Two + Two = Us

This month was, well, unexpectedly quite crazy. It didn't start off that way, though. In fact, the monthly letter touted a low-key month - the first month of 2019 where we didn't have a trip planned - with the only "big" things being Easter and a family movie outing. Sounds beautifully serene, right? Ha! In retrospect, I should have known better - this family does not do "low-key" very well....but the promises of memories made definitely came through!

This month was a month of festivals and egg hunts. We made it to our first Franklin Art Crawl of 2019, and it was hands-down one of our favorites. The kids had a blast chatting with local artists and magicians, listening to awesome live music, and eating all.of.the.snacks. We even won some art at a silent auction to benefit the Make-a-Wish Foundation because the kids wanted the Disney painting to put up as a reminder of their Disney Cruise.

One of the salons had hair glitter! L was thrilled, while X was enjoying the snacks. Ha!

I love how the artists take time to talk to the kids!

Watching the kids play the violins as inspiration for their own musical journey

We won art at the silent auction!

We also ventured to a few special events in our town this month - we rode our bikes about 6 miles to two different family events, an Arbor Day celebration and a Fun Day at the Y - and the next weekend went to the Brentwood 50th Birthday Parade.

Justin also took the kids to our church egg hunt, as well.

Since we became Cheekwood members again this year, we decided that we would attempt the Spring Art Hop Easter event rain or shine. Luckily, it didn't rain but the mud and icky forecast drew others away, so we had the place almost to ourselves and the kids scored big with crafts, live music, and more Easter Eggs than their baskets could carry!

Easter at home was a small event this year - of course, we dyed our eggs and had our own Egg Hunt with the golden egg prizes - but with Justin working this year, we decided to just have a small feast at home for dinner when he came home.

I really love this picture - how X is hard at work, and how L is patiently waiting her turn while reading her book.

Making an Easter Basket cake with the grandparents

Easter Basket Goodies!

We forgot to get family pics in our Easter Best, so we stopped by Walgreens to get one with Daddy at work.

Xavier was so sad that he didn't find the Golden Egg at our home egg hunt...

...but big sis shared her findings. Love her sweet heart!

We went on an afternoon hike at Radnor to enjoy the beautiful Easter Sunday!

We also spent some time in service to others as we volunteered with friends at the Dismas House. Xavier had been wanting to go back for a while, and he picked who he wanted to join us, and we made it possible thanks to his big heart!

Ah, and then the crazy came. We knew we were going to do some renovations at the end of April - putting in hardwood floors in the entire upstairs where all of the bedrooms are. Our contractor promised us that while they would work for about a week, we wouldn't be displaced until the last weekend. Sounds great, right? Justin and I had planned a short camping weekend as a special (and inexpensive!) treat for the kids. Well, the workers came and tried to move every.single.thing the first day they came! Luckily I was able to bargain with them to get us one more night in our bedrooms, but we did end up displaced - not just for a weekend, but for over a week! We scrambled to pack everything up and find a not-so-expensive-yet-not-so-shady hotel (we did have some very generous friends offer to put us up, but please - nobody really wants a family of four crazies living with them, haha). We resigned to hotel hopping because last-minute prices for hotels the weekend of big events in Nashville (the NFL draft, marathon, Main Street Festival, to name a few) was through.the.roof.

Even though we were going crazy with this "staycation" we did our best to make it fun for the kids. Even though we still had school and work, we made it a point to go to the pool as often as we could and enjoy the hot breakfasts in the mornings and the warm cookies in the lobby each afternoon. I must admit, I also enjoyed the benefits of daily maid and towel service, too. Haha. We even were able to finagle staying in the same hotel the whole week instead of picking up and moving like we had originally thought. It was an adventure, for sure, but the kids were such troopers and we made it work.

And, look, our hardwood floors look amazing!

The end of April also was a busy one with the KidsRock Marathon and Lola's birthday celebration to cap off the month. Throw in a family trip to the zoo where we somehow got lucky enough to go behind the scenes to feed the tapirs for World Tapir Day and a postponed Easter Egg Dive in the mix, as well!