May began with a fun Derby Party at our friends the Bolans up the street. Our fam sported some fun attire for the evening. It was a fun time with friends and fascinators – ha!
My annual Mother’s Day handprint painting! Each year I look forward to the new creative way the boys capture their hand prints. This year it is fun cactus plants with hand flowers! I also received a lovely necklace with Griffin, Nathan, and Reid.
This kiddo was lucky to get his face painted at the zoo on a trip with Lilly. I was working late and wasn’t able to see it in real life before bedtime so we facetimed and then he wanted to sleep that way so I could see him in the morning. Raaawwwwrrrr!
Brutus and Reid both took note of the little birdy on our patio that wasn’t faring so well. They both just watched the birdy. It was cute to watch them watch the bird.
I think these Christmas family jammies are on like year 3. They are some of the most frequently worn when they want to match each other at night. And on this night they both wanted to show me their styled slicked back hair.
Kevin took the boys to the 1 year anniversary celebration of Father and Son Sports Cards and Collectibles shop. They had cake and fun activities. Griffin loves going to the shop and asks to go at least once a week. He enjoys looking through the boxes for specific players and also takes in cards (sports or pokemon) to try to sell.
On the 20th we celebrated Reid turning 5 years old! Woah, it seems so hard to believe it’s been 5 years since our silly, stubborn, fun, goofy, expression-filled, hug and kissing little man was born. He loves movies and popcorn. He is always hungry yet never eats much in quantity and prefers food in crinkly packages (aka anything processed). He eats PBJ, mac and cheese, yogurt, crackers, butter butter toast, and loves his MILK and not much else unless it is a “snack”. This one keeps us on our toes.
This year Reid’s birthday fell on a Friday and being a weekday at the end of a busy spring week I didn’t have much free time to make a cake. My sister came to the rescue and made Reid an AMAZING rainbow cake (which is what he’d asked for) for his birthday! Look at this thing. It was so awesome and he was amazed. Being a Friday and Griffin’s soccer team had a game that evening and a pool party after at teammate Brady’s house – we opted for cake for breakfast and prezzies before school!
Reid enjoyed watching Sonic 2 with friends at the Dublin AMC for his 5th birthday (directly after a soccer game, of course)!
Reid’s birthday celebration continued with our family gathering on the patio! We also celebrated Graham turning 12! Woah. Last year before he will be a teenager!!
And here are some more soccer memories captured this spring. These boys on the OUFC B09 Blue team are so fun as are their families. We had a great fall and spring season and the boys improved to much throughout that time. They have such fun together and truly enjoy hanging out with each other. They go to so many different schools across the Olentangy district as well as private schools it has been fun getting to know others from outside of Powell.
Special roses from the boys on Mother’s Day at the game!
Spring brought our first out of town Soccer Tournament down in Cincinnati at the Kings Hammer tournament. The boys went 4-0 and were champions in their bracket! We spent two nights in Cinci getting to spend time with our teammates and families between games and in the evenings at the hotel and restaurants. It was fun!
To celebrate the end of the season we hosted a cookout after the last game. The weather thankfully was warm enough to be out on the patio and the boys played soccer and other games outside while many of the girls created art on the driveway. Sadly, our friend Xander injured his eye toward the end of the party slinging water balloons. Ugh. I felt terrible that it happened but our team rallied around him over the next couple of weeks (he ended up needing surgery for a partially detached retina) but has since healed well and we are so glad!
Prior to hosting the soccer team Kevin and Dad built our patio tables. He got the design from Chad’s tables (that Chad built) and made two tables for under our pavilion. Altogether we can seat 12 or when separated we can do 8 and 4 in different areas of the patio. Yay for having a big table!
Last day of school starts with a donut celebration for the kiddos!
And celebrating after school with dinner at Cap City followed by fun at Pins Mechanical. My busy work season is winding down as well.
We celebrated Abbie Manning’s graduation at her party though somehow we didn’t get a photo with her in it (other than the table decor!).
Brutus is such a good boy he often accompanies me outside when I’m working in the yard or just sitting around out front. Even when other dogs walk by he just lays there and I often don’t even know they are nearby. On occasion he may sit up. I love that he can have the freedom to hang out anywhere.
Dad was off on hosta adventures so Mom joined us solo for the Memorial Day Parade in Powell. Griffin walked with his Cub Scout Pack (along with Kevin) me, Reid, and Mom tried to find a shady spot on the sidewalk. Afterward we watched the flag burning ceremony that Griffin participated in at the Municipal Building in Powell.
Look at this 5-year old pre-K monkey and some fun pictures from school.
Reid, Titus, and Garrison – these three are buddies!
And our annual end of school neighborhood hang out. These two also love to play together. Abbie even calls him “Reidy” all the time.
Griffin has been invited to join the Black team for next season with Olentangy United. We are excited at the opportunity for him to play a level up (this year he was Blue, Gold was a level up – for 2023 the team colors/names change from Gold to Black and Blue to White). We’ve learned two other teammates, Graham and Emerson, will also play on the Black team so we’re excited about that. But we will surely miss the remainder of our team and families who will be playing White.
