Egg Hunt, and FIRST BASEBALL PRACTICE!

We had a nicely full day on Saturday. Nico and I went to Grandma and Papa's house so that Grandma could explain the Printer Mystery to Nico. Nico had told us about the printer randomly printing pages during Grandma Camp, so Nico texted Grandma on Friday to ask her if she had figured it out yet, he seemed a bit worried about it, so she decided to spill the beans! When we visited them on Satuday, Grandma told him to check the printer. He checked it and found a paper that had been printed on! They read it and then she sent him back to the printer to see if there was anything else. YES there was another paper! (Which Papa had secretly snuck in there). Grandma and Papa worked together like this until about 10 papers had been revealed, each one telling a piece of the Printer Mystery story. View the video at the end of this entry to read through the papers and discover the mystery!

From there, we drove to Timberline High School, where our church was putting on a Glow-in-the-Dark Easter Egg Hunt. Guy was working the sound, and I was set to work at the Face Painting table. We helped set up and then people slowly started to arrive. I realized after a time that between me and Guy, there was no one to watch Nico. It wasn't a big deal when it was just our church there setting up, he could run around the huge field and everyone knew him. But as thousands of people started arriving, I realized I may need to figure this out. The line for face painting was long and I had no visual of the field. Nico would run over every once in a while for water, which made me happy. I told him to keep checking in and then prayed that God would take care of him. The next time he checked in, he had Lexie with him!  The next time after that he told me he was going to be with Jonny and Alanna and Lexie. I looked up and Jonny was waving at me. HUGE SIGH OF RELIEF. The crowd was really packed now. I didn't know they were going to be there, but I am so grateful they were!

The face painting line went to ZERO as soon as Pastor Tim got on the mic and started preparing everyone for the countdown. We started cleaning up and I was able to catch a video of the countdown and field rush. (check out video at end of entry)

Thank you to Alanna for taking these pictures!! They estimated 4,000-6,500 people showed up!

Sunday was a relaxing day. We decided to have pizza that night since we weren't able to on Saturday. It was Nico's turn to choose the show, and he chose Garfield.

Monday came along and it was back to school for Nico!

Tuesday was an interesting day! In the morning Nico lifted his shirt up and asked me why there was a painful lump on his stomach right above his belly button. It was about the size of peanut and painful to the touch. I calmly said we would go to a doctor that day to figure it out. I called the office at the stroke of 8, and got Nico in at 9:30. The doc said it wasn't a hernia, but was definitely a lump, she could move it around with her finger (ouch!). The next step would be an ultrasound to determine whether it was "vascular" or just an easily removable cyst. I didn't know what vascular meant, when I asked her she said that if it was vascular it meant that the lump had blood vessels involved with it and it would be harder to remove and could possibly continue growing. The outcome we should hope for would be the cyst. They could them remove it right in their office instead of doing surgery at the hospital. She told me the imaging center would call soon to schedule the ultrasound.

I dropped Nico off at school and then called up my prayer team. My mom and Guy's mom, then texted Aunt Mary and Ellen Gray. I did this from the school parking lot. When I was done, I started driving home. As I was turning onto our street my phone rang. I thought it was the ultrasound place to schedule the appointment but instead it was the doctor's office. She said she consulted with Dr Eck (the main doctor at the office) and he said it sounded like a "liquefied hematoma", which is much less scary and much more common (especially in active children). I don't know much about it, but I understand it to be like an internal bruise where blood is collected in a spot and can produce a lump. The fact that it was very painful was a good sign. She told me to watch it over the next few days and if it became less painful and the slight bruising started turning yellow, that means it's healing and it's not a cyst or other kind of lump. PHEW.

I gave all my prayer team the update. Apparently they're goooood at what they do! I didn't even have time to worry about it before it was resolved. I went back to Nico's school to tell him the news. The doctor had told him all about ultrasounds and said "It might hurt because they'll have to press the spot, BUT, there won't be any needles!" So I'm sure he was relieved at the news.

On Wednesday morning he woke up and I asked him how it felt. Still painful but not as bad... and look it's starting to turn yellow!

I learned that my cousin Rick (Aunt Mary's son) and my Uncle Jerry both had similar lumps like this when they were younger, and they both went away! Not sure if they were the same thing, but it was still reassuring to hear stories of disappearing lumps :)

Wednesday was Nico's first baseball practice. The doc had given us the OK to continue normal physical activity, since it wasn't a hernia. Nico got to wear his new cleats and made sure that I brought the towel that Dick's Sporting Goods gave him, "in case I sweat!" Hehe.

We found the practice field, and once practice started his team huddled up. The coach talked about the 3 things to remember about baseball:
1 - Have Fun
2 - Work Hard
3 - ?

Hmmm.... Oh well.

The coach showed them how to hold the ball, and they practiced the "creeper stance", while you're in the outfield waiting for the batter to hit the ball.

Video down below with more baseball stuff!

Tonight we had Evelyn over for dinner even though her family was home. Avery felt a little bad about it, I'll have to figure out a way to make it up to him. We had mandarin chicken and fried rice. I don't think I could ever make those two dishes again at the same time. If Guy wouldn't have been home early tonight I would have ruined both dishes!! It requires two people and a few more burners, and a few more dishes.

BUT,  it was REALLY tasty and everyone loved it. In the future I could probably make the rice ahead of time so I won't be doing both dishes at once.

Afterwards they did some rough housing. One of their favorite things to do.

