Playhouse

The property line of our backyard is not straight.  It has a strange angle in the corner.  One day this spring I said, "You know, we should just build a house front to make the fence line straight.  Then the girls would have a little play area back in that corner."  No sooner did the words leave my mouth than Steve was busy taking measurements and making drawings.  I am all "let's talk about this forever and figure out everything before we do anything" and he's all "let's get started on this immediately!"  We balance each other out....or drive each other crazy. :)  If it were up to me, we would still be looking at Pinterest playhouses.  But because I have him, the playhouse is finished!

Before

The best part is the girls helped design and build their own house.  They even shopped for hardware and picked out the white hinges and knobs.

And of course they painted!

We painted it the same colors as our real house.

 The finished product!  Hannah spent about 30 minutes picking out the perfect flowers at the store.  While we were shopping, the also fell in love with the pink flamingo.  They call it their "guard flamingo."  Olive wanted the serving ledge on the door for her fast food restaurant (Although I think it will go out of business because it only serves hamburgers and lemonade.)  Hannah wanted shutters that really worked.  Right now the inside is unfinished.  The girls want some shelves with pots and pans to use in their restaurant.  Maybe we'll had a table and chairs?  To be continued...

Kids' Flea Market

We finally went to the kids' flea market.  Every year I want to go to it and we are always out of town or something else is going on.  But this year.  This year.  We went.  And I was excited.  Yes, I am weird.  Make fun of me all you want.  I'll be at the kids' flea market buying lots of toys.  

So our local toy store set this up and kids run their booth and sell their toys or food or whatever they want.  So fun!  Armed with the experience of African Market and their birthday money, the girls cleaned up!  They were so excited to carry their purses and pay with their money.  (Also- look that outfit Olive put together)

Our bounty: Leap Frog pen and books, more books, puzzle, Little People camping set, My Little Pony rainbow house, two ponies, toy plane, and a whole box of dolls and dresses!  All for $18.  The girls LOVE their stuff.  Hannah played with the Leap Frog books non-stop for the rest of the day.  Olive is all about the little dolls.  She bought the whole box for only $3!  I can't wait until the girls are old enough to have their own booth.

Prairie Village Art Fair

Oh boy I love me some art fair.  Summer night+art+my family=awesome.  Plus we saw lots of people we knew.  It felt like Chautauqua in Chillicothe (the only festival in my small hometown).  AND we saw a water main break on the way there, which Steve thought was even better than the art. :)

bird watching

Memorial Day McWeekend

Memorial Day weekend in St. Louis with the McGuires.  Recap.  Steve used his three-day weekend to help Taco build a tree house.  Jane and I took the kids to the zoo, a park, and played in a pool and sprinklers in the backyard.  We all went to a graduation party for the McGuires' friend and the kids ate a billion marshmallows.  I won a game of Wizard for the first time ever.  #MothersMay

Tattoos and Blocks

I think this is funny because she looks so tough with her ladybug tattoo and tank top...and she is sucking her thumb.  It is hard to see, but the other hand is in her bellybutton.

Hannah showing off her block creations at a library event.

Messy Day

We have been going to monthly preschool activities at Hannah's soon-to-be kindergarten since January.  The May activity was "messy day" and Hannah has been looking forward to it since it was announced last month.  It was lots of shaving cream, water, spaghetti noodles, and bubbles.  Olive decided to get in on the action, too.

Bike Ride

Best way to spend a Sunday afternoon?  On a bike.

Girls in Trees

Cat Coloring

Our grocery store started weekly coloring contests for kids.  Although they didn't win, I think the girls' entries were very cute.  We have already entered again.  (I think eventually everyone wins.)

BTW- grocery stores are way more fun than when I was little.  Ours has carts with little cars in front for the kids to ride in.  They have signs hidden in the store and if the kids find them, they get to pick out free treats.  There are also coloring sheets and suckers for the kids while the parents are in the check-out lane.

Mother's Day

A conversation in late April when Steve was trying to put things on the calendar....

Megan:  You realize that's Mother's Day weekend so people are probably busy?

Steve:  Oh.  So what do you want to do for Mother's Day?

Megan:  I don't know.  The art museum?  Actually why stop at a day?  It should be Mother's MAY and I get a whole month.

Steve:  Ha.  That's funny.  Wait.  Is that a thing?  Mother's May?

Megan:  No.

Steve:  It sounds like a thing.  Did you just make that up?

Megan:  Yes.

And so a holiday (or should we say holimonth?) was born.

And then Steve started doing little nice things for me and posting on Facebook with #Mother'sMay.  I don't think anyone else thought it was funny at all, but we found it hilarious.  I love Steve.  And my girls.  And Mother's May.

We did end up going to the museum.  I think it is a Mother's Day tradition at this point.  But this was our first year seeing the annual giant puppet show.  It was pretty cool!

In a "tense" part of the show where there was fake fire that would hurt the animals.

The kids got to "meet" the puppets after the show.

Of course Olive was more interested in meeting the water princess who helped put out the fire.

As usual, we didn't get any good pictures of the three of us.  This was the best of the bunch.

Most looked like this:

We went to Ingredient again for dinner, just like last year.  I love the food, plus they have a neat outdoor space.  We watched the girls play for over an hour.  Wonderful way to end the day.

 Mother's Days of yore:  2013, 2012, 2011, 2010, and my very first: 2009