catch up, lists, and belated spring cleaning

Here is a conglomeration of some pix from the last two weeks or so.

After Zoe's surgery she was up and walking, getting into everything as usual. As you can see from the first pix, standing was no hurdle. The second pix is quite the rocker pose, thumbs up and all. The third pix is her trying to pull an ear of corn off the counter using her gimp foot as a heightening advantage. Go, go, go...

Here is a classic example of me trying to get my girls to pose---next to impossible to have both of them looking at the camera. they are wearing their cute, new dresses from Grandma Allred and eating graham crackers before church. Lily's hair is an ongoing experimental process as I have been on a hair kick and have been using her tresses as my guinea pig. Zoe is not a very good subject as anything placed in her hair is ripped out seconds or minutes later. (I probably should just cut the long, wispy pieces in front so it's not always in her eyes, but I am hoping she'll out grow this pull-out-ponytail phase just like Lily did at her age).

This past Sunday was Andrew's last day for motor school, and wouldn't you know it, he missed the final test by one mistake and thus was not allowed to be on the list as a potential motor cop for the upcoming year. He was way bummed (I was too, mainly because of all the time he put into it. Next year's school will probably be a sore point as I really don't want him to do it again)

We took Zoe in for her follow-up with the surgeon. He said the swelling on her foot is normal due to the space left by the fatty tumor that was removed. He said it was a completely benign tumor and shouldn't grow back. She is still walks very gingerly on her toes on that foot and will make a sad face when she looks at the stitches. I'm sure a lot of it's mental in how she's walking, but I'm really hoping once the stitches finally dissolve that she'll be able to take off and not look back.

One thing that has really interested Zoe since the surgery is wearing shoes. Before, it was so hard to put shoes on her because they just didn't fit right and would almost always invariably fall off. She most often just wore socks. But now that shoes fit her, she'll go to our shoe basket, find a shoe, hold it up to me and stick her foot out, waiting for me put it on. It brings a whole new meaning to shoe fetish--just like Cinderella who didn't have a shoe on one foot, but now can wear a matching pair.

Here she is standing in her shoes and sitting in the doll stroller (she was bound and determined to get inside even though she's not exactly doll-size)

And lastly, I've been SOOO enjoying my flowers. That's one thing that I'm so grateful for--the previous owners who planted gorgeous irises and roses all along the side of the house, which I get to enjoy every spring/summer. It's given me a gardening bug which I never thought would be part of my repertoire.

And speaking of repertoire, lately I've been into trying a lot of new things--expanding my horizons. I mentioned earlier the hair thing...I found a great blog (see my fave blogs) and have been getting all kinds of great ideas. That also inspired me to make my own flower clips for my girls' hair (and save a ton of money in the meantime). On top of that, my cute neighbor and friend down the street has been re-decorating her house and has really got me into it to. I guess the word re-decorate in our house is relative seeing as it was never decorated to begin with. But I've been doing my best to find some inexpensive ways to spruce up and spring clean. I've been surprised to find how much of a mood-lift it creates. I found a great little bistro table set for my front porch which is so darling, and I'm excited to have more excuses to sit outside and enjoy the early-summer weather. Hopefully now I'll have enough motivation to actually re-paint our room and finish painting the downstairs...all in good time though (and in all good money).