Happy 3rd Birthday to Allie

We had a low-key family day for Allie's 3rd birthday! Probably the last year we can do that :-) We were planning on having a neighborhood BBQ on Allie's birthday weekend, but that is when Allie's Chicken Pox made their appearance, so we had to cancel the party :-( My mom (IE) came out for a long weekend to help make Allie's day a little more special. It's always great when my mom visits :-)

Allie got some pretty neat things from family! But not too much, since we are trying to simplify and have less "stuff"!! Besides the pictures below she also got a ton of books from Grandpa and Cici when we went to Atlanta!

Legos from Grandma and Mike

Easy Bake Oven from Nonny

Emma being cute

Playing with Legos

Suprise!

Opening her gift from IE and Gpa

A Leapster Explorer!!

Thanks IE and Gpa

And from Mommy and Daddy...

A Strider Bike

Now it's time for cake

cutie pie!

Time to ride bikes with Daddy!! And see the cute helmet from Uncle Garrett?

Happy Easter!

I had to work Easter this year, so we celebrated on Monday. Allie and I colored Easter eggs the Friday before and OMG does glitter make a mess!!! It was lots of fun to color the eggs, and then it was especially fun for Allie to eat them!! But I am still finding glitter all over my house :-)

Comparison Pictures

Joe's mom recently sent us a picture of Joe at 3 months and I couldn't believe the similarity between him and Emma!!! I also thought I would add some pictures of Allie at 5 months and me at 5 months to see the difference:

Joe 5 months

Emma 5 months (looks most like Joe here)

Emma 5 months

Allie 5 months
Andrea 5 months

Quarantine

We have been placed under quarantine because somehow Emma got Chicken Pox!! We have no idea how or when she was exposed, but thankfully she has a mild case and is handling it really well :-) Allie received the Chicken Pox vaccine when she was a year old, but despite that she got "break through" Chicken Pox with about 5 spots on her body!! I am very thankful that the vaccine worked because her case would have been really bad. They say the second child in the house gets it worse because of such close and prolonged exposure! And on another thankful note, Joe and I both had Chicken Pox as kids and we didn't get any spots from the girls :-) Here are some pictures of Emma's spots. It seems like the big one on her back is going to leave a "pox mark scar" :-( At least it's on her back and not her face!

Kitchen Organization

Week 4 of Project Simplify is complete!! I got the whole family involved in this one :-) Allie helped me throw away food that had gone bad, Emma smiled, laughed and encouraged me while I was working, and Joe built a spice rack!! I was really glad that this was the area to tackle this week, mostly because our cabinets and drawers needed to be organized and pared down. We really don't need 15 knives, 5 spatulas, 3 can openers, 5 wine openers and 3 mis-matched sets of silverware!! I took as much off our counter tops as possible and with the new space in our cabinets put some appliances, gadgets, and utensils in drawers. After 5 years in this house it was time to reorganize and clean out. We have a pretty good system going in our pantry and fridge, that just needed to be spruced up a bit. It is really amazing what cleaning out does for your desire to spend more time in the kitchen, cooking wholesome meals for your family :-) Enjoy the before and afters:

Fridge door Before

Fridge door After

Fridge Before (taken right after we got back from the grocery store)

Fridge After (Molly had to poke her head in!)

Pantry Before

Pantry After

Spices Before

Spices After (nice work Joe!)

Utensil drawers Before

Utensil Drawers After