Hoppy Easter

Good morning everyone. It was yet, another busy week over here. I didn't get my usual Wednesday off and worked part of the day, which meant that I worked Sunday through Friday last week. It was exhausting, to say the least, but I made it through. Since Mia didn't have school on Good Friday, she could basically, attend any day this week she'd like (since it IS paid for) so since she had a doctor appt on Wednesday morning (she's now 39 lbs and over 3 feet tall) she went to school on Thursday morning. Dropped her off like I normally do, and when I went to pick her up I noticed that the Thursday class is pretty big. Her teacher could tell that I was surprised and goes "yeah this is my bigger class of the week" but all of the kids were playing so nicely during free-time. Mia was playing in the flower shop in the right side of the building. It was a pity I had to take her home. She had class with a few of her Friday friends including Brooklyn and Brayden and her BFF Hannah also goes to the Thursday 3k so they hung out quite a bit. They were talking about Mia's birthday party and the bananas she had brought on the previous week. Sounded like Mia had a good day and apparently enjoys a bigger class. She immediately told me "I wasn't even SHY DAD!!!" Great kiddo!

Friday, after Jill got out of work, they left for Illinois to spend some time with her family. I got to do some art here and there and Saturday, I watched the Chelsea vs Stoke game. My brother and I were supposed to go to a pub in downtown Milwaukee to watch it, but Friday he texted me he couldn't which ended the night and the long week in not the best way. I had a beer and watched the game with the dog instead. It was a gripping game at times. After Hazard got the PK, one of their players made a crazy goal from half-pitch, or about 65 yards. Courtois was a bit too far off his line and couldn't get back in time to get it over the bar. 1-1. Luckily, Remy got the game-winning-goal off of some goofy roll-out to a Stoke player. Hazard calmly got around their defense to set up Remy with the pass. It was a bitter-sweet victory. We got our 3 points, but Costa may be out injured for a few weeks. He was holding his hamstring after a short time on the pitch in the 2nd half and limped off and was replaced by Drogba. Hope his season isn't done.

Sunday, I did the early shift and when I got home, I set up a scavenger hunt for Mia. She REALLY loves these kinds of things. She loves figuring out clues and puzzles to find surprises and treats. It was fun coming up with the clues at work (since it was incredibly slow for 4 hours straight before picking up) Watched the Quakes vs Real Salt Lake game before they came home. Mia and Jill came with Mia, super tired but when she saw the Easter Bunny left a note, she perked up and did her hunt. It was a lot of fun. We quickly went to my parent's house for Easter Dinner with my bro, his wife and kids and my sister. The kids got to go egg hunting and they had a blast. This is why Mia says Easter is her favorite. Dinner and dessert was great and Mia had a lot of fun "helping with those troublemaker boys". "Ashley, you want help with him?" So cute.

That's all for now. Thanks for reading!

4th Birthday Madness

Good Morming~
It was an incredibly busy week over here, but somehow we survived. All week, we were preparing for Mia's 4th Birthday party getting everything cleaned, and figuring out exactly how many people were coming, etc. I think it got to about 30 total, which included 9 small kids running around, but more on that later. Friday, was Mia's actual birthday so Jill and I decided to take the day off to spend with her after she was finished with school. We made a little treat for her kids. We tied suckers to bananas, and put party hats on the bananas which had little faces on them (that I drew on) I made different faces of characters that her friends liked. For instance,
Mia tells me that Brayden likes Ninja Turtles, so I drew one on for him, I did Olaf for her friend Brooklyn because Mia told me she has Frozen mittens, etc. The kids had fun guessing who's banana was for whom. It was fun. Jill and I both took Mia to school, and like I imagined, Mia was her normal self, and said "OKAY BYE GUYS" like we couldn't get out of there fast enough. We spent the two and a half hours cleaning, and baking Mia's Minnie Mouse car cake. It turned out pretty awesome. We picked her up later, and she had a cute birthday crown they made for her, as well as birthday book of pictures her friends and classmates drew for the diva.

