Are you Kidding Me???

It's the middle of March..... Happy Spring!!!!  We woke up to 9 INCHES of snow this morning, which resulted in the NINTH day of school cancellation so far this season.  As it stands right now, school will not get out until June 25th, unless the submitted waiver is granted.  

It's beautiful.  But beauty aside, I think we're all getting a little tired of Winter....

In addition to the massive snow dump, today also happens to be St. Patrick's Day!  And St. Patrick's Day is like Christmas at our house.  The kids wake up in the morning (gotta love the bed-head!) and can't wait to go downstairs to see what those mischievous little leprechauns did while they slept.

For starters, they covered our stairs with sparkly green clovers

Then, they made rainbows over several of the doorways

And look what those little rascals did to our sunroom!

They left the kids a note and left them each a bucket full of green and gold treats

The cutest little leprechaun in town :)

Checking out a gold "coin"...

No pinching here!

My four Lucky Charms 

(one of which was NOT happy about sitting still for a pic)

After finding green milk in the fridge, green water in all the toilets and other little surprises throughout the day, we spent the rest of the day enjoying what is (hopefully!!) our last big dump of the season......

Happy St. Paddy's Day from the Tundra of Maryland :)

#6

Lacey bug just lost her 6th tooth!  She has been saying that her tooth has been "wiggly" for a while, but alas on Thursday, while at school, it finally wiggled free! The tooth she lost was the top right tooth right next to her top middle tooth.  So, she has now lost her bottom middle two and the top middle four.  The Tooth Fairy brought her a princess journal, new toothpaste, tic-tacs, an easter egg full of jelly beans and $2.00.  Dave thought the Tooth Fairy went a little overboard for a sixth tooth, but the Tooth Fairy thinks that coming to visit little girls who get SO excited to see what she brought them in the morning is way too much fun to scale back :)

Ricardo Bidardo

My baby brother was born when I was 12 years old.  So, he has truly always been by baby brother, and thus was the receiver of many a nickname from the family and from me in particular.  But the one that has really stuck is Ricardo Bidardo.  We were so happy when they moved to North Carolina in December, we were so happy because for the first time in my adult life, I actually have an immediate family member within driving distance (although it's still a 5 hour drive!)  Anyway, the stars aligned last weekend for Ricky and his cute wife, Heather to come up for a quick visit.

We hadn't seen them since Maret's wedding 5 months ago, so it was great to see them.  They couldn't believe how much baby girl had grown since they last saw her :(

BYU Management Dinner

Okay, so apparently I can't figure out how to look directly in the camera during a Selfie, but unfortunately, this Selfie is the only pic we have of the two of us together during our night out!

Hands down, the best meal I've had all year!

                                         Yum!

                          Cathy Crittenden.  Love this woman!

                          Congratulations to Gary Crittenden!

For some reason, blogger won't let me center pics that I upload on to blogger from my phone.  Bummer.  Oh well.

Anyway..... last night was the Thirtieth Annual Gala Dinner of the BYU Management Society, Washington DC Chapter.  The Society has chapters in nearly twenty countries and forty U.S. cities, but the Washington DC Chapter is the largest in the BYU Management Society organization.  Because Dave graduated from the BYU Marriott School of Management, we try to go to this each year.  It's always a great excuse to get dressed up and have a nice kid-free night out, which always includes a reception hour with drinks and appetizers followed by a fabulous dinner.  After dinner, entertainment is provided (this year, it was Dallyn Bayles, a professional actor and singer who performed a Medley from Phantom of the Opera and Bring Him Home from Les Miserables) followed by a keynote speaker.  The first time we went, Henry B. Eyering was the keynote speaker.  We went again two years ago when Condoleezza Rice was the Distinguished Public Service Award Recipient and speaker.  Last year, we had a very fresh newborn at home, so we stayed home.  But this year, when we saw that the speaker and Distinguished Business Leader Award recipient was going to be Gary Crittenden, we immediately got tickets.  I have known the Crittendens since 1994 when I met their daughter Kelli my freshman year at BYU.  Kelli and I became best of friends that year and proceeded to be roommates until she got married to her cute hubby Jeff, who she first met in my parents' living room.  When we discovered that we had younger sisters the same age, we introduced them and they have been best friends ever since.  In fact, Maret chose Stephanie to give her toast at her wedding last October.  So, it was so nice to reconnect with them.  Such a fun night!

Monster Truck Jam

We also got to see some Motorcross bikes do some pretty sweet tricks.  We all decided that was our favorite part.

I never thought I'd say this, but I spent my Friday night...... at Monster Truck Jam!  MTJ comes to Baltimore every year and we considered taking Tanner last year, but, after just having had a brand new baby, it just didn't happen.  So, this year, we talked about it again and were considering getting tickets for just Dave and Tanner to go.  The tickets weren't too expensive, but by the time you added in the crazy high ticket fees, it was more than we wanted to spend for a MTJ that Tanner didn't even know existed.  So, we hemmed and hawed and kept sitting on it....... And then just 4 days before the event, I got an email saying that I won a family four pack of tickets to the MTJ!  Perfect!!!  So, we got a sitter for Riley and Ella and Dave and I took the "big kids" to their (and our!) first Truck Jam.