This happy guy is so excited when you go into his room and greet him after his nap. And he is such a great sleeper, sometimes so much so that I think something is wrong because he sleeps SO much or at least seems as though he’s always ready to go back to bed! This week we were certainly thankful for the help of Jim and Pat on Monday and Friday and my parents on Thursday of this week to care for the boys. Since this post is after-the-fact, it turns out the Debbie has decided to quit and gave no notice. Rather, she told us she was “sick” for several days, texting at crazy hours of 12 and 1 am that she wouldn’t be coming. Friday of this week was her first “call off” but next week they continued until she quit via text on Wednesday afternoon. I had reached out to her mom as I was genuinely concerned about her and her behavior of calling off for nearly a week, at strange hours of the night, a couple times via a “friends” phone as she spilled water on hers. It just kept getting more and more strange. It turns out she didn’t appreciate the conversation that Kevin had with her on Wednesday of this week, and even though as a part of that conversation we setup a time to meet on Friday to discuss some things – that is when her call offs began and she never actually came back to work. It’s a shame and it’s upsetting that she chose to quit in such an immature and unprofessional way after 4 1/2 years of being with our family. I’m upset at the manner in which she departed and that she lied to us over several days saying she wasn’t “feeling well” even though she basically also removed all of her belongings from our house the last day she was here. It will be a big change for Griffin moving forward, not only for Debbie no longer caring for him each day, but also for him not having his best bud Sam around either. But we remain grateful for our parents who have really helped us out in a bind this week (and next!). Somehow I didn’t manage to get any pics of the Armstrongs :(. 
This was the week before mother’s day, aka one of my most busiest weeks of the year, especially with the years odd April weather our May has been busier than “normal”. It was so great to arrive home to a tasty meal made by my parents, including dessert of angel food cake with a homemade blueberry reduction sauce. Yummers! Dad and Finn have developed a hobby of running to the store together to get the days dinner stuffs. If you know my Dad, you know he doesn’t like to sit still (or when he does he’ll end up napping – now you know where I get it, lol!). 
I so loved going to NPCA for the Moms and Muffins morning with Finn. We played connect four (he is really good!) and he showed me around his classroom. We played with some toys and then Mrs. Laura read the paper that each kid completed about their Mom. He’s pretty much got me down. Well, he could have just stopped at my mom is really good at “working”….and left off the “out”. This boy has my heart! 
Later during the school day the kids went to a nearby pond for a nature expedition where they looked for frogs and various insects. My friend Laura helped chaperoned and sent me these pics 🙂
Good old Brutes. He has ruined so many things from shoes to clothes to toys, lovies, and so much more. This puppy stage is always a long one with labs. But underneath it all he has the sweetest disposition. It’s not often the first thing you notice about him, as he can be overbearing, he has a deep and scary bark, and when he’s full of energy he can be a handful. And eventhough I’m sometimes cautious with him around strangers or people who are uneasy around him, I have no concerns at all about him with the boys. He let’s these kids do any and everything to him and he’s never once reacted poorly. They climb on him, wrestle him, pet him, push him, tackle him, and on and on. And when he’s tired he’ll just lay there and take it all in, like the picture below (which is terribly blurry but you get the point). He could care less that Reid is smothering him, crawling over him, and dumping all kinds of things off the shelf all over his face. He just lays there and lets it all happen!
After Griffin’s football game on Saturday we headed to Mansfield for Mother’s Day. Not wanting to always show the highlight reel, I included this one of Reid (and check out Greta’s expression) not really digging my photo request. 
We explored Dad’s hostas and he showed Finn lots of his raised beds. And I love the photo of Reid up in the tree looking at Dad 🙂
And here are a few photos from Mother’s Day with my Mom! We are in front of the Coral Burst Crabapple tree that Amy and I gave them several years back. This might be the best year yet for flowering 🙂
Finn loves being a helper, so he and Kevin each bring up a rolling bin after the trash man has taken away our waste!
Powell’s Touch a Truck was this week too, so it was a perfect fit for learning all about policeman, firemen, doctors, and such. 
And a fun trip to the zoo where Finn saw a playful kangaroo up close and personal!
I was able to break away from work to go to Finn’s Mommy and Me day at pre-school. He was so excited to have me there with him. He took me around to all of the toys he likes to play with and we shared a quick little muffin together. It was a short time, but it was so nice to go!
Our beans started out like this early in the week and by Sunday we were ready to plant! 
Mother’s Day was a beautiful day. We spent the morning taking all of our plants outside and planting many of them in the garden. Finn loves to dig the holes and play in the dirt. We planted pumpkins, mini pumpkins, cucumbers, zucchini, beans, and watermelon. 
Later that morning we headed to Mansfield for an early afternoon visit and brunch with my Mom for Mother’s day. The Bethune’s were there too and we had a fun-filled afternoon of adventure throughout Grandma and Grandpa’s gardens, a trip to the Gorman Nature Center, and the finale at Dairy Queen – of course!