We grabbed a bite for lunch at a very busy Panera, and later went to the movies to see Cinderella. She was stoked for Frozen Fever, but Cinderella was live-action with a lot of death, so that was a tad difficult to sit through. This was only her 2nd time going to a movie theatre, but she did mostly well. Later, we visited Grandma and Grandpa and they gave her a few outfits and a toy for her birthday. Saturday was the big day. We got everything ready and prepared. Her other Grandparents and uncle came in from Illinois and before long, we had quite a lot of people at the house. She was quite shy at first because as she did invite so many friends, their parents came too, so she was a bit nervous around them at times, but later felt better. I, on the other hand got to meet a few of her BFF's from school's Mom and Dad so that was pretty good. Surprisingly, all the kids got along really nicely, including Mia who let them play with her toys and in her play-kitchen. She got a massive haul of presents, and hopefully today I can make my best attempt to put them places. Saturday evening Jill's family had to head back to Illinois, but this will hopefully be the last time they'll have to drive up for her birthday since they're planning on moving up this year.

Sunday, we had an early baptism for my nephew Camden. I photographed while Jill fulfilled her Godmother duties during the service. Mia was really really good so I was quite proud of her. It may have been because she was super tired.


So quickly, I'll do my year-summary for the kid. From 3-4 years old, She taught herself how to use the potty, has become more independent with wanting to do everything herself (like putting her jacket on or sneakers). She's getting more confident on new obstacles at the park and most importantly, she's gained trust in me that when I drop her off at school, I'll be back to pick her up. It's weird to think that now she's at the "school age" that every year from now on, she'll be in school. 3K has been an interesting experience for the kid, but she's really enjoying it. I just wish she was less shy during free-time/recess. Her attitude (at times ) really is a pain but she still is this lovable little girl.


This week, she doesn't technically have school Friday because its Good Friday, however because we already paid for the week, she can go in on a day so I have to figure out if she should go on Tuesday or Thursday. Wednesday, she had a doc appt and Friday evening, Jill and Mia are making their first road trip without me to Illinois to visit with her family. Mia's pretty good on long car rides these days so they're gonna see how this works. I have the 6am-2pm shift Sunday so I can do Easter with the family later in the evening. Chelsea is back in action Saturday morning against Stoke after a long international break, so I'm really looking forward to the game :) Thanks for reading!

Where Did Spring Go?

Morning all. Got a real late start on my Monday morning routines. For some reason, I didn't hear my obnoxiously loud alarm go off at 5:30am..Weird. Anyways, here's how last week went. Last Monday was the nicest of the days with a high of 70 degrees! We hung out with some of her old friends she hasn't seen in quite some time. It was really nice and enjoyable. She was talking to a random girl on the swings about Disney and how this will be her first time there. She also tried something completely new: At the park, they have a small fireman's pole and because her friend Gracie could do it, Mia wanted to. Sure enough, with a little help from me, she was able to do it :) St Paddy's Day, I worked a very busy shift and enjoyed a Guinness later at home.
Friday, she had school and when I picked her up, it sounded like she had a great time. Her friends are so nice, because apparently during recess, Mia gets nervous when there are a lot of kids out and Mia doesn't like all of the loud boys running around pushing each other. Her pal Alexa took her hand and they walked around. So all in all, good day. This Friday we're bringing a treat for her class for Mia's birthday.

Saturday Jill went to a craft fair most of the morning into the afternoon while I kept Mia busy. Mia and I went to this community event at one of the high schools. They had a gym full of kid stuff that had Mia playing for a few hours. It was mostly a bunch of different preschool and daycare giving out info, but having small tables out for kids to try different things. They had a karate demonstrator and a small gym group too. Mia has absolutely no interest in gymnastics, which is weird because at home she's constantly trying to tumble and jump. Later we cruised over to Interstate Music store on the way home. We had fun playing the different E-kids. Mia's got her heart set on getting a mandolin some day. Better save your $ kid.

Later when Jill came home, we cleaned the house getting it ready for Mia's birthday party next Saturday. We have 9 kids that will be attending (which includes Mia) Sunday, we watched Chelsea beat Hull City. For some reason, I read the game started at 12, but in actuality it was 11am so I missed 4 GODDAMN GOALS!! Caught the end of the first half and the rest of the 2nd. The defense for some reason, wasn't playing well at ALL. Brana was making all kinds of mistakes but thankfully, Remy got us the goal we needed to win and secure the 3 points before the international break. Phew. I was hoping this wouldn't be a game we'd hand the title over to Man City.

