True Michigan spring

It was 27 degrees on Saturday morning.  We kid you not - 27 degrees.  We had been all set to go to the zoo, but decided instead to stay home and bake 12 dozen cookies for church, some for the Confirmation banquet and some for the Sunday morning coffee hour.  Sunday was beautiful, though, and today even more so.  From 27 degrees on Saturday morning we got to about 63 degrees this afternoon!  Cortney and Raspberry enjoyed a long walk in the neighborhood today (the treadmill is jealous), and then couldn't resist the hamburger when they went grocery shopping.  So for the first time this season we all enjoyed a good summer meal - grilled burgers with grilled buns, lettuce, tomato, onion, and avocado, green beans, and salad (also with all the above fixins).  We spent the evening lounging in a house with open windows, a breeze playing around us, and then retired early, the smell of the outdoors lingering in the air.  Argh, too poetic.  Let's just say it was a really nice day, and we hear that tomorrow is likely to be even better!

A quiet weekend.

Spring is beginning to return to our barren winter land.  Cortney got outside for a walk with friends Leah and Kristin last week and had such a good time that we went out together both days this weekend - even the dogs got in on the action, going out for their first walk of the new year.  But before the warmth of the weekend, we ventured into the chill of Friday night with friends Andrew and Erin for a stab at Thai food, which is somewhat new to us, and we had a great time.  Who knew curry came in three colors?  We've only ever had yellow curry, but on Friday Cortney tried red curry, and green is also an option.  What they didn't have was burnt umber...oh well.  The rest of our weekend was quiet, filled with cat sitting, lunch with Cortney's mom, potluck dinner at church, lunch with our confirmands, and a quiet Sunday night at home.  One would think we were getting chores done, but we gave those up for Lent.

Spring showers, May flowers

We didn't have a whole lot of April showers, mostly snow, so I just call them spring showers.  We did get a lot of flowers, though.  This was only our second spring in the house so it was our first try with planting tulips in the fall.  A lot of them came up, and then a lot of them fed a lot of hungry baby bunnies, so only a few made it to adulthood.  Poor tulips.
With the nice weather returning the whole family is enjoying neighborhood walks.  The dogs get really riled up whenever you mention "walk" or "cart" (Diamond's wheelchair) or "OUTside," and then all bets are off.  We should probably know better than to try and take a family photo when the kids are in their walk paraphernalia.  It took about fifty tries to get a decent one, and this is it, thanks to the "attention getting device" that we tossed towards the camera (read: a rock).