February

I don't generally care much for February.  First of all, the weather generally stinks here.  I am not  a big fan of Valentine's Day and it is spelled weird.  Why the first r?  Why?  

However, February proved to a be nice surprise this year, because it has been great.  We have had quite a few sunny days and partially sunny days.  And Briz and I  have been doing a lot of fun things.  I definitely feel like we're getting ready for spring and that is a good thing.

 1.  Briz and I have started loving watching movies together.  We regularly have movie parties, which is a fancy way for me saying we sit on the couch and watch a movie.  Briz has now fallen in love with State Fair.  The other day she asked me if she could watch it with her friend Harper, who was coming over to play.  I informed her that she couldn't because I could guarantee most other normal three year olds would not like watching State Fair.

3.  As always we visited Holly's grave a few times.  It was so nice to go there on some sunny days too.  Makes it much more pleasant.

4.  Briz likes to use her umbrella as much as possible, so she is a little disappointed in the lack of rain.

 5.  Briz continued to play basketball on her team.  She scored her first (and so far her only) basket.  She was so excited, she jumped up and down, clapped, and ran straight over to Nick for a big hug.  She continued to run off the court and give us both hugs.  About the fifth time, I was about to tell  her to stop running off the court when she whispered to me, "Mom, I love you."  Hahaha.  Guess she was just feeling the love and my heart melted.  But truthfully, her making a basket is a huge accomplishment for her.  We generally encourage her to just touch the basketball during the game.  She's gotten excellent at her defensive slide, but on offense she generally just continues to defend her own teammates.  So the fact that she got the ball, attempted to dribble it down the court, shot it, made the ball reach the height of the basket, and then the ball fell through the net . . . well that was a miracle.

6.  Went to the children's museum one last time before our pass expired.  Her and Jaron ran around like crazy animals the whole time.  Julia and I sat and watched them.  Julia has the excuse of being pregnant, but me, I like to let Briz explore on her own (while I sit as much as possible).

7.  We went to the zoo and saw baby Lilly.  Oh my goodness, I loved watching her. I laughed, I cried. I think had an overly emotional response to a baby elephant, but what can ya do.

 8.  Lanny came into town for a weekend and we got to spend some time with him.  He and Briz had fun chillin at the zoo, and the highlight of the weekend was when someone asked Landon if he was Briz' father.  Say WHAT!  It was one of the funniest things I've heard in a while.

9.  Holy crap, Briz has been coloring like a banche.  I'm not sure if its physically possible for her to color anymore.  I feel a bit of guilt for constantly throwing trees away, but its doubly worse having to deal with Briz constantly making her disappointed face when she finds her art in the trash. I have thus learned to be very sneaky.

10.  Nick got knee surgery again.  And luckily, it ended up being fairly minor.  But Nick's knee is still taking a while to heal and all of us can't wait until he's 100%.

11.  Briz has been practicing her biking skills on our nice days.  And its a double whammy because she gets to cart along a doll/stuffed animal.  Not much more she could want in life.

12. In the absence of Nick being gone in Vegas and hanging out with Bo Jackson, I decided to send him a self portrait of myself.  It doesn't happen very often.

13.  We went up to Seattle to visit our cousins.  We went to the zoo (and it was freezing), and we also went swimming.  Briz is just in heaven following Portia around.  And I love my nephew and nieces so much; its so great being around them more often.  Can't wait for Thatcher Hugh to be born in a couple months!

 14.  It has been nonstop Baby Business here.  There are very few people that we know who aren't pregnant or had a baby recently.  All of this baby mania has been getting to Briz and she finally decided it was time to join the club by having her baby boy and girl, named Collie and Carline, respectively.

15.  It's the time of year again for swim lessons.  We had to sneak them in before we left for Florida for spring break.  It's crazy to think of how much better Briz is than she was a year ago.  She pretty much swims by herself; we just need to work on her technique some.  The doggy paddle only lasts so long.

 16.  We started going back to our Tryon Creek nature hikes.  Briz loves them.  But she calls it camping.  Clearly we need to spend more time in nature and hiking.  I am so disappointed.  But either way, its fun and its FREE.

17.  Briz is ending her tap class and starting her ballet class.  There are a few weeks of overlap so it feels like she has got way too many classes right now.  I will be sad to see the tap class go, because it was pretty cute to watch.

18.  I started teaching piano lessons which I absolutely love.  And I keep saying I should have started it a long time ago.  One of my favorite things about it is how it keeps me playing a lot more.

19.  Nick has been working like a maniac recently.  But his department has been getting incredible reviews, in particular for the fuel band (which is in fact, incredible if I don't say so myself).

20.  I finished my application for licensure for professional counseling.  I am waiting to  hear back the board's review and will then have to probably take a few classes, but I'm excited to be back on the road that I have wanted to be on for a while.

Now that February has come to and end, we have a bunch of fun things in March to look forward to: Amander's wedding on the 22nd, Andrew McMahon concert on the 25th, and then Disneyworld on the 27th!

And as a PS, my goal next month is to blog more because these posts are way too long.