So much going on this week with preparing for the party. Both Jill and I are off Friday. She's going to bake the cake while Mia's at school and later, we're going to take her to Cinderella. Oh, also, it's SNOWING right now. Ugh... That's all for now. Thanks for reading :)

Reunion

Good Morning. All kinds of things to talk about on this Monday. Last Wednesday, Mia and I watched the Champions League game against PSG in the 2nd leg together with my Dad. It was an important one, and sadly, we were beat 2-2 on aggregate. PSG wanted it so much more then us. We couldn't get pace or a good string of passing going. Diego Costa looked like he was about to explode and kept getting in trouble with every call. The controversial red card early in the first half against Zlatan Ibrahimovic was (in my opinion, a yellow) but our instant reaction to get the entire squad in the referee's face a bit too much. Hazard and Cahill's goals weren't enough to get us through, so now we have to focus all of our attention on the league title. More on that later.

So that was a frustrating day to say the least, but we enjoyed the rest of the day off with Jill when she got home from work. Friday, Mia had school. Her teacher (who was sick last week) returned and she was happy. Mia had a good day. Learned about St. Patrick's Day, shamrocks and rainbows. She gave her pals hugs after bathroom time and we were off on our way.

Saturday the weather was pretty nice, so we spent as much time as we could outside. Mia played at a couple parks with some kids and started doing more slides. She doesn't like the big ones still, but she'll get there. She pulled out her Mustang and drove it around the cul de sac. The boy across from our house last summer would run out and give her a sucker when he'd see her, but Saturday, he wasn't around. "Where is Max? He's the only cute boy that I know. Well, I LOVE YOU TOO DADDY!" that comment she made explained the whole "I don't like boys thing" to me. She wants to consistently prove to me that I'm her #1 boy whether I have to be or not, but man, was she so upset when Max wasn't home. She sad-face drove and parked her Mustang back i the driveway and kept repeating "Max is the ONLY cute boy that I know.."
Saturday night was a super rare night for me. My tech college friends and I got together (4 of us) and had dinner/drinks for the first time since my wedding. We went to La Estecion, one of the more authentic places to get Mexican food. Later, we head out for drinks at a local bar. My face hurt all the way home from smiling and laughing so much. These are some good old friends that I haven't hung out with in so long, so it was a total blast to catch up. My friend Nicole, we hang out from time to time at the park with our kids, and she'll be coming to Mia's birthday party in a couple weeks. Hard to believe we've been friends for 13 years. Anyways, when I got home, we put Mia to bed and watched a movie.

Sunday, I watched a very frustrating Chelsea vs Southhampton game. We got an early goal but a take down in the box left us tied 1-1 at HT. We should have been able to take this game, but we couldn't get that 2nd goal. We had a lot of chances, but in the end, we split the point and are now 6 ahead of Man City with a game in hand. I tell you, when I found out Man City lost Saturday, I thought we'd be able to capitalize on that and give some significant distance between us and them. 6 is still a good number to be ahead on, but we have to make more space and strengthen the defense. After the game, we later watched some of the Pens/Wings slaughtering before Mia noticed something outside. "DO YOU SEE IT??!! DO YOU SEE IT??!! MAX IS HOME! OH MY GOSH WE HAVE TO GO OUTSIDE NOW!!" I have never seen that kid get up and off the couch to get shoes/jacket on for anyone, but oh, the boy-next-door is outside and she has to go see him. She grabbed a sucker of her own to hopefully exchange with him. They were all shy to each other, but in the end, exchanged the suckers. It was pretty adorable.

I'm going to try to make as much progress as possible on this dog portrait that I've been casually working on. That's it for now, thanks for reading!

