Saturday, the girls and I had a fun morning at the nail salon. 

Our adventure was the result of three things.

1.Meredith enduring 10 days of twice a day amoxicillan... with a smile 

2.  Maddie catching up on a MASS of  monster math assignment.

AND

3.  Marky achieving an outstanding 3rd quarter report card.

The little girls decided to get their toes painted

and Marky chose to get her fingernails done.  

I tell you what...

I have never seen 3 little girls more relaxed, more in heaven, more delighted to be pampered.    

They had earned every stroke of the brush, every toe massaged, every relaxed sigh

 and WOW were they loving it!.

Meredith called the lady who was taking care of her, her "artist". 

And boy, this woman painted a MASTERPIECE on Meredith's TOENAILS, for goodness sakes!

This masterpiece was something amazing... so amazing, that Meredith came home from school yesterday exclaiming that she shared her toes at school.  At first, I didn't know what she was telling me, but after some further explanation, I realized that rather than BRINGING something from home to share with the class during sharing time at school, my sweet daughter bared her toes for all of her classmates to see.  Took her tennies and her socks off and did a big reveal.  I can just imagine it.  

What a joy it was to be with my girls

on a Saturday morning.

These moments are the precious, privileged ones 

that being the mama of 3 daughters affords me. 

While they were getting their hands and feet pampered,

my heart felt wrapped up in it's own luxury - the luxury of knowing that

there are many, many more of these experiences to come. 

If you give a boy a nice spring day...

He will want some water to go with it.

And if you give him some water, he will make a muddy lake in the garden

 and he will need to put his "gardening boots" on.

And if you give him some muddy gardning boots, he will need to get 

some dinosaurs and crocodiles to play with him in his muddy lake.

And if his dinosaurs and crocodiles can splash around in the muddy lake, 

he will be a very happy boy, on a warm spring day!

we need each other

http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=4696315n&tag=related;photovideo

Rest

Meredith is home from school with a fever and a very sore throat today. 

Her demeanor has pinballed between pathetic (before Advil) to "I'm feeling great!" (after Advil) all day long.

Michael isn't sure if he has a playmate or an adversary at home with him.

A little bit ago, I announced that they were both looking tired

 so we were going to lay down for naps.

That was then...

I heard cries of

"But I'm not tired!!" and

"I'll never be able to go to sleep!" 

And

this is now

And here is how much time had passed

I have a snoring, little girlie on the couch
and a twitchy, sweet boy next to me on my bed.

They were both so tired, they never knew what hit them in those 2 minutes.

Score one for the Mama
Smile.

One of my favorite times of the year is when the calendar turns to March.  It means that January and February are behind us, and that the best of the year is comin' round those mountains.  This weekend we talked about vacations and camping and swimming at the pool; I looked through a seed catalog; Patrick made mention of starting to plan his veggie garden.  We are an outdoor kind of family.  That is why I love it when our sweet state of Colorado shows kindness to my winter heart and floods it with hopeful, March sunshine.  Even right now, all of the kids are outside jumping on the tramp soaking up every last ray they can until the sun says goodnight.  It's been a happy kind of day; the kind of day that makes you think you can do anything.  March 1st - An over the rainbow sort of day.   I washed all of the curtains to get the winter dust off.  They smell fresher and look brighter.    The joy of today's calendar flip is not lost on us. Happy March to all!!