He passed his test!

Yahoooo!!!!

Karl has been studying for the licensing exam for the last two years we have lived in NY,  and today he took the final monster test and passed!  It is such a relief to have that huge ordeal lifted off our shoulders.  We went out to celebrate tonight. 

English teacher snarky

We were having some pre birthday cake for josh and Sydney corrected a minor grammatical mistake Josh made.  Emily promptly chimed in that Sydney should be and English teacher because she is always correcting mistakes made by Emily and Josh.  Syd sent her a dirty look but didn't shoot the idea down.  I think Grandma Hicks is proud of her!

Birthday boy

EHe wanted cereal for his birthday breakfast, the meal where I'd let him pick anything!

Karl laughed and said "he is so my son!"  Gotta love Cold cereal! 

Karl  has a night shift this week so we did birthday celebration last night and it was so fun

This morning Josh is been running up to anyone who would listen and saying, " it's my birthday!"

Life lessons from Frozen

Josh: could there ever be Aven with a last name of Pilz?

Me: only if you marry her

Josh: marry her??

Me: then she would have the same last name.

Josh: and she would live here with us??

Me: (laughing) yep!

Josh: (grinning) and she could sleep in my bunk bed on top.

Me: yep.

Josh: and would we kiss?  

Me: yes, and hold hands and snuggle.

Josh: And bow? And dance? Like in frozen at the party for queen Elsa?  I like that part. 

(Excited) That would be my first time getting married!

Me: well you really only want to get married once.

Josh: not ten times,  that would be silly.

Birthday time!

My little munchkin turned 12 this week!  Ahhhhhhh!  I can't believe for fast time has flown. 

We had her birthday party yesterday with a friend from school, and friends from church.  Sadly Karl and Josh had to stay home because josh was running a fever! I scheduled it at a place called Wonderworks,  and the kids had a great time! It was also the longest party ever!  By the end of the day, I was tired,  but they had such a good time it was totally worth it!

Seriously confused weather

Yesterday morning I sent Emily out to the bus stop in the rainy drizzle.  I didn't check the school website because the blizzard we had been warned would come at 5 am clearly was no where in site.  After a few minutes out alone, she texted wondering if she missed the bus.  I checked the website. Yup. Snow day.

I grumbled for the first rainy hour or two and then the flurries started and didn't stop until after dinner.

Tuesday we rode bikes in the lovely 45-50 degree weather.  Thursday we shoveled still more snow-we got a foot for sure off the sidewalk and driveway so the kids and I could get to the bus.

The snowy mountain is at least as tall as Josh!  Sydney walked a little too far to the left and fell in up to her knees.  Sigh. And of course she said,  "why does it always happen to me?"

Emily said this morning, "yeah! I have a white birthday."

  I miss spring! I got some bulbs from wegmans to lift my spirits!

Pantry organization!

I should have really taken a before picture,  but imagine an overflowing pantry with stuff piled higher and tending to fall over.  So Karl got me some mdf boards to fit in my closet.  I had half depth boards,  but saw double depth at Meri's house (my neighbor) and loved her baskets and extra storage space!

So Karl cut down the mdf boards and emptied the closet of all the food and bins we had.  What a mess!

We picked up a few bins from the dollar store.  I still need to find a good deal on one or two really deep ones, but the box will work for now. After an hour or so we have this!!!  Hopefully it will work for us.