The Great (New) Outdoors

We moved into this home in June 2008, and redesigning the exterior of the home has been our first BIG project that we have completed. I do not have any before pics, so you will have to use your imagination on how BAD the landscaping and basic set up was before the improvements. All landscaping was dead, the border around the landscaping was raised and would not allow water to properly drain out of it which then caused a pond to form, and it was not interesting to be outside in general.

Now, we have done new landscaping on all 4 sides of our home, plus 2 beds along the fence. We put in a wood fence around the backyard, added a swingset, took out our cement slab patio and installed a much larger stone patio, bought outdoor furniture, installed landscape irrigation and lighting, buried our downspouts, and put in a home security system. Whew! Just don't ask me the names of the plants put in...I do not know unless I refer to the blueprint! As far as I can tell, all we need now are some hanging baskets and a new bench for the front porch and I can then mark this project complete!

Here is an extended view of our backyard. In reality, we do not have a large yard. We were concerned that the fence would make us feel even more boxed in, but instead it did the opposite. Our yard feels so much larger to us! The new swingset is behind me in the picture. Keep reading in the earlier blog posts to see pics of that!

Ah, my beloved colonial stone patio. I cannot begin to tell you how much I LOVE this patio. It is beautiful! This patio was suggested by our landscaper, and it almost didn't make the final cut as we were not sure it was necessary. Joe and I are thrilled that we took the leap to have it installed as it is really a centerpiece to the backyard. The space is at least twice as large as what the cement slab was, and makes it a much better area for entertaining. I plan to add planters to the patio in the future for more color.

This has become our bird area in the landscaping. Olivia and Ethan love to watch them eat and drink, and Enid (our cat) will sit and stare at the 2 birdfeeders for hours.

This back corner was to be my lilac area. However, we are having unexpected flooding issues with this corner, and 3 of the bushes have not survived this. Unfortunately one of the bushes was my lilac. :( We are working on a solution to stop the flooding before replanting.

You may be wondering about the seemingly random black iron fences we have installed. They are protection for the extremely large recessed window openings from the basement. Each one measures about 10 feet across and 4 feet in width. Needless to say, we could not find a covering for them unless it was custom made (don't even ask the cost of that!). These fences are to keep the little ones from falling into the holes. Joe and I breathe much easier knowing that that danger is now taken care of!

Next home improvement project...the study. We are still living out of boxes in that room. Stay tuned!

Busch Stadium

We made our first trek of the year to Busch Stadium over the Memorial Day weekend. It was a beautiful day for the first 8 innings, and then it rained. Which was OK since the kids were ready to leave anyway.


Last year at the games, Ethan did a great job sitting and watching the action. Our seats were about 8 rows behind home plate for this game, so I figured that he would again be mesmerized by the game since he loves to watch/play baseball. However, he lasted about 2 innings before he was ready to walk around the stadium. We ended up here at the playland in the Family Pavillion. Perfect for Ethan, although Olivia has about outgrown it.

Oh, and for those who plan to come here in the future...bring socks! We did not bring socks and I had to trek to the gift shop to buy some so they could play here.

In the previous game, Albert Pujols had shattered the "I" in the Big Mac Land sign. Here is the Cardinals' sense of humor over giving the sign a black "i". Reminds me of the band aid over the Post Dispatch sign in old Busch Stadium!

Another trombone player in the family?

Painting outside.

Olivia did not want her picture taken on this day, so I had to sneak this one.

Here is our new swingset. I cannot begin to tell you how much this has made a difference in our backyard enjoyment! Last year we did not have much for the kids to do, nothing to sit on, no fence to contain them, and nothing pretty to look at. This summer will be completely different. I will do an upcoming blog on all of the outdoors remodeling we did!

And Olivia posing in the "crow's nest" on the back of the swingset.

Golf time. I swear, if the sport involves a ball, Ethan loves it.

Daddy time on the new outdoor furniture.

Olivia's Dance Recital

Olivia's first ballet dance recital was on Thursday. Every mom of a daughter is entitled to one frilly, fancy dance recital! Olivia loved her costume...she thought she was Cinderella going to the ball! This was also a first for her wearing make up and her hair in a bun, and needless to say she really liked wearing make up! (Some of these pics were taken the day before the recital at her rehearsal if you notice clothing discrepancies!).


