March Happenings

We have managed to stay pretty healthy this winter but Lucy came down with a fever at school and was sent home one day in March. Due to logistical reasons, it was easier to pick Roman up from day care at the same time so we all circled back home for a day of popsicles and rest. These two don’t look too sick, am I right?

After popsicles we played with colorforms! Thanks for the fun and nostalgic gift, Grandma Sharon and Grandpa Glen!



The children absolutely love these cinnamon alphabet cookies from Trader Joe’s. The only downside is that they are obsessed with getting an equal number of letters for treats. The fact that Roman has more letters than Lucy has in her name causes issues. Here was our compromise on this day-



We did some painting after watching a movie.

We are still spending our Thursday nights at swim lessons and Girl Scouts. On this night the kids had the dinner of champions AKA McDonalds Happy Meals between events.



Lucy’s Girl Scout troop made over 200 Easter Baskets in March for the homeless shelter, first responders, and nursing homes in the community. The girls were so proud!

Roman’s daycare room had a unit to learn about the changing weather in March. He made this fun cloud formation craft in class. :)



In Rhinelander the community does not even attempt to hold an outdoor Easter egg hunt. Instead they hide eggs and treats at the local movie theater. These two bunnies were excited to head to the hunt!



Each kiddos could find 10 eggs in the theater!

 

Here we are camping out and looking at our loot. :) The children don’t get candy - just little treasures like bracelets, tattoos, bouncy balls, etc. Then we trades in some tickets for popcorn and cotton candy and watched a movie for a little bit. Lucy and Romy decided to watch Peter Rabbit on this day.

 



We went to music class after the egg hunt and then headed home for lunch and bike rides. These 3 did not mind that it was a brisk 34 degrees outside... they loved biking and running together. We did have one sad moment when Lucy lost both of her shoes in a snow bank #NorthwoodsLifeProblems but we recover both of them with the help of a shovel.

We celebrated Palm Sunday with these two cuties! 

 

Speaking of cuties - how fun is this? Lucy chose this sweet deviled egg at Fellowship Hour after church. So fun but looks like a ton of work!!

 

 

We ended Palm Sunday and kicked off spring break with a trip back to the movie theater to see Sherlock Gnomes. We happened to meet our friends Ed and Miriam there so the kids were pumped. Lucy even managed to find a few eggs shoved in the movie seats that were missed by children who attended the Easter Egg hunter earlier that weekend. Haha!

 

Happy March everyone!

Ladies Weekend

Every year we have a Hoekman ladies weekend where my mom, my sisters-in-law, and I get together for eating, shopping, and spending time together without the boys or kids. This is one of my favorite weekends of the year!

We always meet up in the Twin Cities since that is the halfway point between Sioux Falls and Rhinelander. We arrived on Friday evening and headed out for Indian food. Yum!

Here are my lovely sisters-in-law, Mallory and Katie.

My mom and me waiting for Indian food!

We spent all day Saturday thrifting and shopping! So much fun!! We kicked off the day at the Salvation Army/Target thrift store. Love this place - there are so many treasures! 

It was St. Patrick's Day on this Saturday and I was really lucky this year because I randomly ran into my other beautiful sister-in-law, Amelia and my sweet nephew James in the store! Crazy!

I just love this sweet little guy! He is going to be such a good big brother!

After finding lots of good deals @ Target thrift we headed to Ikea. Mallory prefers to venture out on her own in Ikea rather than browsing as a group so that is why she was not part of this picture! 

The rest of the day was a blur of shopping and spending time together so I don't have any pictures until dinner! 

It was St. Patty's Day so we decided to celebrate with Mexican food! Hahahaha!

Cheers to a fun weekend!

Here is Katie with a huge (non-alcoholic) margarita. 

One last picture together!! Another successful ladies weekend. :) Thanks ladies for the fun times and a big shout out to Dan for holding down the fort and shuttling the kids to T-ball, a birthday party, and other weekend happenings.

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Life Lately - Mid March

Here are some snapshots of life lately at the Storm residence this March!

We stopped for donuts after Sunday School one week. Breakfast of champions! Lucy loves the strawberry donuts with sprinkles.

Roman prefers powdered sugar munchkins. :)

Dan and I went to check on the kids before we went to bed one evening and we found that Lucy wrote an elaborate note to her Fairy Godmother asking for 5 more babies -- all girls of course! Hahahaha! 

Nicolet College hosted a traveling Children's Theater group so we took the kids to see a performance of Harry the Dirty Dog. 

Here is the set! It was such a cute show. Lucy and Roman loved it! 

You guys! I took my baby boy to Elementary School sign up for 4K last week. I can't believe how quickly my Romy is growing up! He is so excited to attend school this fall. There are at least 4 other boys from his daycare that will be at the same school for 4K next year! Watch out! ;)

As you know, Roman has a late summer birthday so we decided to wait an extra year before sending him off to school. I could probably do an entire blogpost on that topic and our decision to hold off on enrollment but, long story short, I am glad that we are going down this path! It was the right choice for Roman and we just want to set our little guy up for success! 

Mid-March is the time of year when winter starts to feel very l-o-n-g! We are loving the light in the evenings and are going on more family walks after supper but I am sick of the snow! Come soon spring!

Did I ever mention that these two (Especially Roman) could play Mousetrap for hours on end ...at least they are getting pretty self sufficient at setting things up again after running the marbles through the circuit!

