Happy Retirement Mom!

After many, many years of enriching the lives of our young (or not so young) my mom has retired from teaching.  She worked in the high school setting for a while, but spent the majority of her career at Ridgewater College in the Administrative Support area.  She started working part time for Ridgewater (or Hutchinson Technical College as it was known back then) in 1981, but became a full-time regular faculty member in 1987.  That's a LONG time to be teaching!!  Congrats mom on a well deserved retirement!!!  Now, what are you doing tomorrow - can you babysit?!?!?!

Mom receiving her gift from the Dean at Ridgewater during their retirement ceremony 

We surprised her at her ceremony - she knew I was coming, but didn't know Alissa and two of her friends were also coming!  So fun! 

Following there ceremony we went to Axel's in Chanhassen for a celebratory dinner - and cake! We surprised her again and a few more guests joined us for dinner.

At Axel's 

Mom with her biggest fans

The whole crew!

Big girls' day

The beginning of May, my mom, my sisters and I had a fun outing at a new trendy spot in Hutch -The Paint Factory. It's a group painting class - that serves cocktails!!!  It was so fun!  Our session was at 10 in the morning so we didn't take full advantage of the cocktail part, but I can only imaging what an afternoon session would be like!  I didn't have high hopes going into the day, but my painting actually turned out pretty decent and I may even hang on my wall!

Before we started -notice the nervousness in everyone's faces!!

Whew - step 1 done - paint the entire canvas black.  That wasn't so bad! 

 Now, for the harder parts... the flowers!  But it was actually easier than it looked.  The instructor was great and gave step-by-step instructions.  You could follow her or be creative and take your own spin on it.  All four of us followed the instructions exactly... 

Hard at work 

Ta-Da!!!  The finished product - yes, I actually painted this!  Not too shabby... 

All of us with our paintings.

Easter

Easter Fun - the Easter bunny arrived right on schedule and filled the kids' baskets plump full!!  

Will seems to be a little excited for something... 

My kids!

After we got home from church and brunch, the Easter bunny made another stop and hid some eggs!!!  So fun now that the kids are getting bigger and able to do some of these fun traditions.

Will checking out the goods in his eggs... 

Julianne with her eggs

 Patiently waiting to open the eggs

 And there they go!!! 

It was gorgeous out on Easter Sunday this year (go figure - check out my earlier post)!  We went to brunch with mom, dad and Grandma Edna and then had a relaxing afternoon at home.  A perfect way to spend Easter.

Girls night

In mid-April, we had a girls' night at the Chanhassen Dinner Theater to see The Little Mermaid.  It was Julianne's first time to the CDT and we had a great time!  I'd recommend the show to anyone!

Happy Birthday Princess J!

I can't believe that Julianne is now 5!!!!  She has grown up so much this last year.  She's such a kind and sweet big sister, but also has enough sassy and spunk to stand up for herself and be successful in life.  

I'm not much for themes at birthday parties, but this year we went all out with the Princess theme!  

Some of the kids from the party 

By far the best present of the day - her very own Frozen movie! 

It wouldn't be a princess party without the princess cupcakes! 

Will with his rainbow Jell-O and flower sandwich 

5 candles for this birthday girl! 

Happy birthday to you, 

happy birthday to you, 

happy birthday Julianne, 

happy birthday to you!

On her "real" birthday, she got a special breakfast, 

and we went to Willmar, had ice cream and got Julianne a new bike!

Only in MN

Wednesday

Sunday!

Mother Nature was pretty cruel to us this winter - but this had to have been the worst - over a foot of snow on April 16th!!  Good thing it was all melted by Sunday!

Happy Birthday Mom

Sunday, March 23, was my mom's birthday. We had my mom and dad, sisters and my nephew over for lunch.  It was a fun day with family!

Mom with her grandkids 

Mom, with Jules and I.  Notice the cake??? Proud to say - I made it!! The last time I tried to make a 2 layer cake, it didn't turn out so well, so I was very proud of this one.  Jules helped too - she put on the sprinkles. 

William thought the cake was yummy too!

Happy Birthday Mom - we wish you many more!  Love you lots!