St. Patrick's Day, 2014

We always enjoy celebrating our part-Irish heritage with St. Patrick's Day!  Since Cassidy has become involved in the Irish Dance program, our St. Patty's Day weekend usually includes some dance festivities.  This year, we joined her dance school to march in the downtown Chicago parade, where they draw huge crowds and turn the river green each year.  It was so much fun!  Cassidy marched alongside her dance school's float with the rest of the dancers and all the parents and families marched behind.  Later that day, the girls gave a performance at our school's annual St. Pat's party in the gym.  It was a fun day full of green!  Here are some photos from the day.

 

Gavin Turns 5!

Happy Birthday to our Gavin!  5 years old!  We had so much fun celebrating his special day.  Grammy and Grandpa Brown and our cousin Jack all came over for the party.  We opened presents at our house then went out for dinner at Gavin's favorite spot, Meatheads.  The restaurant was very kind to let us bring our cake there, so we ended our meal with Gavin's special-request shark cake.  It was delicious.  Since Daddy was in Las Vegas for work that day, we got to have a second birthday celebration the day after Gavin's birthday when Daddy returned!  For that, we headed off to Chuck-e-Cheese for some birthday pizza and skee-ball fun.  Erik ran around with the kids playing games and collecting tickets to exchange for plastic trinkets - nothing better when you're 5!  And beyond this, Gavin and his best friend Will hatched a plan to have a double-birthday party with their friends from school.  The only problem is that Will's birthday is in May, not March!  So we settled on April and are looking forward to jumping the day away at Pump It Up a few weeks from now.  More to come on that last installment of Gavin's 5th birthday extravaganza.  We love you, bud!

Gavin had always wanted some wings to match Cassidy's butterfly wings, so for his birthday she gave him pteranadon wings.  A huge hit!

NOLA with the greatest friends!

I recently took the most amazing trip down to New Orleans with 2 of my best girlfriends!  Jamie, Meg and I decided to book a fun trip together (we missed our Tara who could not make it!) and we are so blessed to have such kind, generous and capable husbands who held down our respective forts back home and became stay-at-home Dads for a few days.  I had never been to New Orleans so I was very excited to not only spend a few days catching up with my great friends but to also experience a new city.

We went from Wednesday to Sunday, so we had a number of days to explore (i.e. eat/drink/shop!).  We stayed at the quaint Bourbon Orleans Hotel that sits right in the heart of the French Quarter (might as well get the full experience, we figured!).  We ate the most delicious meals at various restaurants in the area, just taking recommendations from locals and stopping in to grab a table.  We of course spent our first morning at Cafe Du Monde, ordering beignets and coffee amidst a sea of other tourists.  Those beignets were tasty though, I must say!  One afternoon, we headed to the Garden District and had lunch at the historic Commander's Palace Restaurant.  The food was amazing and we spent some time walking through the neighborhood afterwards, which was really fun.  It's a pretty, quiet area and offered such a drastic change of scene from the French Quarter where we spent the bulk of our time.  We also spent an evening living it up along Bourbon Street, taking in the scene and ordering a round of hurricanes!  It was an experience - we shared a lot of laughs as we walked through the streets.  People-watching at it's finest!

After 2 great days in New Orleans, we headed about 2 hours east towards Bay St. Louis, MS, where Meg's family has a vacation home.  We knew we'd need some R&R after a few days in New Orleans, and this adorable, tiny beach town was just perfect.  The pace is slower, the people are friendlier, and the beachfront views are so pretty!  We (once again!) ate some really delicious meals and enjoyed our days just popping into shops and chatting.  One afternoon, Meg's parents treated us to a day of bike rides along the shore!  They are friendly with the owners of the beachfront bike rental store and had it all set up for us.  We felt like kids as we rented our bikes and rode down the beach's bike path for hours one afternoon.  It was fantastic!

When Sunday arrived, it was really hard to part ways with these girls, but also great to know we'd be greeted back home with lots of hugs from the kids and exhausted husbands.  Ha ha.  And - now that Meg's headed to Luxembourg for her husband's job transfer, we're dreaming up our next girls' trip - perhaps Paris!  Ha - we'll see!

Brotherly Love

Nothing makes me happier than seeing my 2 boys embraced in a bear hug!  I'll need to keep this one handy for all the wrestling matches that are also in our future.

Daddy/Daughter Dance 2014

Erik and Cassidy got all dressed up for their own special date night!  Last weekend was the SFX Daddy Daughter Dance.  Cassidy loved her pretty corsage from Daddy and she always loves putting on a fancy dress and jewelry.  They dined on pizza and pop in the school gym and danced the night away.  Cassidy took first place in a hula-hooping contest, beating out three 8th graders (her little known talent).  They didn't come home until nearly 10pm and from all accounts, they had a blast!

Life with our little ones

Our three rascals continue to provide laughter and on a daily basis.  Some examples of life around here...

I told Cassidy I'd give her 15 minutes to clean up her room, and then I'd come check her work.  This is what I found at check-in time - Princess Ariel immersed in pencil drawing.  While the drawing was impressive, the room was untouched.  Sigh...

Our little Tyler always hamming it up

Gavin showcases super hero skills every time the camera comes out

A normal weeknight at the Brown house!