I love hanging out by the pool and reading with this little nugget while we watch Roman's swim class!

The kids have been celebrating all things St. Patrick's Day at daycare and school lately. Roman worked on this pot of gold with the help of Miss Kimmie and told her that he would buy a motorcycle with his coins!

Finally I will leave you with a festive little picture of my leprechauns. :) I love how excited these guys get for holidays!

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Hope you had a nice St. Patrick's Day!

A Week in the Life

Some blogs that I follow feature a 'Day in the Life' post from time to time. These are some of my favorite types of posts because they are fun glimpse into someone's everyday life. I am afraid that my 'Day in the Life' isn't too exciting - no one wants to see snapshots of my office, me running reports, drinking coffee, microwaving my lunch, etc, so I decided to do a 'Week in the Life' post to show what an average week looks like at the Storm Household in March 2018. Just your typical/boring stuff that I want to look back on someday and remember fondly. :) 

So here goes - We typically kick off the week with Sunday School. Here is Roman getting ready for church to start at Trinity. :)

After services, Lucy and I went to the grocery store together. She still likes to sit in the front of the cart while we shop. I often wonder when she will get too big to do this! Between her long legs and bulky snow boots, it is already a challenge to squeeze into this spot. Hah!

I spent Sunday afternoon with some girlfriends participating in a clothing swap.  Clothes and jewelry to trade - check!

Wine and snacks - Check! We had the best afternoon hanging out - eating, talking, and rummaging through clothes and treasures. All of my favorite things!

When I got home Dan and Roman were playing Dinosaurs. This is pretty typical of what Roman's bedroom floor looks like these days. I love it!

Mondays are dance night so I pack Lucy's ballet shoes, leotard, and leg warmers in her school bag in the morning.

I pick Lucy up from herAfter school program, drop her off at the Art Start dance studio and zip over to the CLC to pick up this sweet guy!

Roman and I head home to get dinner going and Dan picks up Lucy from ballet. While Dan brings Ranger on a run, these two put on a gymnastics performance for me.

Dan got home just in time to do the bedtime routine while I took part in my favorite guilty pleasure - watching the Bachelor. If you think that I wasted not 1 but 2 evenings of my life watching this garbage this week, well, you are absolutely right! Haha! I felt a little vindicated later in the week when one of my favorite NPR shows, On Point, dedicated an hour of their programming to discussing the cultural phenomenon that is the Bachelor. :)

On Tuesdays and Wednesdays, Lucy has PE so we need to pack her gym shoes. I can not wait for the day when I can stop shoving her snow pants into her school bag! Come soon, spring!

On Wednesday afternoons, Lucy goes to gymnastics class at the YMCA. There is a little squad of girls at her After School program that attend this class so one of staff members just reminds them to change into their leotards and walks them down the hall to the gymnastics studio.

On Wednesday, Lucy wore her St. Patrick's Day outfit and Roman dressed up for March Madness (Even though our beloved Badgers did not make it this year!) I love these kids of mine! Dan had a work trip to Eau Claire on this day so I drove Lucy and Roman to school in the morning.

On Thursday nights Romy has swim lessons and Lucy has Girl Scouts. I packed up Roman's swim gear and threw together a picnic supper for the children. Dan did the swimming/Girl Scout circuit on this evening.

You can tell what season it is around here - Girl Scout Cookie time! Dan picked up all of our boxes on Thursday evening and now we need to deliver these treats to our co-workers, family, and friends.

On Thursday, my work dismissed early because the Crandon Cardinal girls basketball team made it to the State Championships for the first time ever! Gotta love small towns - they really support their high school kids. I took the extra little window of time to make a nice dinner for Dan and me. Broiled pork, couscous, and broccoli ... yum! The Lady Cards did not win but they still made Crandon very proud!

On Friday I picked Lucy up from school. We ran a few errands and her snowboot literally fell apart. Ugh! Again, can't wait for spring! Good thing that she had 2 pairs because these guys were thrown away this weekend.

We picked up a few groceries and a birthday present and made a quick stop at the Video Store. I remember when we first moved to Rhinelander and I saw Family Video. I laughed out loud at the thought of renting DVDs ... Fast forward a few years and we are still loyal customers of this place! #StreamingProblems

On this Friday night the kids chose Super Hero Girls as their movie from the Video Store. Here are Lucy and Roman snuggled into their beanbags, ready to watch.

Saturday morning meant bathtime for Roman. He takes a bath with an entire entourage of toys these days! Here is Roman with his sea creatures.

Dan and Roman left for T-Ball and Lucy and I joined them at the YMCA later that morning. Dan sat with the children at practice while I exercised.

There was a little window of time before the children's friend Aydann had her birthday party so Dan took the kids to the library. Roman got his very own library card this morning and just look at how precious it is!! I love that little signature so much!

We all circled back at the YMCA to celebrate dear Aydann's 7th Birthday! Aydann went to summer camp with Lucy last year and they are currently in the same Girl Scout troop. Her brother Cooper and Roman are besties from day care. :) The kids had a blast at her party.

Roman was so excited to spend time with his buddies Dennis and Cooper! These boys are so sweet!

After we got home we had some quiet time and then went on a winter walk. I was feeling overly optomistic on this March afternoon and let the kids go outdoors without snowpants. They got cold and wet pretty quickly so we came in for some hot chocolate and tea!

And that is a typical week for us ... like I said, nothing too exciting! :) So grateful for our healthy and busy little family!