checking in and catching up...

Well hello, there.  I've been thinking of blogging for weeks but just haven't.  I took a mini-break on purpose and then just never came back.  I've been trying to get a sense of what I want this blog to be and I think I've figured it out.  So I'm going to get back on track here with a pictorial update of what we've been up to since I last blogged.

The month of February was not a good one for me.  It was cold and snowy, the kids were never in school, Grace was sick and I was super busy but felt like I didn't get anything accomplished.  My friend Jamye said it best in this post.  The month started with Mark away for a nine day business trip.  Which reinforced my thought that I don't want to be a single-mom.  So I told him I'd kill him if he ever died and left me alone, to which he said 'that makes perfect sense.'.  You gotta love a man who knows when to agree with his crazy wife.

 We lost power for 36 hours during one of the storms and it was while our friends were 

visiting, here's a picture of the crew that slept by the fire.  The rest of us slept upstairs, 

and it was close to 45 degrees in the morning inside.

 Evidence of our crazy weather!  John was in shorts playing basketball while Luke was

 in his snow pants playing in the snow.

 Luke practicing the skeleton on the driveway.

 John found good use for the eternal snow on the ground.  He played snow baseball with the neighbor.

One of my best friends and her family stayed with us for a while, well actually she stayed for a whole month.  It was awesome.  Sort of like being back in college, but without all the angst and drama over boys, school and other nonsense.  We spent every night on the couch watching the Olympics and talking.  We both liked to know the outcome of the events we were watching before we saw the coverage so we would google the results and then we were able to just hang out and not really focus on the events.  It was so great to have her here and I really miss her.  Which we've decided is the sign of a great friendship! 

 We dog sat my parents dog and Grace loved having a dog in the house.  She would follow 

Sam around and then pet her.  It was adorable.

 But not nearly as adorable as John and Same.  They LOVE each other - 

this was the day they had to say goodbye...

I was able to sneak away to the beach for an overnight to recharge.  

I love, love being at the beach.  It was way too short, but super nice to get away for a little while.

I was privileged to give a talk at a local MOPS chapter.  It was actually the MOPS I attended when I first became a mom so it was fun to be back as a presenter.  My talk is called The Gift of Grace, which is where my blog title comes from.  This was the fourth time I have given this same talk and I just realized that I don't have it on my blog.  I'll have to change that soon.

This cutie turned 10 in February and got a surprise dessert from his favorite mexican restaurant.  

This cutie lost her two front teeth and couldn't look cuter if she tried...

I've put some random pictures from my phone on this post because I don't like a post without pictures and none of the pictures warranted their own post.  Plus, I just spent an hour looking at pictures instead of cleaning my house. So, in order to feel like I accomplished something today, I added pictures.