  My plan was to take Noah to the zoo, but he changed his mind and wanted to go to the indoor playground.  So, that’s what we did.  We are going to try for the zoo tomorrow, it’s supposed to be 80 degrees outside!!  YAY!

 

We did have a nice picnic dinner outside with daddy and then hit the road on our bikes!  We took our first ride of the season and enjoyed every minute.  We went to the playground and rode by the very full reservoir!  All the snow melt is flooding our reservoir!  The sun glistening on the water was beautiful.

 

 

Playing "ice cream store" some some girls…