Sometimes I call this post "Other Fun" or something similar, but it's the same miscellaneous group of pictures that just didn't fit anywhere else, but were not quite numerous enough to merit their own post.
Grace and her friends dressed up as crayons for a 'multiples' spirit day, and she did a fantastic job making pieces for her red crayon costume. I didn't get a picture the morning of, so she sent me a selfie she took. = ) I'm not familiar enough with the group that Juliet and her friends chose, but she did a nice job with matching the colors or her chosen character!
Our oven decided to stop properly heating, so after the tech came out the second time, he gave us a rather high price quote, but told us which part we needed and gave a recommendation on where we could buy it.
I ordered the part, and Billy tried his hand at the repair, successfully getting our oven back in business!
Billy and I went out to lunch at a nearby Mexican restaurant, and they brought out our lunch on a robot !!!
The meal was quite good, but tasty particularly amazing, thanks to the magic of the robot delivery!
It's been cold for a long time, and hot tea has become quite the regular fare around here! We drink an herbal lemon loaf most of the day, but loose leaf Scottish breakfast tea for my first cup of the day.
After the speakeasy murder mystery party, I might have mentioned that I intended to use the plastic rolls that we bought to cover the walls as trash bags. I cut and stapled them, then flipped them inside out before putting them inside the lined trashcan. It was a win for sure!
I noticed no spills or leaks, and they went out in the big trashcan without issue! They were bulky, and I'm glad to be done with them, but it felt nice to get a little more use for our money!
After one of Emily's orthodontics appointments, we went to Chick-fil-a. For just a few dollars more, she ordered the largest nugget meal, so that we could bring home some to share with her siblings.
My friend's car was stolen, and since Alice's car was just sitting during the winter months, I offered it to her to use, if they could get it started (the battery drains slowly from the remote start, if not used regularly.) They got it up and running, and it worked great for one day, then refused to start. I felt so bad for her, because this was a headache that she didn't' need. (And I was going to have to deal with this either way, because Alice needs to practice her driving!)
Triple A came out to jump it, but it was a no go, so I'd waited hours, just to find out that I need to wait more hours for the tow truck to come out. We did finally get the car into the shop, it was the starter, and it was ready to go the next morning! After that point, I think it worked for her.
I found a super cool photo shoot on a CD cover, and took some pictures, so that we can recreate them for Emily's senior pictures! lol.
A William Avia height comparison!
In 2024 Billy decided that he wanted to take each child out individually, to a restaurant of their choosing, for their birthday. We started with Alice, and stayed roughly on track, until the twins. Their birthday falls during such a busy time of year, that it took almost to Juliet's next birthday, but we made it!
She chose Ukai, a hibachi grill. I think she really enjoyed it!
William had attended a birthday party up in DeWitt, and every time we go to pick him up, we have gotten in the habit of going to looking glass brewery and getting their won ton nachos! They are really good, and I haven't found anywhere else that serves them.
The brewery used to be a church, and the light fixtures remind me of the fixtures in my childhood church.
At the eye doctor, Emily was reading the books, aloud, to Alice and me. She said "the whispers on the bus go swish, swish, swish," which I thought an odd choice for the author to write, but when she corrected herself, it made it much funnier.
Poor Emily, they dilated her eyes.
My fortune cookie didn't have a fortune! It was sad.
Behind the scenes of the twins packing for a sleepover.
I think this might have been over mid-winter break? The girls and William got to hand out with some friends. They decided to play on the Wii together for a little while, at the very end.
A few weeks ago, there was an accident right in front of our house; a head on collision, even. I had just backed into my spot in the carport, when I heard a car explode around the corner. I ran around the corner, and couldn't wrap my head around what happened, until I walked close enough to see the other vehicle. By then, two of our neighbors were already on their phones to 911. Billy came home very soon thereafter, and I had to go shut my car door, since I'd just abandoned my car. Both drivers walked away from the accident, though one did eventually leave in an ambulance. The road was closed both directions for probably an hour. One of the first helpers on the scene was overheard saying "she almost hit me, right before she hit him." Sadly, we never got to know how or why it happened. Lots of dinner time excitement for our quiet little town.
One of our other, not as close, neighbors was moving, and offered up free things on the internet from inside her garage. I went and found some little things, including a classic Lego kit, and it took me forever to get all the bricks out!
