Landscaping the garage

The landscapers came last week to pretty-up the new garage.


Here's our nice Japanese Hollies along the side of the garage. The little plants between are lilies - pink and yellow and red. The strip of yard between the grass and the mulch has grass seed on it to fill in over the bare dirt that was left behind after the construction.


A little harder to see these shrubs in the back. They are Cherry Laurels, which I've never had so I'm pretty excited about them. More of the lilies in between the shrubs.


This is what I'm most excited about. No more white trash fence to keep the dog in!


The other new non-white-trash barrier.


From the front you can see our new little fences. The one on the left was moved up to be flush with the front of the garage, plus it now matches the other fencing around this edge of the yard. The only part on the right that was added was from that corner post to the right of the garage going back to against the garage. So so happy I can let the dog out without checking on her multiple times.

Hopefully the driveway guys will be able to come next week to get started on that. Once the new driveway is in we get to start actually parking in the new garage!

Mother's Day gifts

As I wake Alex up yesterday morning (at almost 11am, no less), the first thing he says is a murmured "I love you Mommy" into the pillow. He then tells me that every night when he sleeps his heart grows and when he wakes up he loves me even more. Sweet boy!

And my other Mother's Day gift is of course the birthday of sweet Gracie. Eight years old today!

I love this girl!!

Softball season

Softball has started. Grace is on a team with many of her good friends, once again coached by the father of her best friend. And after only a couple weeks I can already see improvement over last year. Timing this year is a bit of a killer - all the 2nd grade girls in town practice at the same time in the same place. So Thursday nights from 6:15 to 7:40 are now filled (luckily the carpool has been activated, so I only have to be there too once every four weeks). And team practice is combined with the games on Saturdays having us up at the fields from 1:30 to 4pm. How about a couple action shots?


This year is the first year the girls' softball teams got to march in the annual Westfield Baseball (and now Softball) Season Kickoff parade. We had a lot of fun - I dropped Grace and her friend off with her coach at the starting point, then Alex and I drove down to the ending point to watch the parade come by. Poor Jim was sick as a dog and had to miss the fun. After the parade there is a street party with all sorts of inflatable slides/bounce houses/etc. and throngs of people.



Here's a tiny clip of Grace and her friends walking by in the parade. They were one of two teams that did not receive their shirts at the prior Thursday practice. So while their team name is the Jays, their signs say Rockets because we didn't know what we would be. And all the girls got their hats and shirts that morning, which explains how everyone's hats are not fitting heads very well.


Alex ended up having an awesome time because we connected there with BOTH his very best buddies. They were so excited to see each other you couldn't tell they'd just spent about 7 hours together the day before in a combination of school and playdate. My little guy who is so reluctant to do anything new told me he can't wait for the parade again next year!