Retired!

My Dad is now officially retired! After working full-time as a pharmacist for over 40 years, 36 of those years owning his own pharmacy, he has retired! He decided he was ready to sell and retire three years ago and finally closed on the pharmacy on January 2 of this year. I'm so happy for him to finally be able to be retired and do whatever he wants. Although, I guess I should say he's semi-retired because he still fills in at the pharmacy when needed. We had a lot of fun celebrating his retirement the first part of this year. My mom mad him a fun sign for the day before he closed. I met him and my mom at the office where they closed on that morning to surprise them with a sign. Stephanie had a little party for him at her house that same weekend. The new owners of the pharmacy had a small retirement dinner for him after work on his last official day of work where we invited some of his closets friends to join us. And finally, we had a "real" retirement party for him one Saturday afternoon in March and invited the whole town to come. Stephanie and I had a lot of fun planning and decorating for it. Happy Retirement Dad! I love you!

Belated Valentine

Lucy came home one day last week with a belated Valentine for Ross, Molly, and I. I just love her creativity and art abilities! :)

Finding Rocks!

I recently learned about a whole little subculture of people: People who paint, hide, and hunt for rocks! I saw a friend's post about this on Facebook and decided to check it out for myself. I think the purpose of the rock painting and hiding is to spread love, happiness, and kindness! They can be hidden anywhere...at a park, at a business, at a restaurant...really anywhere, but just has to be outside and not inside a place. There's a Facebook group called "Springfield Mo Rocks" that you can post a picture of your rock to and see how it can travel from person to person or place to place.

I kept asking the girls if they wanted to go look for rocks at the park and I don't think they really understood what I was asking because they didn't seem interested at all. We finally went one day to look for rocks and thankfully ran into a friend (the same one with the Facebook posts who also happens to be on the PTA and has a daughter in Lucy's class) and they showed us where some of their hidden rocks were. We had our first finds and they girls thought it was pretty neat! We found several more and kept a few and then rehid around the park.

I got some rocks for us to paint and later that week we painted them and had a fun time hiding our rocks at the park. It's a great way to get out and enjoy the beautiful spring weather we've been having lately. I might like it a little more than they do, but that's okay. ;)

St. Patrick's Day Fun

I like to decorate and celebrate most all holidays, even the kind of "lesser" ones. I get this form my mom. She decorated for every holiday when we were growing up and I've taken to doing that myself. The latest "lesser" holiday we celebrated was St. Patrick's Day. We had a fun time making green scrambled eggs and green pancakes for breakfast that day. The girls really loved it!

I also had to make sure and get my traditional St. Patrick's Day picture with the girls in the same position. I started this in 2015 when Molly was a baby and have taken a picture as close to this ask possible all the years since. It's fun to see how they've grown over the years!

2019

2018

2017

2016

2015

New Computer

We recently bought a new laptop. I took the picture below the night it was delivered. The girls were really excited to watch Ross take it out of the box and set it up. This scene made me chuckle, thinking back to when we got our first computer when I was a kid. It was a similar scene with Stephanie and I both watching my dad pull it out of the box, but it would have been a MUCH bigger box! Our computer was an IBM desktop computer that was huge! It was all one piece - the computer and screen were together, not separate like computers are now. It was probably in the late 80s, early 90s when we bought it, so you can imagine what I'm talking about. Fun comparisons and memories!