Without further ado... Video!

Garage sale, Kestrel

One night before bed, Nico asked Alexa to play his favorite lullaby which is called Australian Lullaby. We started talking about playing the song on the piano and I asked him if he wanted to learn how to play the piano and he said Yes so I started talking about it and after I was done I hear this almost silent whine come from Nico. I look over at him in his bed and he has this sad look on his face and I ask him what's wrong. He says, "I don't WANT to learn how to play the piano."

Wow! The first thing Nico has declared he doesn't want to do. And I am A-ok with that! I really just want to give him opportunities to pursue the things he wants to pursue. If it's not piano, then OK!

Last Friday, the entire new season of MST3K was released on Netflix and Guy took the day off to watch them. I watched some with him, but some of the day was spent getting ready for the yard sale which we had on Saturday!

We had everything priced in boxes, so Saturday morning we moved boxes and tables and then just unloaded all the boxes onto the tables. This was actually a bit more work than I was expecting, but we had it pretty much unloaded by the time 9AM rolled around. Papa came that morning to drop off some moving boxes to give away at the yard sale, and to help haul boxes. Thank you Papa!

Nico and Evelyn went up and down the aisle and picked out things to buy. Evelyn was purchasing stuff for her Grandma's cabin. Nico chose to buy Papa's old wallet, a cherry pitter, and an empty tin.

Relaxing in the afternoon after a hard morning of selling his toys

Nico sold a lot of his toys and was a very eager salesman. He asked people outright if they wanted to buy some of his stuff, and when one lady paused to look at his toy table he said to her: "I think your dog would like this gorilla. Do you want to buy it?" When someone tried to haggle with him and lower his price on his train set, he said "No. $10." She laughed and said he drove a hard bargain and bought it from him. He made $32 total! 

And it turns out, about an hour before the end of the garage sale, he grabbed his gorilla and said "I think I want to keep this." so he brought it inside.

We ended at 3PM. A lot of stuff sold but we still had a lot of stuff leftover, so we loaded up our car and Jeff and Allicia's van and Guy and Jeff drove a load to the Youth Ranch to donate it. On the way home they picked up Chipotle for dinner and some Izze Pops from Whole Foods. We ate our dinner on the front lawn, picnic style. We were beat!

The day was sunny but it started out very cold! We were thankful for the sun.

That evening, though we were beat, Guy took Nico to the glow-in-the-dark Easter egg hunt that our church was putting on. Because it was glow-in-the-dark, it had to start late. The mini-sermon started at 8:00 and the hunt wasn't until 8:45. The church was expecting about 100 people but they had about 500. The hunt itself lasted maybe 3 minutes and some kids didn't get any eggs. Nico grabbed 3 eggs and then they sped to the car to get out of the parking lot before the rush. Nico came home and was asleep instantly.

Sunday was Easter, it was a good sermon. Then we went to pick up the eggs and milk from Papa. Grandma Salisbury was out of town visiting her mom in Moscow. Papa told us how to make egg nog with the milk and eggs, so we tried it that night. Guy liked it so he put some in his coffee! 

Since we weren't able to do pizza on Saturday night, we did it on Sunday. We started watching Star Trek: The Next Generation. Nico actually enjoyed it! Guy told us that he used to watch this with the fam while eating pizza on Saturday nights. I remember watching it with my brothers all the time and it will be a fun tradition to continue.

We played a game Easter night that we learned last time we were in Arlington. Grandma Russell sent us what we needed, a list of nursery rhymes, which we cut up and put into all the eggs we could locate which was just 4. You go around and pick an egg, and then sing/say the nursery rhyme. Then it's the next person's turn. Video link here if you'd like to see the round we did: https://goo.gl/photos/cVRu4d1ZtwjPPLVS7

Thanks Grandma Russell! :)

Yesterday was a sunny day, so I picked Nico up from school on my bike. He had his scooter, and we rode to the MK Nature Center (aka Fish Park). I wanted Nico to see the American Kestrel they have there. The greenbelt path was closed due to risk of deterioration because of the height of the river, though everyone was still using it. We rode it to the Nature Center but used a different route home. It will be hard to get around this summer on our bikes because all the paths are closed. They don't think they will get around to assessing danger until August.

Nico found a shady spot and asked if he could finish his lunch that he didn't finish at school.

We went into the lobby of the Nature Center and saw so many animals that had been stuffed. We saw some different birds, a crane, a heron, lots of different ducks, quail, even a bald eagle! All stuffed. Then we went out to meet the American Kestrel. Meet Fiona. American Kestrels are a bird of prey but they are surprisingly small! They have Fiona at the nature center because she is missing an eye. 

Nico told me his leg was hurting from pushing on the scooter, so we figured out a way for him to stand on the lowest bar of my bike right in front of me and I swung the scooter over my handle bars. We rode that way about half of the way home. It was so nice to be outside!

Nico is on Magic Treehouse book #13

We are waiting for its arrival at the library along with #14.

Until next time!

Easter

I know I'm a little behind for the Easter post, I have been waiting for a picture to be sent to me so I could post the entry with that. But the picture will have to wait for now!

Guy and Nico went up to the cabin where Nico got to play with cousins and hunt for Easter eggs. He got mostly trucks in his easter eggs and clementines. I heard that Guy rode around on Grandma Salisbury's bike, which has a toddler seat on it, and let each of the children have turns on it. I'm hoping to post a picture of Guy on the bike with Nico.

It was a beautiful day!