Happy Birthday Xiao Jie!

AnnaWen Mary turned three today! While it was her third birthdate, it was probably her first birthday! We had Wendy's for lunch and a cake I made last night and iced with the girls this morning. She received presents from us, from her Gammie Sue and Poppa John, from Jocelyn and from Missy down South (which is great b/c she had slim pickings from us thanks to snow days and car expenses!). She was glowing with the attention of being sung to and opening presents and was sooo proud the new toys were hers alone.



This morning we had an appt with the Early Interventionist who is fantastic. The girls loved their playtime with her and she thinks AnnaWen is doing very well, which is great to hear.



The sad news of the week is Steve's beloved truck failed safety and would cost over 2K to fix to pass... and that doesn't guarantee that it wouldn't cost another 2K in two months. I think we've already put more maintenance expense into it than the original purchase price and enough's enough. If we had disposable funds, we'd fix it and keep driving it until it couldn't be fixed, but that's obviously not the case. After brainstorming for about 2.5 seconds on how to survive with one car as a family of six with four children in several extracurricular activities (and two adults in a few themselves), we realized it was impossible. Since we needed a second vehicle, we decided we might as well get one that holds everyone so we can drive the kids around and pick them up without worrying who has what car where. (Typically on Wed's I'd drive the kids into daycare, but work that evening. Steve would have to pick the van up from me to get the kids safely home and leave me the truck. Most weeks that meant he inadvertantly took my bag, my phone, or other necessary items home with him.) So we bought a new to us 2004 Chevy Venture. It's ugly, boxy and boring, not my much wished for Sienna or Navigator, but it'll get us from A to B... and C, D, E and F. and G. H on Saturdays. In the interest of half full, I'm calling it "gold" not "brown".



The kids and I went to get carseats. I weighed PJ first hoping she'd be near enough to 40lbs that we could get her a booster instead of a second expensive five point, but she's only 34lbs, and thinning out so she may be there a while. The least expensive 5pts in Walmart were these. Bright freakin' pink. The girls were thrilled. I needed to get one more booster for one of the boys and got a base seat with no back for Jack since he's tall enough now to be safe in one. My OCD wanted me to get two, one for each boy, so they'd match in the car, but my wallet didn't listen. After the bday lunch party, we went to pick up the car, then headed to Walmart to get milk (b/c it would have been too easy to realize I was out of milk before my first Walmart trip for the carseats), then home. Steve is headed to NB for a bball tournament, so he prepped for his departure and I used every ounce of tolerance and patience not to string the kids up on the closeline outside. Heaven help me. All I can say is it's a good darn thing there was left over cake and icecream for me to eat for supper.

N