decisions, decisions...

A few minutes ago I was sitting at the counter filling out Kindergarten-Roundup packets... Seriously, Ryder will be a kindergartner next year??? Time flies...
Anyway, where to send Ryder to school has been such a tough decision. Since I work for all meeker county schools, I can honestly say that I think they are all great! Living in Darwin, we are actually in Litchfield's district, but after much thought, we've decided to send our little man to Dassel Elementary. It just made more sense for many reasons including transportation. With Max working in Dassel, and with my job taking me all over sometimes, it's just more practical. I've had the opportunity to get to know the elementary principal and social worker at Dassel through my job, and I must say that I feel we've made the right decision! It's such a welcoming and happy environment (hopefully all elementary schools are!) and I know Ryder is going to LOVE kindergarten. I'm probably more excited than he is though :)

Now that we've made one tough decisions, it's freed up some time for us to start focusing on the rest of the decisions we've been pondering.... For one, we've decided to (hopefully) finally put on the deck that we've been waiting for! We had our friend Andy come out and do measurements, we've been trying to figure out exactly what our 'wish list' consists of, and filling out lots and lots of paperwork to make it all happen! We are all so excited for this and I know we will use it a TON. I'm sooooo ready for outside projects: the deck, more landscaping, gardening, adding a sandbox to Ryder's swingset, etc. Love it...
Other decisions we are playing around with are just trying to figure out what is best for our family structure. Right now, I work. Generally, I enjoy working outside of home, and I'm fortunate enough to work with some pretty awesome people, but my job is not always enjoyable. Actually, it adds a lot of stress to my life sometimes, and that stress affects our family in many ways. Next year is very up in the air for us. For financial reasons, I would love to continue to work, maybe even just 3 days a week, but at the same time, I feel like I am missing out on alot and Piper is already growing up so fast! She very well could be our last baby (at least for a long time!) so I want to enjoy every. single. moment. with her :) On the flip side, I also have this image in my mind of my husband barely walking in the door from work before I hand him the kids because I simply can not deal with them anymore after being 'stuck at home' with them all day. Don't get me wrong. I like being home, but the problem with me being home all day is that I feel like my house needs to be spotless every second that I'm in it. I love a clean house, and I feel crazy when it's messy. It's crazy how much i enjoy the hour at night after the kids are sleeping that I have a clean house and a candle burning. Even though I know it will be messy by 7am the next morning and will be a disaster by the time I leave for work, it still makes me happy. My other issue with staying home is that I went to college for a reason. Stressful or not, I have a passion for the kind of work that I do, and even if I took some time off now, I can't really imagine never wanting to work again -- and who knows when I will find work again? Ahhhhh can you sense my dilema with this topic?? We honestly can't come up with an answer... Luckily, we have a while to figure it out and I know that the answer will come to us... Enough for tonight! Busy weekend ahead including birthday parties and basketball games with family- love it :)

...it's the little things

By 7:30 this morning, my Valentine’s day was complete. A recap of my morning:


7am- I am getting ready in my bathroom when Ryder walks in, says “Happy Valentine’s Day, Mommy” and gives me a big sleepy hug. I then took him into the kitchen and let him open his Valentine’s card and his little treats/book, etc… He was happy with his goodies and then went on his merry way to brush his teeth and get dressed for the day. By 7:20, Ryder was still downstairs and hadn’t had breakfast yet. Frustrated at the fact that he was taking so long downstairs, I yelled down to him telling him to hurry up and that we were going to be late. (This is nothing new, our mornings are typically a little hectic trying to get everyone out the door, and we usually are late, no matter what). A minute later, Ryder comes upstairs and says, “Sorry it took so long mom, I just wanted to make you a special Valentine’s day card” and presented me with a blue sheet of construction paper that he had found downstairs. As he brought it to me, I realized he drew (in pencil) a picture of our family. He then “read” us the card- “Dear Mommy and Max, I love you soooooo much. And I love doing stuff with you. Happy Valentine’s day. Love, Ryder”

Honestly, it doesn’t get any better than that. And yes, I cried at work this morning just thinking about it. :)

As for P, she expressed her love by screeching and squealing in delight (her new favorite thing) all morning and giving me and daddy lots of smiles.