Did I mention that she LOVED her dress and make up?

Arabesque...her favorite dance move.

Even Ethan wanted to be in the recital!

Olivia showing off her "mermaid stretch". She is very proud of this move since her teacher tells her that she does it the best of anyone in the class.

Waiting our turn to dance was a bit long!

Olivia and her dance class posing for the cameras.

Still waiting to perform! I was a class volunteer, so I was allowed to wait with the girls and keep them in line (not an easy task with 11 wandering girls) and keep their hair and costumes neat. I was not able to see the performance from the audience, but I did have a prime spot backstage to watch!

One of their teachers leading them onto the stage. Olivia is the third girl.

Recital time! After all of this, their time on stage lasted less than one minute. During that minute of dancing, half of the girls stared off into space and the other half did dance moves of some sort. Olivia actually did a very good job doing the choreography and with attempting the moves. We were all very proud of her! Too bad she has now announced that she is done with dance and wants to learn karate like "Kung Fu Panda".

Take a bow.

Grandma and grandpa congratulating the ballerina at the end of her performance.

Olivia's Preschool Graduation

Olivia graduated from preschool last week. Unbelievable. That is all I can say about how quickly it went. Yesterday I dropped off a crying, clinging girl to 3 year old preschool, and now she is graduating from a school that she LOVES. In August she will start kindergarten in the public schools. Here is a picture of her entire class (this is really 2 separate classes). Olivia is front row, third from the left.


Mrs. Fromm presenting Olivia with her "diploma". Olivia walked across the "stage" so quickly that I did not get a shot of her either on the stage or being handed her diploma. Oh, well.

I made Olivia pose on the stage after the ceremony so I could take my shot!

Olivia and her teacher Mrs. Fromm (sorry about the bad picture, Mrs. Fromm, but it is the only one I have!).

Olivia with her group of girlfriends. Even though Olivia towers over the others, she is the youngest in the bunch (she made the school cutoff by exactly one month).

Olivia and her good friend Caden showing off their star necklaces with a sweet school poem written on it.

The tradition at her preschool..."run down the hill". Every day when I would pick her up from school, she would ask if she could run down the hill. The parents had to sort of stick together on this, since if one child was allowed to go down the hill then the rest would start begging to do so as well. On muddy, yucky, cold days it was a no go, but other than that Olivia would spend time running out her energy on "the hill". Ethan began to join her on the hill at the end of the year.

Ethan's Birthday Party

Ethan turned the big 0 - 2 on May 14. Neither Joe nor I can believe that he is 2!! The celebration started at Funshop (a parent/child activity) when the birthday child selects the color of crown they want and then walks around the group while we sing Happy Birthday to them. Ethan did a great job hamming it up for the crowd (some kids do not like the attention).


Here he is passing out his birthday favors the the Funshop kids. He was not too happy with me for handing out Play-doh instead of candy!

The day of Ethan's birthday party was beautiful. Thank goodness since the party was outside! Here are Olivia and Ethan modeling their Little Einstein's hats.

Playing in the sandbox.

The kids eating their birthday lunch.

Chaos!

We wanted a family picture with the cake, but the kids were so excited to see the cake that they wanted in the picture, too.

Make a wish! Yes, we had a Little Einstein party with a Mickey Mouse cake. He was insistent on both of those!

Cake eating was done outside!

Ethan invented a game of blowing on the party favor to then knock down an empty juice box. He was pretty proud of himself for this!

Opening presents turned into a group affair. Luckily, Ethan did not mind in the least. It was actually more difficult to keep him interested with the presents...he just wanted to run back to the swingset to play!

Ethan's present from Aunt Rachel and Uncle Thomas...he has yet to actually hit the ball when it is pitched to him. Ethan will typically watch the ball hit the ground and then swing.

On the day of Ethan's birthday, Joe and I gave him our present to him...a train table with all of the trimmings. However, as you can see in this picture, that is not what first caught his eye. It was the football from Olivia wrapped in ball wrapping paper that he most loved. He is obsessed with any sports ball.

At first, Ethan is not too happy to share his present with Olivia. He has since eased up on this restriction and they will now happily play with the table together.