M&M Party Bag: January 2024

Wednesday, January 31, 2024

Up and Coming

Laney was selected to show their art at the Olathe Education Center!

The first of many, no doubt!

Survivors

It's been a very hard week.

Our sweet Phoebe passed away last Tuesday and it broke our hearts.

She brought our days delight and joy and her loss left us all grieving. Especially AJ.

As a mom, I feel that call to fix and repair what is broken. But this isn't fixable.

It's surviving and grieving and walking through the days and talking about the stages of grief, finding ways to distract ourselves and looking for comfort in the pets of our friends.

Today the sun came out for the first time in weeks and I found myself seeking something in the dirt.

I never know what I will find, but it always comes with a wash of peace.

I pulled the old growth out, clipping back the dry asparagus reeds.

I began to dig up the old basil plants and then I noticed all the dry seeds along the stems.

The plant is gone, it won't come back in the spring...but it carried new life all the way through the winter months.

I looked around and suddenly noticed survivors in almost every bed.

I gathered up the basil seeds, marigolds and sweet peas and put them in some freshly turned soil.

I'll be watching for signs of life in the coming weeks as we wait for our hearts to heal.

Tuesday, January 16, 2024

Sweet Phoebe

I think it's safe to say we have fallen in love with AJ's bird.

We can't get enough of her cute little ways. Climbing up the laundry basket, basking by the fireplace, finding her favorite basket, giving free manicures and snuggling in behind your hair.

Welcom to the family, Phoebe B. Tweety!

Sunday, January 14, 2024

Everly turns 11!

Sweet merciful heaven it's family year!

AND

Everly's birthday falls on a Sunday.

Which! Means that we needed to do a few essential birthday celebration tasks on Saturday.....like.....

Heading to the mall in subzero temperatures (if you know me and my love of space heaters, you will know how much leaving the house was an act of pure love)

Everly wanted to get birthday Boba! And pick out some of her presents at Claire's. That store is the universe's answer to being an 11 year old girl. The parents glance at each other as they follow their daughters around and respond, "oh!, that IS cute! That's 14.99...if that's what you want, then you have 5 dollars left to spend." and we all look desperately for chairs that we know aren't there. We are so old. But our kids love it, so there you have it.

She picked out a green corduroy mini backpack, some green nail polish and green slime. She loves green!

Sunday morning dawned cold and clear with birthday streamers!

Everly helped finish up the birthday cinnamon rolls, all ready for rising in a warmish oven because it was cold outside and in the house. We got out the blog books and read about each of her birthdays...which inspired a last minute change in cake plans! The rainbow cake demands an appearance!

The warm oven did it's job well.,,,and let me tell ya, these were the best cinnamon rolls I have ever made. DELISHious.

Everly got a fervent birthday hug from Laney....a rare and special treat.

And we were off to church.

All the girls are insistent on decorating their own cakes. Can't say I blame them...it's the funnest part!

It turned out so cute!

She invited the Flynn's to come over for her favorite...Salisbury steak with mashed potatoes and homemade rolls. We through together a fruit salad to ward off the scurvy.

As she was lighting the candles we realized that we were missing Mathew and Ethan and Kassie for the singing of the birthday song!

Just as the candles got dangerously low... they magically appeared! And Mathew was out sledding! It's sad not to have them here with us, but it's so much fun to have them on the phone and still sharing in the birthdays. Technology has its moments.