Vacation, sunshine, and dump runs....

First things first, THE SNOW IS ALMOST GONE!!

So, so almost. There's a small crusty pile in the front, patches in shady spots in the woods, but really really just this close to gone for good. Excitement!

Second things second: It's vacation! Oh sweet April vacation! I don't even want to tell you how long I've worked without a solid 9 days off... six or eight weeks, I can't even remember! Well thank GOD for this week, and then it's wind-down season. Whew!

Third, lovely sunny warm day again today. Spring in Maine, when the weather is actually spring-like, is an amazing thing. The sun is shining, the birds are chirping, the bugs aren't yet biting, and life is good.

And last but certainly not least, mom, the girls, and I went to the dump this morning. Girls in the back seat, me and mom in the front. I pulled up to the trash area and tossed my bags in. When I got back in the car, Maggie said "Wow, the men here are NOT good-looking. Like, none of them."

HA! It's funny because it's true (and because she's 6). They were all salty old Mainers. Not a looker among them! Glad to know she's scoping the dump for lookers, though. Hopefully she finds the men in NYC a little easier on the eyes. Ha!

Then she said, "Nick is handsome. He's probably the best looking guy in town." She has many times assured me that I am NOT pretty, so you know she's not just saying that to be nice.

Still, this is better than the gem she dropped last week when we were leaving school. I was turning lights off in my classroom and locking up, and she said to me and Nina as she walked out the door: "I'll be out in the parking lot, getting drunk."

Classy. Classy thing for a child to say. I'll go ahead and blame Bob's Burgers (TV show we've been obsessed with), but that's really just a cop out. Because I asked her right away where she got that idea from and she said, "My brain just came up with it."

Sigh...

The bad and the good

First, the bad news. The hourly forecast for tonight:

Yes, that's snow. We're supposed to get 1 to 3 inches of at wet snow mix by 10 am tomorrow, but we'll see. They're wrong about these things sometimes. And 1 inch, if it goes to that end, is really nothing.  Maybe, if things really go our way, we'll get a late start. But highly unlikely. With temps hovering just above freezing, the roads will probably stay nice and clear. Probably. I'd love love LOVE a 2-hour delay though. Just FYI.

But then, oh glory glory hallelujah!
 

OH MY GOD!!! I'm so happy! Look at this beautiful weather!!!!!!!!!!

Finally!! What are we even going to do? Go to the beach? I don't even remember what people do in the nice weather. Yay!!

A dog's love...

I was looking at the photos of Nick's phone this evening (mostly Nina and Maggie selfies), and came across these lovelies:

They're from a few weeks ago when Nina had that high fever and was home for a few days. They took such good care of her!

Actually, they might be from a few weeks apart. She's wearing the exact same mismatched pajamas, but they're a few weeks apart in the saved photos. Unless they saved funny.

Well, this next one is definitely from one of the sick days, but everyone's looking much cheerier:

Who says there isn't room on a loveseat for three?!

So sweet. Almost makes me forgive Marley for his coming home 2 minutes before I left for work this morning, covered in mud flat mud. Almost....

Happy Easter!

Guess who visited this morning?? Here's a hint:

The Easter Bunny! He hid 11 eggs (grandpa got to them yesterday). He also left the girls a lovely note explaining that he saw the stash of candy that their aunt, uncle, and grandma had gotten them, so he was going to skip baskets this year. They loved the egg hunt so much they didn't even mind.

Busy busy weekend! Mom's been at Central Maine Med with a gallbladder attack, but fortunately they are holding off on the removal and she'll be home later today. Whew! She was furious that she had to miss 2 days of Joey, but all's well that ends well. Erik and I will cook Easter dinner today, and I think I'll let the girls skip school tomorrow so they can enjoy the day and some extra Joey time in the morning tomorrow. They got report cards on Friday and they were just fantastic, so one special missed day shouldn't be too big a deal.

It snowed yesterday and a bit this morning, but just some flurries, no accumulation. The snow is slowly continuing to melt, and today is supposed to hit 40. Still 10 degrees below normal on most days, but perhaps we're slowly emerging from that pattern. I'd move, but where?

April fool!!

Ha! What a day we've had. It started with a plan Nina and I cooked up together to switch the insides of all the cereal boxes. It was amazing. Maggie asked ("asked") Nick to pour her a bowl of Reeses Peanut Butter Puffs, and he tried, but out came Lucky Charms! HA! And he was so confused, he was all, "What's this? What's going on? I'M SO CONFUSED!" I was nudging Nina to yell "April Fools!" but she let it ride for a minute. Good call, because Nick just got more and more confused when he tried the next box, and the next (we have  a lot of cereal). Finally she said it, it was epic.

Then this afternoon the girls made Mount Sledmore, and sprayed perfume on it (Nick hates perfume). Then they tricked him into sitting on the sled and pushed him down the mountain! Ha!

Finally, we swapped the Doritos out with regular tortilla chips. This time he caught on pretty fast. We were like, "OH MY GOSH, THEY FORGOT TO PUT THE CHEESE ON THE DORITOS!" But after the cereal bit, he was on to us. Fool me once, shame one you. Fool me twice....

Two weeks and two days until vacation! It's actually getting incrementally warmer here too. Still 5 - 10 degrees below average every day, but at least it's reliably getting to 40 on most days. We'll take what we can get!