Other April

A few months ago Katie took me by surprise by full on reading something out loud.  She’s known all her letter sounds for quite a while and I knew she could sound out simple words, but surprise!.. Katie can actually read!  Shortly afterward her preschool teacher started sending home little books for her to pass off – four kids down, one to go!

Just a cute picture of my three youngest with their Dad 

Grandma Fletcher treated the kids and I to a movie during spring break – pretty sure this was Drew’s first time in a theatre (at least since infanthood).  We saw “Home” – the kids enjoyed it, but as I suspected it didn’t quite capture Drew’s full attention and I ended up spending the last 10 minutes standing by the entrance with him.  A fun outing though and we enjoyed sharing a few MOD pizzas afterward.

I had a few friends celebrate birthdays this month that went all out on the celebrations.  The first was for crazy, fun Laura who loves to be celebrated and in the spotlight.  We (she) planned a ladies night downtown consisting of dinner and karaoke.  I played around with the idea of wearing Abigail’s hot pink skinny pants and jean jacket.

Jason and Katie got in on the fun posing too.

I opted for something a little less flashy though in hindsight the pink hot pants and heels would have fit the evening perfectly.

Another friend, Jen, celebrated her 40th with a surprise lunch at Maggiano’s in Bellevue.  There’s no way I was going to miss out on this party so I hired a nanny through Justin’s work and made a whole day of it.

Lunch was delicious, the company hilarious, and there was even a personal visit from none other than Elvis!

It’s always a bit crazy getting ready for a trip.  Getting ready to leave the kids with a sitter while Justin and I went Portland was no exception.  It’s those kind of days you just throw on a pair of shoes and go with it.

Drew looked so cute toddling off in his pjs to walk Katie to preschool that I couldn’t resist taking a few pictures and even a video.  Sure love that kid!

Sunday, April 19th was Drew’s lucky day.  As we were heading out to the car after church he found himself an unopened package of fruit snacks on the ground.  Since we always tend to be waiting for Justin to find his way out of church we had plenty of time for him to sit down and enjoy his treasure (with a little sisterly help).

Katie actually took this next picture on my iPad that same Sunday.  Abigail was hard at work making two desserts that afternoon so we could invite some families over to help us eat them.  

This is the first term all year that Abigail hasn’t had to stay after school for sports practices.  It’s been so nice to have her home at 3pm everyday.  With that extra time, she’s been practicing her culinary skills by cooking a dinner of her choosing each week.  We’ve missed a few weeks, but it’s been great when we’ve been able to make it happen.

Justin and I celebrated our 16th wedding anniversary on April 21st.  I use the word “celebrated” loosely as we spent the evening running the lacrosse carpool, taking Jason to baseball practice and getting Abigail off to youth.  We did squeeze a little TV time that evening to catch up on our favorite show.  Just another day in the life of our crazy, busy and wonderful family.  I think we’re pretty blessed.

As a joke I sent Justin a tacky, little collage of pictures from our wedding day.  

Ahh, aren’t we the cutest?!? ;)

Garth Brooks in Portland

There’s not much Texas left in my Texas born and raised husband.  Phrases like “fixin’ to” and “ya’ll” are long gone.  Without any of his family living in Texas anymore, it’s a state our kids haven’t been to and it isn’t even on our radar (after spending less than 24 hours there in June 1999, I’m in no hurry to go back either – so, so HOT!).  Despite all the 80’s rock I’ve subjected Justin to over the last 17 years, he still enjoys country music.  When he got word that Garth Brooks would be performing in Portland he decided it was high time he takes his girl to a concert of his choosing (he’s previously seen Garth in concert three times pre-marriage).

We hired a sitter to stay overnight with the kids ($$$) and were off on a 1.5 day mini-vacation.  The Tacoma Chick-fil-A opened the very day we were driving past on our way to Oregon so it was only logical that we stop in for lunch.  

Turns out we weren’t the only ones heading south for Garth.

We redeemed some points for a free night in downtown Portland at the Westin.

After checking into the hotel we set off in search of a fantastic dinner.  We got a few ideas from yelp and tripadvisor but one was too expensive, another didn’t have a great selection of food, etc… we were running out of time so Justin grabbed a steak sandwich from a food truck and I popped into Starbucks for a strawberry frappicino and chocolate pastry.  Dinner wasn’t what we’d hoped, but it served its purpose.

We took the train to the Moda Center for the concert and arrived with plenty of time to find our seats and get ready for the show.  I must admit the concert was awesome.  Garth Brooks is an incredible performer – he engages the crowd and knows how to entertain.  And his music has just enough rock to keep even me enjoying it.  He played pretty much every one of his best hits from the past so I knew all but one or two of the songs. 

We had fantastic seats!

Trisha Yearwood (who just so happens to be Garth Brook’s wife) also performed a few songs giving Garth a little time to rest his vocal cords and the audience some time to sit down and post to instagram.

We took lots of videos and pictures on own phones.  I’ll just share a few…

Garth's grand entrance...

"I've Got Friends in Low Places"

"The Dance"

The day Justin purchased tickets to the show I mentioned it to my running partner and she quickly got on her phone and bought two tickets to surprise her husband with for his birthday.  The plan was to go down together, but he ended up having too much going on a work to make much of a trip of it.  So they drove 7+ hours on Thursday just for the concert.  They joined us for a late post-concert treat at Voodoo Doughnuts before heading home – which ended up getting them home at 4am with a speeding ticket! Yikes!

We may have failed in our dinner attempts, but we totally scored on our choice of breakfast the next morning.  We walked to “Mother’s Bistro & Bar” and enjoyed a scrumptious breakfast for under $20!  

Justin’s frittata was so yummy, I couldn’t help but help myself and kept eating off his plate.  My crunchy French toast was equally delicious.

I loved the vibe of the restaurant.

Their bakery looked far too delicious to pass up so we bought a mongo slice of banana bread and a couple cookies to enjoy later.

We did a little shopping that afternoon and ended up heading home earlier than planned due to some intense peer pressure from friends that Justin not miss his 8pm playoff game for our ward basketball team.  The team creamed the opposition and in celebration where do we go?  That’s right, Chick-fil-A.  Even at 9:50pm (10 minutes before closing) the place was packed – but oh, so yum!

Katie Turned FIVE!

Katie celebrated her fifth birthday on April 14th.  The girls wanted to decorate Katie’s bedroom the night before so Katie could wake up to some birthday fun.  So while Katie slept, Justin and I worked on painting the upstairs halls and the girls got creative.  

Katie thought it was pretty special to wake up and have balloons and streamers throughout her room.  The girls really did a great job.

Our evening was going to be too busy to have any official birthday celebration with the extended family so Grandma and Grandpa Fletcher came over after Katie got home from preschool and took her out to lunch.  One-on-one time is always a special treat.  They also gave her a few new summer outfits, a couple movies, and a coloring/painting book.  Katie worked on that book for hours that afternoon.

As luck would have it – Jason’s baseball game and Carly’s lacrosse practice ended up being cancelled due to the rain and muddy fields.  Just as Justin was leaving work I noticed that Ben & Jerry’s was having FREE Cone Day – can’t miss FREE Cone Day!  We had just enough time to pile the kids in the van and meet Justin there, eat ice-cream, then get Abigail back in time to make it to her youth activity.

Katie’s requested fetticine alfredo dinner was served a little later than usual and everyone seemed to eat a little less after having ice-cream cones for an appetizer and the promise of birthday cake for dessert.

Happy Birthday Katie-Batie!