Where does the time go?

Its been a month since I've posted and so much has happened! April was a fun and exciting month for us. Here are a few of the highlights

• On April 2nd, Adam took his 2nd trip to the urgent care for another head injury... our little daredevil decided to jump from up high and a chair fell on his head. He had 5 staples put in. No fun for anyone involved.
• On April 3rd, we joined our friends Jed and Lori and their kids (in total, we had 5 kids in tow) and drove to Kansas City for the afternoon. We participated in the "Tweed Ride" at Loose Park, near the Plaza. It was a 10 mile bike ride through beautiful neighborhoods while all dressed in turn of the century clothing... Tim donned his tweed knickers and Adam wore his bowtie. Very handsome indeed. We ate at a fantastic mexican restaurant after the ride and then headed home. It was quite a sight to see the car with 4 bikes on top barreling down the interstate!
• On April 4th, we celebrated Easter with the Browns and McMahons at the lake house. The weather cleared in the afternoon so that we could have a lengthy egg hunt in the front yard. Alexander was a bit confused, but Adam was very diligent about finding them.
• On April 15th, we celebrated Alexander Day!! Our adoption of Alex became final after a trip to the Douglas County Courthouse. We had a BBQ lunch after the event complete with burgers and a special cake.
• On April 19th, Adam started T-Ball. His first practice went very well and he has since had a couple of games. To his disappointment, there are no "winners"... all teams get on base and each player gets a turn to hit a grand slam. I hasn't stopped him from wearing his fancy baseball pants and taunting his friends on the opposing team by saying "You're goin' down!" (oh what a difficult lesson sportsmanship is).
• On April 19th, I started working part-time for Metropolitan Community College. I am assisting the Director of Event Services in planning, organizing, promoting, facilitating (or whatever else she needs) for events they hold on campus. Right now I am helping with the Great Plains Theatre Conference that will be held the end of May.
• On April 25th, we celebrated our 5th Adam Day. Five years ago that day, Adam became legally a Brown. Its our tradition to celebrate becoming a family by allowing Adam to choose a family activity to do together... we swayed him away from Chuck E. Cheese (Whew) and he decided to do a bike ride.
• On April 30th, Adam ran 1.5 miles at school in a Race for Education to help raise funds for his school. We are so proud of him! In preparation for the event, they did lots of fun things at school like crazy sock day, crazy hair day and hat day. He was very stylish with a mohawk on crazy hair day.

Springtime at the Browns

Hello?! Is anyone out there? Sorry I have been neglecting you lately. The Browns have been busy. We are LOVING the nice weather - today its 75 degrees, sunny, no wind... as soon as the boy wakes up from his nap we will grab a dog and head out for a walk or maybe to the park.

Anyway, since we chatted last, the snow has melted and we have enjoyed birthday dinners with friends, St. Patty's day parade and our first taste of corned beef and cabbage (yum), bike rides, long runs, an easter egg hunt, tuesday night LOST viewings (its the last season!), 2 more lost teeth, thrift store shopping (more on this in a later post), Adam's first soccer game, an ER visit for Adam, the Holt gala and auction (date night!), lenten dinners at church and little Mary Flynn's first birthday... the list goes on and on. Here are a few photos of the highlights.

We bought Alex a little bike. We couldn't help ourselves. Those of you who have seen our garage know that at any given time we could have up to 10 bikes... Tim found another bike on Craigs List the other day and I drew the line... he's keeping it at a friends house! Anyway, Alex isn't quite tall enough for the pedals, but it wont be long!

Enter the tooth fairy. Two more visits... one tooth on the bottom and the big tooth on top. Adam's other top tooth is very loose also. The fairy brought Adam more golden dollars and Grandpa McMahon sweetened the deal with a little treat. Adam is enjoying the process and knows that it means he's a "big kid"... Soon after this photo was taken, he demonstrated his stellar balancing skills by standing on the edge of a chair. When the chair tipped over, he collided with a door. There was a nice cut on his head and off to the ER we went. Thanks to Grandma Mary for helping us through!

St. Pius church sponsored an Easter Egg hunt for the kids. My friend Martha and I had the pleasure of hiding about 700 plastic eggs for over 110 kids. It was a lot of fun and the rain stopped just in time for the stampede of kids waiting to pick up their goods.

My good friend and excellent seamstress, Shari, converted Tim's old suit pants into biking knickers. We are going to a fun bike ride in Kansas City this weekend where we need to dress in turn of the century clothing (that explains the thrift store shopping mentioned above!). Tim is stylin' in his new knickers.

The Tooth Fairy Cometh

Adam lost his first tooth yesterday and received a bright shiny golden dollar under his pillow this morning. He wrote a note to the fairy and taped it to his tooth - just to be sure she knew what to do. She was nice and wrote a note back saying that Adam has been a very good boy. He is now working on tooth extraction #2 - the top middle- its currently hanging on for dear life and will be out in the next couple days, I predict! Our little baby is sure growing up fast.

The Puzzle

Many of you may have heard me mention our wonderful neighbors, Karol and Jenny. They live across the street and they are dear friends of ours. They have a beautiful home, free of kid messes, dog messes, and all the other messes that are commonplace around here. Its quiet, it smells good and they are always so nice to welcome me into their home when I need a calm oasis... I sometimes sneak over for a glass of wine in the evenings and to talk about the latest neighborhood gossip. In the winter, I sneak over to become a PUZZLER along with Karol and whoever else she can talk into coming over to help her. Karol loves puzzles. This particular puzzle has 2000 pieces and it was purchased by our very own Adam Brown. There is a castle in it, so there must be knights and dragons inside - or so says Adam. Anyway... here's a photo of the puzzle so far. Its been a couple weeks, and it will be a few more weeks before its completed. But, we're having fun!

Our Little Ziggy

I WISH I WERE TALLER