Along Came May

**It is the weirdest thing to be so on top of documenting my family's life through this blog and then find myself playing catch up so often. I was feeling pretty close to being back to the present this fall (still writing about our spring adventures in October) when our lives changed dramatically and my amazing daddy dies suddenly. It seems both trite and imperative now to track our memories: trite because this life fades away quickly and in its wake, taking the time to upload it and write about it on my laptop seems silly. I could be exploring with my kids or reading a great book or out in the world playing with friends and loved ones. And then again these memories and moments of life are easy to forget and fade away with time. I love having a record of it all even though it takes considerable time to create it. I no longer have a napping baby and evenings that are long and quiet with all the littles in bed. I have a preschooler who needs a lot of attention and in only gone for a handful of hours each week. And the evenings get away from me almost every night — especially because I have middle-schooler who uses my laptop for his homework and by the time he heads to bed around 9:00 pm I feel done with the day and want to unwind for 90 minutes before bed. I am going to make a real effort to carve out time for this blog but if it doesn't happen, that's ok too. 

On a particularly crazy evening (loud, hyper, disobedient, sassy kids who all complained about the dinner I'd made!) Joseph sent me out the door and off on my bike. It was just what I needed to clear my head and regroup. And it didn't hurt that my sweet family all wrote me loving notes and told me they loved me. Ahhhh — mom heaven!

Sold this enormous beauty in the pursuit of a cleaner, lighter, more minimal feel in our living room:

We ended up with this which has been a fantastic change:

 

Plus these slipper chairs we added at the end of the month. I love feeling like we have tons of options for sitting now, especially as we read scriptures or watch a movie. As much as I love the economy of a sectional, I always felt like someone was sliding into my space and we ended up so crowded!

 

Always love studio performances by my tiny dancers:

Caught the waffle truck in Herriman one morning with a bunch of our neighborhood buddies:

Cares and I had a mommy-daughter date to see Maddie's Virginia Tanner recital (on a rainy May day). We felt obligated to grab Hires shakes after and shop at Trader Joe's since we were in the neighborhood:

Bentley's last elementary school event: the 5th grade play all about who really discovered America (Bentley played Columbus but now I know he most likely wasn't the first explorer here as the Vikings probably beat him to it years and years before he made it here...Also Columbus is Italian, not Spanish!) Props to Bean for being a great actor and for fitting into his 4T pirate costume pants from 2008 :)

Glorious morning sunrise out on my bike: