With the exception of being worried sick about Nikki & Elena, this has been a really good Mommy-week for me. Keith has been in San Fran for JavaOne all week, and usually when he's gone for long periods of time I start to go crazy because the constant attention that the kids require with no breaks or help from Keith drives me crazy (and because I miss him too, of course). But this week wasn't like that. The kids were both really good, and I don't think I had any of those "PLEASE JUST GO AWAY!" moments. This is especially impressive since Corgan has 2 new teeth coming in, I took both kids to the craft store with me for a 2+ hour shopping trip, there has been lots of banging and drilling going on outside all week (right now those sounds are more like angels singing than annoying noises anyway because it means they're making progress), we went to the Zoo then lunch which ran over both of their nap times, I went grocery shopping, I did about 5 loads of laundry, and I did dishes and pseudo-cleaned the kitchen. On top of not having any breakdowns, some highlights of the week were getting my first Mother's Day crafts from my little girl (more on that later), going in a little early to pick up Annabelle from school so I got to sit on the floor with the kids and play with them for a while (Corgan is such a hit, and they love to take turns riding on my legs and stuff too), the appreciation from Belle's teacher for her Teacher Appreciation gifts, they made so much progress on the garage and addition, I got a few crafts done, we had fun at the Zoo, we had a relaxing fun time at Benjamin's 3rd birthday party (this was before Keith left, but still... the start of a good week), Corgan seems to have matured a whole month in one week (he's signing, babbling more, climbing up on things, started clapping, seems to have really developed a sense of humor, sitting himself up more, and did a crawl-step yesterday), Corgan and Annabelle seem to be really playing together now, Annabelle didn't have any potty accidents, we had a surprise visit from my Aunt Judy, Uncle Gator (no, not a UF fan), and cousin Caroline, and I even I got Mother's Day cards mailed off early enough that it didn't arrive last minute! :)
To embellish on a few of the things in the list above, for Teacher Appreciation I ended up having Annabelle make cards for her teacher and the floating teachers who have really been helpful with Annabelle during the whole potty-training thing. I drew a bunny on the front and Annabelle painted them pink (her class is called "Pink Bunnies"). Inside I wrote "Miss ___, Thank you! Love, Pink Bunny Annabelle" in crayon. I included Target gift cards in each card (her teacher even happened to mention that Target was her favorite place to shop when I said that we were going there last week, so I knew she'd like it). Belle's teacher also got a nice picture frame that fit her personality with an awesome picture of her and Annabelle in it. I don't expect her to display a picture of her and Belle in her home, but I never like to give picture frames as gifts without a personal picture in it even if the picture is only there temporarily, and I figured she can put the picture on her bulletin board at school.
The zoo was loads of fun. We signed up for a family annual pass so I'm sure we'll be going lots more. Both kids were great the whole time. And Annabelle LOVED the dinosaur exhibit (which, unfortunately, ends this weekend). Thanks to The Land Before Time, she's a big dino fan. Hope and Jesse went to the zoo as part of their playgroup and they invited us along to meet the other moms and kids. The core group is all 4 year olds, but one of the moms has a boy who will be 2 in a couple of weeks and she lives ridiculously near me AND her daughter goes to Bellee's school. Annabelle was a little shy, but she likes older kids so she still had fun trying to keep up with the 4 year olds. The moms were quite a diverse group, which I thought was really cool. We'll probably be joining them for more outings in the future.
The garage/addition is really moving along. Right now for the garage we have all of the openings formed out, the plywood is all on the roof, the tar paper is just about done, plumbing rough-in is done, and I think they had an inspection today so they can start on the paneling and finish the roof next week. The addition has the plumbing done and everything is framed out for the concrete. I assume concrete will be poured early next week. 
In the picture of the garage, you are looking at it from our front door and you'll see the 2 garage doors on the front (to the far left), the regular door and 3rd garage door (for the riding mower) on the side facing the front door, and if you look through the house you can see the holes for the 2 windows. In the "addition" picture, the open framed area on the left that wraps around to the back is the porch and the part with all of the pipes sticking out is the master suite.
This afternoon I got a call from my Aunty Judy (who had apparently called my cell yesterday but I didn't see that she called) who said that she, my Uncle Gator, and my cousin Caroline were on their way up 95 and would be passing my area in about an hour. They were down in Miami picking up Caroline from the end of her awesome Semester at Sea school-on-a-cruise-around-the-world. We met for dinner at the Cracker Barrel around the corner. I got to hear more about her trip and got to visit with the family! They live in Myrtle Beach so I don't get to see them nearly as often as I'd like. They had never met Corgan and last time they saw Belle she was younger than Corgan is now. To sweeten the deal, Aunty Judy bought Belle a huge jawbreaker lollipop on our way out which Belle proceeded to enjoy for the next 3+ hours! :)
There's more that I could write about and I'm SOOO behind on posting pictures (I have 100s from this past month that I still need to share), but I gotta sleep sometime. :) I did manage to post a couple of new albums, so head on over and check them out.