I washed them all, and when Grace came home, she built something fun. I allowed her to keep a few pieces that she didn't think we had in our collection, and donated the rest to the kids' toy collection at our mom's group.
In German class, William befriended someone who lives nearby, so now he can walk to a friend's house! It's been too cold recently, but hopefully he'll get more outdoor time as it warms up.
A behind the scenes of our upcoming murder mystery party, our mudroom is full of chairs for the backyard party!
Our drying towel looked very patriotic one day! And it's not even the fourth of July!
An announcement over Facebook indicated that our village ice cream shop was being sold to another local family. We were only a few cones shy of getting the t-shirt, so one night for dinner, before the previous owners turned over operations, we bought the remaining cones to earn the t-shirt! Sadly, they only had kid sizes left, so we got the largest one, but Grace and Juliet are the only two who will be able to fit in it. = ( It is a cute shirt though!
Emily and I saw this cute little market, which bore "Lotti's" name, so of course we stopped. We tried a few things, the best of which, according to Emily, was a strawberry drink of some sort.
At parent teacher conferences, all five of my dear ones got rave reviews. Grace was trying to 'break into' Juliet's locker.
I had two more of these sheets, one for Grace and Juliet, and one for William, but Alice and Emily's looked the craziest this year.
I found a tennis racket for Emily at a rummage sale for $5, but had to re-wrap the handle, so the price was closer to $17, once we bought the wraps. When I was at a thrift store, I found one with a cover, for $2, so I got it for her, since she is taking it on the bus each day. She doesn't actually use the cover, but apparently her coaches recommended, to everyone on the team, that they should have a back up during matches, so it all worked out in the end.
During that same shopping trip, I found three matching tags for my birthday luggage, so I took off the old and put on the new.
Emily was pretending to be a piece of luggage, though I don't remember the circumstance for that.
A quick Grace story, with no picture. Grace was trading time with a friend in exchange for making dinner. She was going to make chicken noodle soup, but changed her mind and decided to make fish stick instead. Aside from asking me the oven temperature and time, she didn't need any help, and made dinner all by herself (including some chicken nuggets for William.) When Billy came home I remembered that I needed to make some tartar sauce, and as I was measuring out the mayonnaise, Billy was placing some fish sticks on his plate and asked: "is this mozzarella?" Y'all, Grace made us an entire bag of mozzarella sticks (and some chicken nuggets) for dinner. It wasn't bad, but certainly humorous and unexpected.
Grace set up a leprechaun trap for St. Patrick's Day. Sadly, she didn't catch anything.
We got out all of our accessories, and they looked really festive!
After I took this picture, I did add a couple of pieces of candy for each child, but wasn't able to find chocolate coins this year. = (
My big kids all dressed up before school!
William was featured in the newsletter! It's an enlarged cropped screenshot of the picture, so sorry for the poor quality.
For dinner that night, I made Reubens, they weren't super well received, but I think everyone tried them. Billy and I enjoyed ours.
Alice made some tasty, themed cupcakes for dessert!
Alice took the opportunity to go on an afterschool field trip to see the State Police Laboratory. It's not even 10 minutes from our house, but I was working that day, and would not have been able to get her to the event. Luckily for her, Avia was in town and saved the day!
I was able to collect her afterwards, and she seemed to have enjoyed it.
On the Thursday before Valentine's day, Billy and I went to Fabiano's to get chocolates 'for each other' for Valentine's day. The parking lot was awful, because right next door is the soup spoon, and they are always super busy. Ironically, this one time, it was Fabiano's with the line in a candy cane shape leading all the way to the door!
Since Billy only has an hour for lunch, we decided that we would go in another time, and went to have lunch at the soup spoon, which had no wait, and was not particularly busy. We were in an out in 20 minutes. lol. I didn't take a picture the first time, but I did enjoy my Eggs Benedict a second time as leftovers!
When we finished, we thought we would poke our head in the door of Fabiano's to see if the line were any better, and it was, by four or five customers, so we did it. We waited about 30 minutes, while 4 employees helped customers fill their candy boxes. Juliet added the sticker to the box, but I don't think it is adhered, just resting on top.
I reused the Aldi boxes again, so they were filled with sweets. I wrote a post about it in January I'm pretty sure.
It's been a very busy few months, and Alice has her final robotics qualifying match this weekend, luckily, it's nearby, and then things should slow down, a tiny bit, until Emily starts driver's training. This coming week is spring break, and I'm looking most forward to a little more time at home.
later days
