The Hanson Crew

I took the kids to a Royals game last night with a good friend from high school who was here for work. They had a great time and loved the food the best...it was $1 night, which was awesome! I hadn't seen Lisa for a few years and it was a lot of fun catching up! Here are some pictures from the evening...

A couple weeks ago, we planted 3 new trees in our backyard. We pulled up an old slanted tree and a big bush first, then found spots for the new ones. Here is the bigger one and the one we are most excited about - a Red Autumn Blazing Maple tree... We found some Willow trees clearanced for $7.50 while we were looking for the maple tree and grabbed those too...These are our 2 new willow trees. We might put a swing set in the middle of them one day... Today we hung our new bird feeders too. We haven't painted them yet with a stain, but went ahead and found their new locations...each child is standing by their new bird feeder... We also got a new lawn mower when we got the trees...which is very exciting! It is a push mower, but is self propelled. We have lots of hills in the front yard and now it is a breeze to walk up the hills with the new one. We are hoping the new lawn guy can help the grass look better too - we had out first Spring treatment the other day. We have little g

For school to end...8 official school days for Ashlyn and Joshua (only counting MWF days). We still have 6 homeschool days too. The last day is May 14th For preschool for Caleb - 12 school days left (only counting MWF too!) And then he begins summer school with Mrs. Lisa (along with Joshua) 6 more hours of 24!!!!! (1 hour tonight, 3 more Mondays and then 1 2-hour season finale (May 24th)...and yes, this is the end of 24 as we know it - at least on TV - next up, 24 at the movie theatre :) A big family wedding - 46 days away...I am the maid of honor, Ashlyn is the flower girl and all 3 boys are ring bearers...we are excited for the day as well as the time with Carol, Chris and Rylee before they move back to the Philippines in August. Some exciting visitors in June - my dad and stepmom are visiting in late June - it has been a couple years since we saw them, we are all very excited!!

Our entire crew had a pretty productive, yet relaxing Sat. We started the day by sleeping in and then heading off to Lowe's for our 2nd Kids clinic. John joined us this time and it was a little easier. We made these bird feeders... We then ventured to some neighborhood garage sales - our neighborhood and 2 other big ones close by. We found a few things for a great deal and then drove around a lake near our house...it was kinda fun. We ended the morning excitement by touring a couple nice homes in the Parade of Homes...it ends this weekend. It's so fun to do this if you ever have time...great decorating/paint/landscaping ideas as well as a fun way to spend a raining day - for FREE. Here are a few more pictures from our Lowe's clinic...I remembered my camera this time!

So we took the two older kids yesterday for eye exams after we found out we have a new vision benefit on our insurance card. When we took Caleb a few weeks ago we found we only have to pay $20 for eye exams! This is exciting since we usually pay $60. So off we went... They are both very slightly far sighted, which they might out grow with age. They see 20/20. So no glasses! And no more eye exams for 2 or 3 years. It was hard to see how much the dilation affected Ashlyn . She almost threw up and got really dizzy. She had to stop in the middle of the exam for a drink of water and to breathe deeply. She swears the eye doctor is way worse than the dentist. And this coming from a girl who has had a root canal and 15 cavities filled! I wish I had my camera when we left. Here is a visual for what I saw: All four kids wearing the paper glasses walking out of the sliding glass doors to pouring rain. Ashlyn was walking as though she was drunk and mumbling something under her breat

When I was a baby, my parents baptized me in a Catholic church. I am not sure which one of them were Catholic because I don't ever remember going to church, but either way I was baptized. And so I had Godparents. But, I never really knew them and my parents divorced when I was 4. So I never had the opportunity to really know either one of them. I met up with my Godfather when I was on my own and about 18. It was neat to have met him and start to keep in contact via letters and phone calls. He actually helped me find my dad too then, which I am forever grateful for. This past week, he came to Kansas City to visit his new wife's daughter. And we got to meet in person! It was a very neat and sweet reunion. Here is our picture at the restaurant we met up at... I also got to meet his new wife and her granddaughter. The granddaughter and Jonathan hit it off right away (see the picture below - they wouldn't stop holding hands!) It was very cute! Too bad my children act

Here is Ashlyn trying out her new pole she got with some Christmas money in Dec. Here she is waiting to catch something And the boys cheering her on...waiting for their poles to get fixed (they got new poles too, but their mom can't seem to figure them out)

