Spring Break Updates

The week went faster than we thought it would, though sometimes it seemed to be creeping by. That's the way it goes, right? The kids spent a lot of time playing with friends -- thank goodness the weather has been gorgeous.

Sidney had Jessica over for a sleepover. Cody's friends were busy with family in for the week, so in lieu of a sleepover for him, we let him choose an "outing." He picked a matinée showing of How To Tame a Dragon. It was in 3-D and fan-tastic!!

One day when Sidney was bored, we decided to make homemade brownies. I promise you, they came out as good -- better, even -- than brownies from a box. And you know how good those are! Here are a couple pics of the kids:

When you don't have a bar of baker's chocolate, it's time to improvise! Three tablespoons cocoa plus one tablespoon oil for each square of chocolate the recipe calls for.

Part of homemade brownies includes melting baker's chocolate with butter. Looks good, tastes bitter!

Add sugar, flour, salt, eggs, and vanilla and mix well. The kids are getting really good at figuring out how much of each ingredient we need and measuring carefully. These brownies came out perfect!

The only way they could have been better was if we'd had scoops of vanilla ice cream, drizzled with chocolate sauce and topped with fresh whipped cream. Yum!

On Friday, Christian had the day off. We got up early and drove to Atlanta. Rush hour traffic was mercifully light, probably a lot of people had Good Friday off. We went to the French Embassy in Buckhead and picked up Christian, Cody and Sidney's French passports. All three needed to be renewed for our upcoming trip to France in June.

After a late breakfast at Denny's, we were home by eleven. Christian and the kids went to a gardening center and bought a truckload of organic topsoil, while I stayed home and wrote a quick blog post on my professional blog.

Once they got home, some serious gardening took place!

First, we put in a new herb garden. In a couple months, we'll have thyme, rosemary, basil, chives, tarragon, and parsley.

Next, we planted various flowers in a new bed between our property and the Lowry's. That way we'll both enjoy them!

We're looking forward to the Easter weekend. Then, it's back to school with the kids, and back to more serious writing on my novel!

Hope your Easter is magical :)

Getting Our Act Together

First off, I want to welcome Joyful Jessi Bear into our little blog circle of friends and family! The kids were jumping for joy (or should I say, jumping for joyful *smile*) to see a new follower. Knowing someone out there is interested in what they have to say put huge smiles on their faces. Thanks for brightening our day!

We're getting this little blog project off the ground, one day at a time. Yesterday, Cody and Sidney were my art design consultants as we (finally) decided on a background and banner we all liked. How do you like the way it turned out? The banner was the most fun to create, and the kids picked up some of my mad Paint Shop Pro skills along the way. Fun!

This morning, Cody and Sidney started working on their personal "pages." Blogger's latest feature is perfect for a family blog, because each family member can create a page all their own, introducing themselves to visitors who don't know us and catching up family members, who live far away, on all their current likes and dislikes. They'll add to these pages as they become more comfortable with the format, but I hope you'll take a moment to click the links just under the blog banner and read what Big Sid and Code Man have presented so far.

Christian, preferring his role behind-the-scenes where this project is concerned (...okay, he's not interested at all in blogging...LOL), has nonetheless agreed to let us make a page for him. The kids and I will use this week, our Spring Break, to think up three questions each for him. Once we have our nine-question list ready, we'll interview Christian and record all his answers. From that, we'll create his "Papa" page. And he will like it!

As I said, this is our Spring Break and since our trip to France this summer will be our vacation of the year, this week we're on stay-cation. That means we'll have time to blog, so check back soon!