Happy 4th everyone!

Since Monday was a holiday, I’ll cover two weeks of groceries plus the June summary next Monday.

For now, we’ll look back at last week:

• We started summer golf and swimming lessons.
• We went strawberry picking.
• We went to the town carnival.

• I ordered more lighting and cabinet hardware for the new house.
• I caught up on the missing March Monday posts (apparently I missed a few weeks of pictures so there’s not much I can do about that).
  • March 7: February Grocery Review
  • March 28: Grocery Update
• I did a paint walk through for the new house.
• We BBQed three times over the holiday weekend:
  • Friday: hot dogs, chips, potato salad, strawberries
  • Saturday: chicken, baked beans, corn on the cob, biscuits, salad
  • Monday: steak, pan fried potatoes, creamed spinach, veggies

The moving date is closing in on us so, with school / sports largely done, things are pivoting in that direction.

• We attended one birthday (fairy garden) party and one end-of-year party.
• The last day of elementary school occurred, which resulted in the inevitable onslaught of paper.  Normally I just deal with this in September, but not wanting to move it I’m about 75% through sorting keep from recycle.
• I made it to a monthly twins meeting for the first time since December.  It was nice to see folks again.
• We went to the pool.  I still have one water unfriendly child but he’s not water unsafe, just water averse.
• After some hiccups, we finalized the kitchen counters and bathroom lighting fixtures.
• The house is moving along with retaining walls starting to appear.

• I packed 6 boxes.
• I sorted many things for Goodwill/recycling/trash.
• I updated the grocery postings for February.  I have the pictures and receipts so I’m going to go back and fill in just the Mondays that I missed as it is a good record for me and seems to be popular reading.
  • Feb 15: Grocery Update
  • Feb 22: Grocery Update
  • Feb 29: Grocery Update

As we sat through our third preschool graduation – middle one or first of the second batch depending on how you look at it – I realized that we’d have 5th grade graduation next year.  What I didn’t quite realize initially is that we’ll be going to at least one graduation for the next 7 years in a row.  At that point, assuming everyone stays on track, we’ll have one year off (1st, 4th, 6th, 9th, and 11th) followed by 8 more consecutive years of graduations.  Then there’s another single year off before more graduations; but, things do taper off at that point!

Eventful week last week.

• We had preschool graduation and the last day of preschool.
• We attended an end of the year party for the younger preschooler.
• The older three went to a Red Sox game.
• Our oldest had his last baseball game of the season.  They lost, but since it was the playoffs pretty much everyone lost their last game.
• We had soccer & baseball end of year gatherings.
• We attended two birthday parties + one family BBQ.
• We had a playdate – I should do more of these but with the number of people involved and the bus logistics its annoyingly challenging.
• We met with the builder about landscaping.  This is still a work in progress.
• I registered our oldest for summer baseball + the older three for summer golf lessons.
• I took all the boys to the strawberry festival.

We are closing in on summer!

• The swimming pool is open.  Baseball is done for three of four kids (playoffs run one more week for our oldest).  Soccer is done.
• We went for Kindergarten visiting day.
• We attended two birthday parties.
• We selected garage doors and carpet for the new house.

Most of all we’ve enjoyed the distinctly fall-like weather.  It’s been sunny, but windy and hardly out of the 60s.

It’s been quite a while since I wrote one of these posts – January to be precise.  And, there haven’t been many big events in the past two weeks.  So, I’m going to take the opportunity to catch everyone up on the past.

February was a busy month.  While the boys don’t do many winter activities, we were still in new baby mode, we were prepping to put our house on the market in March, and decisions on for the new house were just getting underway.

• To kick up the cleaning out process, I sold a few items on a local online sale site.
• We had the contractors back to touch up some exterior paint since we had a very mild winter.
• The older boys finished up their ski lessons.
• Winter soccer finished.
• Winter baseball lessons started.
• The old house on our new lot came down.  (It was chock full of lead and asbestos, among other problems.)

• We attended a preschool family breakfast and the 2nd grade concert on the same day.
• We made two trips to the showroom to select appliances, plumbing fixtures, and lighting.  Only the appliances had to be finalized this early, but its easier to make fewer trips so we made many of the other decisions at the same time.
• Two boys went to the Bruins-Penguins game.  The other two had been in December.

Altogether a nice mix of things.