Mother's Day - 2014

I always love the fun homemade gifts I get from Jacob that he makes in school.  They mean so much to me and I will treasure them forever!  I cant wait until I start getting them from Henry as well.  This year Jacob made me a cute hard and a necklace in school that I just LOVED!

The past couple of years I've tried doing things to create memories for my mom for Mother's Day instead of buying gifts.  It's hard for me to come up with new ideas for gifts, so I thought this was a good alternative.  I know I always enjoy doing stuff that is meaningful and will help create new memories, so I figured she would too.  Last year I took her to Spa World for the day.  That was fun and relaxing!  This year, however, I decided we'd go paint some pottery!  I have never done it before and I don't think she had either, so I figured it'd be something fun we could do together for the first time.

We went to a place in Sterling called Color Me Mine.  We both picked out what we wanted to paint ... my mom, a jewelry box type thing and myself, a vase.  

For the first time painting pottery, you'd think I could have chosen something a little less difficult.  Lol  Anyway, we just took our time, enjoying ourselves, choosing our colors and carefully decorating our jewelry box and vase.  It took us about 2-3 hours total, but it was well worth it, and I, personally, was enjoying some quiet. haha

After we were done painting our pottery, we decided to stop next door at Sweet Frog for some frozen yogurt.  Little did we know that our frozen yogurt would be free!  SWEET!  Lol

After our frozen yogurt, we went home to get our guys ... all four of them .. and then we headed out for dinner at Outback.  I specifically wanted to eat there because I really wanted the Ahi Tuna Salad they have.  It is SOOOOO good!!  Funnily enough mine came out long after everyone else's, and mine had the least amount of cooking time.  What the heck?!  But, whatever .. dinner was good.  The company was good.  Our day was good.  We had a really great, low-key Mother's Day, and I wouldn't change it for anything. :)

Mother's Day Weekend ~ May 12, 2013

This was my mom's first Mother's Day without Ashlee, so I felt like my main goal for the day was to keep her mind OFF of that one aspect.  I think I did okay. We had plans for both days that weekend (one day was our Mother's Day plans and one day was Jacob's birthday plans), but we had to wait until we saw the weather forecast before we could make definite plans.  The weather ended up being nicer on Sunday (Mother's Day), so we did Jacob's birthday stuff that day and on Saturday we did our Mother's Day stuff.

So, anyway, on Saturday my mom and I went to Spa World and just hung out and RELAXED. Something I think we both needed. I ended up relaxing so much I fell asleep. lol I can't even remember what we did for dinner that evening, but I know I didn't cook or clean up from it, so that's all that really counts. Sunday, we did Jacob's birthday stuff, but we were still celebrating Mother's Day some too. Confused, yet?? haha Anyway, we went down in to DC to play tourist for the day. That's always a fun thing to do especially when you live in the area you're touring! It was such a cold day outside, but the sky was clear and I was able to get some really great pictures! We bought tickets for one of the double decker tour bus lines. Those are so great because you can just hop on and off when you want.

 

I was able to get some really great photos of the Capital building from the top of the bus! Aren't the buildings in our Nation's Capital so beautiful?!

   

 The first stop we got off at was for the National Mall right by the Washington Monument. The Washington Monument ended up being under construction STILL from the earthquake we had almost 2 years ago, so we just took some quick photos and then hopped back on the bus to continue on to our ultimate stop ... the Lincoln Memorial!

   

   

 The Lincoln Memorial! We've finally arrived!! Or, as Jacob calls it "the Inklin' Memorial". hehe too cute! Anyway, the boy is obsessed with the Presidents, especially President Lincoln. He was in Heaven getting to see the giant statue of him ... he talked about it for weeks after!

   

   

 Here's another view of the Washington Monument looking from the Lincoln Memorial. Very pretty, if you ask me! Oh, and a cute little duck family we saw swimming through the reflecting pool. :)

   

 This statue of Albert Einstein might possibly be my favorite thing we saw all day! There is a galaxy on the floor in front of the statue and if you stand directly in the middle it is said that you are in the middle of the Milky Way. Also, when you talk you can hear it echoing, but no one else can. It's so neat!! We all took turns listening to our echos!!

   

 After we were done with all this, we hopped on a bus and headed over to Arlington National Cemetery. We would have gone to visit John's friend who is buried there, but oh boy would that have been a lot of walking! We did, however, stop by JFK's grave and that of Jackie O. and their two young children.

   

 And, finally before our day was over we stopped by the White House to take a quick pic.

 

Mother's Day Tea

This has been probably my favorite part of Jacob attending St. Timothy's preschool.  The Mother's Day Tea they do every year.  It never fails to bring tears to my eyes (happy tears) watching all the kids sing songs about their moms.  Even as I type I get a little teary.  It's just the sweetest thing ever!

This year the Mother's Day Tea fell on Jacob's birthday, so we ended up celebrating his birthday with his class the following week.  My mom was able to go with us, so it was extra special for me and for Jacob.  I'm excited to see what his new school will do to celebrate Mother's Day next year.

Here are a few photos from the day ....

Henry and Gee waiting for the show to start. 

 

Here they are singing.  I loved every minute of it!

 

Jacob's entire class and then him with a few of his buddies.

And, last Jacob with both teachers.  They were absolutely wonderful!  We're gonna miss them next year for sure. 

Mother's Day

It's taken me a few days to have the time to sit down and blog about our Mother's Day weekend, but it was fantastic!  I hope everyone else had as awesome of a weekend as we did.

On Friday, John surprised me and sent an edible arragement and balloon to my office.  It was such a pleasant surprise since it's SO out of character for him. 

Friday afternoon John picked Jacob up early from daycare and took him for his first overnight camping trip.  He loved it!  So, while daddy and Jacob were off on their guy bonding trip, Henry and I spent the evening having a mommy/baby bonding night.  We had dinner at Houlihans and then went to Kohls to do a little shopping.  I ended up letting Henry stay up an hour and a half later than normal just because he was having such a blast playing quietly by himself and/or with me.  I love having one-on-one time with my guys!

The next morning Henry and I just hung out at home and waited on Jacob and daddy to get home, and then that afternoon/evening I had to work at Kohls (my 14th day in a row working - a new personal record!).

Finally on Sunday I had the entire day off!  When I woke up, Jacob jumped out of his bed and climbed in bed with me and said (in the sweetest voice ever) "Happy Mother's Day, Mommy!  You have to stay in bed today, cause it's Mother's Day.  I'll bring you cake in bed."  lol  He forgot all about the cake once he went downstairs, but that's okay, it's the thought that counts.  :)  When I came downstairs about an hour later, I was given my present (a new charm for my Pandora bracelet), and then John went off to get us Anita's for breakfast (this seems to be turning into a Mother's Day breakfast tradition).  I had planned for us to do nothing but hang out at home, but we had some errands that had to be taken care of, so off we went.  Henry got his hair cut for the first time, and we did some grocery shopping.  When we got home, we just hung around the house for the rest of the day.  Later, for dinner, we met my parents at Red Lobster (also starting to become a Mother's Day dinner tradition).  We had a pretty long wait, but it was fun getting to visit with my parents and hanging out with the whole family.  The best part, for me anyway, was that Henry had fallen asleep on our way to dinner and then when we got there, he stayed asleep and cuddled with me for another 30 minutes or so.  The whole weekend was just perfect - I couldn't have asked for a better Mother's Day! :)