cake and Spring Break

I can't believe I'm "this many".....this is roughly about how old I imagine my oldest sister is, and she's 10 years older than me! SOO, what does that say about how old I imagine myself to be??!? :) In case you can't tell, it's Costco cake. And, if you read my post where I raved about cake in NYC, you'll remember that I LOVE Costco cake. Thanks again, Mom & Dad, for splurging on one for me... And thanks again, Jeanine & Eileen, for making sure my b-day got celebrated in some way. This was one of the hardest/unpleasant birthdays I've ever had, although I can't actually think of another hard/unpleasant b-day at the moment, but I'm sure I've had one or two...

I DESPERATELY needed to get the heck out of dodge, so the kids & I went up to my parents' (2 hours -ish north of us) for 3 and a half days. It was unfortunate that the weather was so wet (it even snowed a couple of inches!) while we were there, but we still had a good time. A MUCH-needed change of scenery/change of pace. Here, Missy is playing some version of tennis and golf with my dad, out in the sprinkles after dinner on the 14th. I had to take a picture; that is my 2nd tennis racket from back in the day. A string is partially broke, but it still works pretty OK, considering how old it is.

Though it's hard to tell, Missy's jumping on that little trampoline in my parents' garage in this pic. Notice her hands, cheeks and nose...! Certainly didn't feel like mid-April! The kids spent a lot of time playing in there since it was raining or snowing most of the time. The boys were usually playing Cherry Bomb and A was usually on this mini-tramp.

Both of the boys--I know it's hard to see Ethan--are playing on my mom's piano. (My mom took this pic.) That's always one of the kids' favorite activities at my parents'.