January 2013.

Yes, I realize it's March.

Almost the end of March, to be exact.

But I love to be able to look back at these monthly posts, so I'm still going to write them, even though I should be working on school work.

I totally have my priorities straight.

As I said in the December post, we spent NYE with some friends.  Of course we were up fairly late, and then got up the next morning to head to Tampa.  Our beloved Wolverines played the Gamecocks in the Outback bowl and we bought tickets for ourselves for Christmas.  Our dear friend Roman watched the boys all day long and we couldn't have been more grateful to have a nice day to ourselves.  Unfortunately, Michigan lost.  ::womp womp::

Brian worked quite a bit that next weekend to make up for lost time.  So we laid low around the house and made our own fun.  Brian made a slide for the boys out of Brennan's boxspring and Brennan and I stayed up late watching a movie and eating pizza one night while Brian was working.  It's little things like this that I think make the best memories.

On the 9th I boarded a plane and headed back to Michigan ALL.BY.MYSELF.  It was awesome.  I had class for a few hours on Thursday, hung out with my BFF & her kidlets, had lunch with my MIL for her birthday on Friday, got a pedi with my mama, and spent time relaxing with my family by the fire.  It was the perfect little break and Daddy had a blast with the boys.

I headed back to Florida on Saturday morning.  When Brian and the boys picked me up, we stayed in Orlando and spent some time with our friends Larry & Caitlyn.  After swimming in the pool at their hotel for a bit, we headed to downtown Disney for lunch at the Rainforest Cafe.  They are wonderful friends and incredibly good with our kids, so it's always great to see them.

Mid-month was filled with enjoying the beautiful Florida-in-January weather.  The boys and I love to spend time outside and they tend to get a little angry if we don't get out for at least an hour every day.  God help me if we lived in Michigan!

On the 20th we made an impromptu trip to the beach.  Our plan was to go for a walk on the beach, but you don't actually do a whole lot of walking when you take 3 small boys to the beach.  It was fun nonetheless and I was able to snap one of my all-time-favorite photos of my 4 boys.  Unfortunately, I took it with our video camera, so it's pretty grainy.  But I love it too much to care.

 


Bri took a quick business trip at the end of that week.  It was a short 3 day trip and we stayed plenty busy so we barely noticed he was gone.  I mean, we missed him terribly.

Our 6th wedding anniversary was on the 27th.  That morning, while I was making breakfast for the boys, I noticed a big box on the counter with a towel thrown over it.  In my quest to hurry up and feed the rabid beasts and turn them back into sweet boys, I grabbed the towel and said, "What is this thing?"  Under that towel was a big giant box ... with a new camera in it.  I've been drooling over DSLRs for awhile now and hubby decided to surprise me with one.  I adore him.

We spent the day at the zoo with our boys, exploring and burning off energy.  It was fun to think about the fact that 6 years ago we had no clue what kind of beautiful chaos life had in store for us.

That night, my awesome friend Lisa watched the boys for us while we went to dinner.  Neither of us felt like doing anything fancy, so we just headed to the Cocoa Beach pier for a burger and beer kinda dinner.  It was perfect and comfortable and refreshing to spend some time with my hubby.

I spent the rest of the month (and the first week of February) stalking my boys with my new camera and taking 9287349283749234 photos of them.  So.Much.Fun.  And relaxing.  It was nice to have a little down time in January because we knew how crazy February was going to be ....