Little Ears

Good Morning everyone. Another busy weekend came and went here but we sure enjoyed the above-freezing and mostly pleasant weather! Last Wednesday, Mia and I watched the Chelsea vs West Ham game on my day off. Not the best performance, but we got the win, the three points and the weekend off to prepare for the 2nd leg of the Champions League match against PSG. Loved Hazard's goal he scored. A rare header, but awesome nonetheless. Friday Mia had school. She woke up surprisingly in a pretty good mood. When it was time to go, she ran to the car and was singing the whole way there. When we got to the class room, I discovered that her teacher wasn't there and that she had a sub. This made me a tad nervous because she's never had a substitute before. I said my goodbyes and reminded her that I'd be back earlier to read to the class, and when I'm done reading, we'll head home. For the last two weeks, the 3k classes have been reading and researching about authors and illustrators such as Dr Seuss. Parents were invited to come and read, so I came in on their last day on the unit and read to her class. When I came in, Mia was playing "librarian" and checking out books for her pal Alexa. So, I read to her class and they all clapped and enjoy it. On our way home, she told me how much she enjoyed her sub teacher and made a little fish.

Saturday, we went to my friend Nicole's boy Benny's 4th birthday party. It was nice hanging out and playing with the birthday boy. Later, we went to a 30th birthday party for my friend Stacy at a bar. It was like a Carroll College reunion. Lots of fun and a rare evening for us to hang with some friends we never get to see. Sunday, we cleaned and worked on laundry before I worked a very busy 2-10 shift.  Jill and Mia went to the zoo and later my brother Andy's last pre-playoff hockey game. When I came home, they weren't home yet, but later they told me his team lost 1-0.
Soon, I'm gonna build Jill a new website for her wearable art she's got on Easy. All of her listings expired and instead of having to pay the little $ to keep them up, I'm gonna put together a new website that she can sell from so that should be fun.
That's all for now. Thanks for reading :)

One Down, Two to Go!

Good Morning, hope everyone enjoyed the weekend. It was a pretty quick week over here, and now that we're in March, we hope the snow eventually melts and that we can finally enjoy some nice weather. Thursday, my little bro and I took the kids to Tot-Time at Helium. This may have been the LAST time we will go, because they changed the rules. Upon arrival, we found out that NO parents are allowed to jump with their kids. We were both pretty bummed out since both kids like having us out there. Eventually, Mia was fine and I sat on the platform in the middle of the park and watched her jump, but my nephew Easton is 2, and needed his Dad out there. They stayed for about an hour, but Mia wanted to hang a little longer. We were whipping balls at the basketball hoop from 20 feet away. Eventually, I made one in. Not as much fun as dunking, but whatever.
 Friday, Mia had a pretty good day at school. She invited a few of her friends (Alexa and Olivia) to her birthday party in a few weeks. I even had her write out the letters on the envelop to give her some practice. When I went to pick her up, it was the first time that she wasn't coming from either the gym or outside. Usually, I have to hang out a bit in the entry way and wait till I see her running down the hall way. I came in, and the class was enjoying some free time with some music. She didn't see me for a few minutes till some kid goes "WHO ARE YOU?!" They've been reading a lot of different books, and learning about the artwork created. They even have a little "book store" the kids can play and checkout books to read during class. Cute right? Friday was a normal busy day at work. My inlaws came in for a short visit for the weekend. When I came home, they were at the house looking up houses with Jill and Mia. I changed and headed over to my little brother's hockey game. Got there, doors were locked. DAMMIT.

Saturday was a pretty low-key day. We didn't do too much. Mia had them watch Lego Movie. Still funny and awesome. Sunday morning was what I was amped for. Sunday was the class of the rivals Chelsea vs Spurs for the Capital One Cup Final at Wembley. The final wasn't on TV or even NBC Sports Live which made it difficult to find a different place to watch it on. I swear, if I wasn't working, I would have went to a soccer pub and taken my Dad to go watch since he too couldn't watch the finale I eventually found a BEin sports in Spanish that worked for the first half before going down. Terry got the first goal, an awesome corner that he was able to get a loose ball and boot it in. In the 2nd half, I found a Youtube channel that had a live feed of the game in Russian. It was a few minutes behind, but whatever, it WORKED. Costa got the 2nd goal off a deflection (like Terry's) When it was all said and done, we won the trophy. Spurs couldn't dig their way through our defense. We had a very strange formation when they showed the line up, and for some reason, Mourinho had Cahill playing a more attacking mid position instead of the likes of Oscar. At one point, my favorite Left Back Azpilicueta got kicked in the back of the head and was bleeding. Mia came over and sat on my lap with this sad look on her face "IS HE OKAY??" With Man City losing to Liverpool, we're looking real good for the Premier League title. They need to continue to blow these important games so we can widen the gap. We play West Ham on Wednesday and our 2nd leg of the Champions League against PSG soon. I worked later 2-10, and when I got home, read Mia a story and she was fast asleep.

