The Thing about Spring

The thing about Spring is, sometimes it actually turns back into Winter.

Which was okay this year, because it gave us a chance to build a snowman.

Of course, the thing about snowmen is that they melt--and this one did so rather quickly. When Mika saw its hat had fallen off, she carefully picked it up and placed it back on its shrunken head.

Another thing about Spring is that it is a great time to dust off one's bicycle and take it for a ride around the neighborhood.

 But you may want to park it and stop to dance with your sister if you get the urge.

Yet another thing about Spring is that it brings Easter with it. And among other wonderful things, Easter brings Easter eggs . . .

 

 

 

 

 

. . . Easter brings bunny pancakes . . .

 . . . and Easter brings Easter dresses from Grandma, too. Thank you!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here's the thing, Spring . . . we love all the beautiful things you bring.

Bracket Bribery

March Madness is here again, as well as the mad rush to fill out brackets for both girls, according to Dixon family tradition. We had their attention for the picks in the first couple of rounds, but I had to bribe Mika with some chocolate goldfish cookies to finish her bracket at the end.

 

 

 

 Ramona's champion: New Mexico State Aggies (the cowboy)

 Mika's championship teams: Michigan State Spartans vs. VCU Rams

 She showed little hesitation when selecting the goldfish on the Spartan card.

Ramona's bracket

Mika's bracket

On Friday we put on our Illini apparel for the Illinois vs. Colorado game. Our team just barely pulled off the win to move on to the next round.

 

 

Thank goodness Ramona was there to add comic relief to the tense eleven minutes during which Illinois did not score.What would Forest do without her?

Packing crew from ISU

Last week was spring break for Illinois State University, and my parents spent most of their vacation time with us in Colorado. They arrived on my mother's birthday, in time to come to my orchestra concert (Schumann 4 and Tchaikovsky 6).

The next day they entertained Ramona and Mika while Forest and I started packing our belongings for the upcoming move. The girls loved the big stack of Japanese books my parents brought them.

Ramona was able to point out all the hiragana characters she knows from the mini Japanese lessons I've tried to squeeze in with her here and there.

Playing with food coloring in the kitchen with Baachan

At church on Sunday, Ramona was eager to introduce everyone to Baachan: "This is Baachan. She's really good at origami and she does Japanese!"

That afternoon Jii and Baachan gave Ramona an early birthday present: a set of wooden Hello Kitty puzzles. She played with them every day while they were here.

 On Monday Baachan made the girls Mickey Mouse pancakes.

On Tuesday she and Ramona made paper chains, paper princesses, paper princes, paper pianos, and paper "bad guys." In the meantime, I was getting a decent amount of packing done, and Jii and Baachan did a few boxes for me also.

On Wednesday we took a break from packing and drove up to Martinez Farm in Fort Collins.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Their visit seemed quick but we managed to pack in some fun when we weren't packing moving boxes. I'm so glad they came when they did!

Mika has been asking for "Chii" and Baachan ever since they left. She has also been reading those books they brought, and just repeats "Baachan, Baachan, Baachan" in her attempt to speak Japanese.

Homeownership, Take 2

The same week I was helping to plan this event (a conference attended by about 350 women from our church) . . .

. . . we saw this house . . .

 . . . and we liked it.

After several pages of paperwork and a nearly immaculate house inspection, we are most of the way into a contract. Looks like the house may become ours.

Just to be sure, we did a final walk-through last week on Forest's birthday. We still liked it. Then we went out to Lucile's Restaurant in Fort Collins to celebrate--to celebrate the birthday and the fact that we still liked the house.

It actually felt a little bit less just "house" that last time--it maybe felt a little bit more like "home." If all goes well, said house will become all the way "home" approximately April 12.