Another crazy week around here. The week didn’t start out too good but by the weekend it started getting better. On Friday night Zoey and I went to meet Dana at her dad’s house to help her clean out some things before their garage sale. I was so glad Zoey got to go and play in Dana’s bedroom. Since my parents have moved out of my childhood home this was the last childhood type home I had. So, so, so many childhood memories took place in that house since Dana and I have been best friends since we were 2 years old! And I am super sad to see the house being sold but realize that Dana’s dad has to move on but still it breaks my heart a bit. I was going to help Dana and supposed to be a support. But I ended up being more emotional about it than she was! But it was still sweet having Zoey there and letting her play with some of our childhood toys.
On Saturday Zoey and I got up early and met Liz and Hannah for a really fun day. We started out by attending the Easter Egg Hunt at Aldridge Gardens and those kids (and parents) were a bit crazy there so Zoey only got one egg and Hannah got 2 but they still had fun getting their egg tattoos, balloons and just walking around the garden for a bit. After the hunt we went on down the Asian Food Festival. We watched the opening ceremony of kids singing then a dragon dance and then a really cool traditional Chinese puppet show. But it was going to be another hour before they started serving food and we knew the girls (and me) would not make it so we headed out the door to purple onion. And out of all the fun things we did that day I think throwing pennies in the fountain and dancing to the music was the girls favorite thing of the day! 
Later that night I took Zoey with me to do some grocery shopping since our pantry had an echo due to the lack of food! She loves the store so that was easy but as we were walking out to the car the bottom dropped out and it was raining so hard. The wind blew the toilet paper off and then the case of diet cokes fell off and went everywhere. It was lightning pretty bad so I just wanted Z in the car and was rushing trying to get her all in while trying to salvage our food. This man in his 4o’s stopped to help us and kind of yelled over the rain and thunder “You can do this mom! You got this!” and when he said that another man walking in the store yelled “You can do it!”. It was really random but I do have to say it pumped me up a bit! Once all the food and me and Z were in the car safe and sound I turned to Zoey and said “I can do this!” in my most pumped up tone of voice to which Z yelled “This!” with excitement! There are some days and some situations that make life seem so hard and most of the time people say “Oh you have your hands full!” Or “Poor thing I remember how hard it was when my kids were young!” And those comments don’t encourage you one bit but those kind words those men said were so positive and uplifting. So the next time any of you see some moms out there struggling give her some positive encouragement because that got me through the rest of the night which included unloading groceries in the rain while a certain 20 month old had a meltdown!
On Sunday Tanner and Nichole were moving back into their house and had a family work day so Eric headed over there to help them paint their garage and Zoey and I kept their girls. We had so much fun on our little adventure. Nichole told me about this pretty place to take pictures. It was like a scavenger hunt…go down this trail 1/4 of a mile, look for a bib hanging in a tree, take a right, walk a ways and then you have this beautiful spot and beautiful it was!!! I loved the way the pics turned out. Z was really tired so I may try to take her back again while the spring flowers are still in bloom when she is not so sleepy. But the girls were great together and had the best time playing together. And I loved hearing three little girls giggle in the back seat too! Music to my ears!
Later that afternoon after the girls had gone home Zoey and I cleaned out her closet to switch out the winter clothes for her spring and summer ones so watch…it will probably snow next week since I did that but hopefully not. While we worked away we listened to our church’s Palm Sunday services which was wonderful! You can listen to it here!
On Monday night after work Z and I went on over to my parents house to visit Larry and Jake our cousins who were in from out-of-town. We had the best time eating dinner with them and playing outside together. Z was a trooper and stayed up pretty late visiting too.
We are fully taking advantage of the late nights around here and after work on Tuesday night Eric and I took Zoey on a three-mile hike at the new Red Mountain Park off Lakeshore. She was such a trooper and hiked at least 2 miles by herself. By the time we got back to the car she was SO muddy I had to strip her down before putting her in the car! But she LOVED it and we made it back just in time to miss the rain.
On Wednesday night after work I got to dye Easter Eggs for the first time with Zoey. But she was much more interested in eating them than decorating them. She just didn’t get why she had to wait to eat them! Got to love my little egg monster!
And that leads us to right now I am a busy, busy bee packing around here because tomorrow we are off to Boston!!!! Eric has to go on a work trip and since I had Friday off anyway I decided to use some of my vacation days to tag along with Zoey. We plan on leaving the house at 3:30 in the morning so I have to finish getting all of our bags together so I can hit the sack early. Say a prayer for us around 9:30 am it will be our first time flying with Zoey since the long trip back from Korea!