March is shaping up to be a pretty busy month with a handful of birthdays, a baptism and other events filling up our weekend. Thanks for reading!

Everything is Awesome!!!

Good morning everyone. Hope the weekend was enjoyable. Everyone here is pretty much back to normal and not sick and miserable as we all were in the previous week. Mia went back to school Friday and when we arrived, she had discovered she got a bag of Valentines from her classmates that she would have got if she went last week. She was pretty stoked by all of them. When I went to pick her up, her teacher told me how she had such a great day with her friend Olivia playing in the kid's Post Office for quite a while writing and making letters for each other. That kid is so sweet to Mia. As she gave a hug goodbye to her when we were leaving, a brave little boy ran up and hugged her too. I think his name is Finn. After he ran back to the rug for "Calendar Time" she whispers to me "Daddy, I did NOT want him to hug me". Kid, it's no biggie, he just wanted to say goodbye. Ugh. What was real nice Friday, is that I had the day off. I rarely take off on Fridays but since Jill was in Madison till about 7ish for a conference/seminar for work, I spent the rest of Mia's day after school with her.

We grabbed some lunch after I picked her up and went to Monkey Joe's. Haven't been there in a while, but she had a good time. I can never talk her into going down some of the bigger slides, but we still had a lot of fun. They were pretty busy, and later I found out it was because a lot of the area schools had the day off. Afterwards, we visited a few stores, and on the way home, she was fast asleep. When Jill came home, we made dinner and watched The Lego Movie. Mia wanted nothing to do with this, but as soon as I turned it on, she instantly got into the film. It was pretty cute and very funny. It was really nice to enjoy the evening with Jill and Mia.

Saturday morning, I got up, did the usual routine and made my way to the computer to watch the Chelsea vs Burnley game. This should have been easy. Real easy. It still drives me insane that we couldn't secure 3 points at the Bridge, but something wasn't right. Ivanovic set the tone in the first half with a great goal from a very creative pass from Hazard. We had two different instances in the box and the referee didn't even pull a card or stop the play. One guy, easy hands in the box. Everyone saw it. Nope. Ref didn't stop the play. Costa, got shoved in the box. Once again, no card. He was pretty furious about that one. Then the cherry on top. Matic had the ball, and Barnes from Burnley stuck his boot straight into his leg and clearly missed the ball. NO CALL ON THIS. When I saw Matic get up and sprint to go shove Barnes, my jaw dropped. Now, we're out a key CDM for three games including the Capital One Cup final all because the incompetent ref didn't catch that blatant and dirty tackle. Ashley Barnes was fouling our boys all game. It was crazy. I don't know how Mourinho didn't go crazy in the post-interviews, but the game ended in a draw 1-1.

Tuesday, we played PSG. Sadly, I missed the Champions League match, but we also finished 1-1. Hopefully we can beat them in the 2nd leg.

After that frustrating game Saturday morning, we spent the rest of the day doing laundry and later Jill and I went on a rare date and had grandma babysit the kiddo. We haven't had a date night since I believe May. I thought August at first, but I just figured out that the last movie we saw in theaters was A Million Ways to Die In The West. Yeah, it's a raunchy comedy that we felt dumber after it was over, but it was still funny. I'm not going to go into great detail what we went to see, but It was nice evening. For the first time, we did the Dine-In thing where you order food there, and watch the movie. It's like cutting out the "going out before the movie" and just eating there. The food was pretty good. Mia wasn't too stoked we went out, but she had a great night with Grandma.

Sunday I worked. Nothing too exciting. When I came home, Mia was asleep. Jill said she fell asleep sitting up watching Cinderella at 8:30pm. WOW. Okay, that's all for now. Thanks for reading!