This weekend was the Maids National Meeting in Omaha. Usually the kids and I go up with John and hang out at the hotel, visit the zoo, and swim, but we opted out this year for a variety of reasons. John called last night to tell us some exciting news! Our franchise won "Franchise of the Year," which is a huge honor. It is always a surprise also and I think they were pretty surprised they won. There are more than 100 Maids franchises in the USA and Canada, and our Kansas City one was awarded it :) And right after their big "Best Quality of the Year" award too. We wished we would have been there now. Everyone pictured above keeps the business growing and have done an excellent job. We are very proud of them all and this big honor. Congrats KC Maids!!

The kids and I attended our first Lowe's "Build and Grow" Saturday clinic today. We were SO impressed! You register online before you go and it's all free. The kids each got an apron w/ a name tag, a pair of goggles and a seed planter kit. They used children size hammers and nailed all the pieces of wood together to make the neat planter. When they finished, they received a certificate (we are going to hang these in the garage), a reusable bag, and a patch for the class that they can put on their aprons. Each Sat they have a class and we hope to get more patches for out fun Lowe's aprons! They were all so very excited about the whole experience, which lasted about 40 minutes! Here are the boys posing with their proud work. We planted some Marigolds after the picture and are excited to watch it grown through the glass. We are also registered for the next class...a bird feeder!

Have sprouted for me to enjoy while I wash the dishes. We made them last weekend at our Parents As Teachers Spring Fling. They grew pretty fast!

of the movie or maybe just too tired!

On Sat afternoon, Ashlyn and I discovered a Free Iron table sitting in front of a house down the street. It had a "Free" sign on it and was about 2 blocks away. We sent the boys in the house and took out the car seats and drove back a little excited to pick it up. When we got there, we discovered it didn't fit in the back of our Journey. So our adventure began... We turned the table on it's side and began rolling it down the hill in the street. We talked about hair and tennis as we walked. We got about 3 or 4 funny looks while we rolled it to our house. We even were offered a wheel barrow from a nice neighbor on the corner. Once we got it home, we walked back up the hill and picked up our car. It was a little funny. Then we went to Lowe's and bought some primer and brown spray paint. After a few hours, it looked as good as new. We pulled out a new umbrella we had bought on clearance at Target in November ($3.48) and some old green lawn chairs from the g

We spent Sat morning attending our PAT Spring Fling. The kids made lots of crafts, played some games, and saw some cool vehicles...we then went to take our church directory pictures and ate QT hot dogs at Penguin Park. It was such a nice afternoon...we even found time to plant some new trees in our backyard...I'll post some more pics of our afternoon later today.

Walgreens is doing a special today where you get a free 8 x 10 print (use code: BIG8X10) We took the opportunity to update some frames in Ashlyn's room. This one was one of the updates we made.

Jonathan has really fallen in love...the kind of love that has a theme song! He walks around humming the theme song and always carries his green light saber everywhere. Today, the green light saber was a Green Crayola marker. Yesterday, it was a blue pen. He protects his mommy when he comes out of the car by pointing the green light saber at anything that moves while humming his theme song...it is awfully sweet. I need to record him soon and share it. He probably knows more of the character names than me now. All he wants for his birthday is a REAL green light saber (oh, and a yoda cake)....we'll keep you posted...

After much prayer, discussion with teachers, friends, other FCA parents, and speech pathologists, we have finally come to our K decision with Caleb. We pulled his spot yesterday at FCA , the private school we use for Ashlyn and Joshua. They offer a half day K, MWF , and a T/TH homeschool curriculum that is a little more phonetically demanding than most K schools. Here is why we have chosen public, full day Kindergarten: He is still missing too many age appropriate sounds. These will come over time with repetition and time, so one more year of on-site help will benefit him greatly Full day K will really help with his communication skills - being around more children each day and having to communicate is something that will help him tremendously He is a boy with an April birthday....many other FCA families, especially those with bigger families like us, have held back or are holding back Spring and Summer birthday boys. He will not be the only one next year not to go, which make

He had a great party and way too much fun opening presents...we followed presents with an Easter Egg Hunt, which also was a lot of fun! I still can't believe he is 5! To have 3 in school in the fall still seems unreal to me. We are so proud of who you have become Caleb and love you very much!