Gram, Pop and Holly March 2010

I am several weeks behind in posting this but in no way does that mean this post is not special...I am way behind on everything due to Mei Mei being hung up with a pesky ear infection, her painful teething and her bad case of roseola:( Poor buggy:) But my biggest excuse is that I thew my back out, 1+ weeks ago, which meant that I couldn't sit at the computer long enough to blog about anything. I never really understood what "throwing your back out" meant until it happened to me.

I was working out with Sandy (my lovely, amazing, muscly trainer of 5+ years) and Courtnay (my partner in the "fight to stay fit" for over 5 years) when I was hopping side to side between 2 Bosu balls and suddenly felt the "seize" of my mid-back. The pain wasn't immediately all that bad...it was the minutes/hours afterwards that things went from a 5 pain level to a 10 and it would be several days later before I could get out of bed myself or lift the kids. I went to several Chiropractic appointments (which really helped) and to see an Orthopedist. The experts said it was "in spasm" and will return to normal on it's own...and it is...slowly:)

So back to Gram and Pop's visit! They came to visit a couple weeks before Easter to hang out with the kids. It was so cool that we were able to enjoys both of them in the same trip. Gram and Pop have been divorced for years:) and ironically both asked to come the same Sunday and stay through the same Wednesday. I said "of course!" and I should have kept their joint visit a surprise but I didn't think about it fast enough:) They were thrilled to enjoy their grandchildren together I think. Funny enough the Tuesday they were here together would have been their 36th anniversary. Ha!

Tweet bugs and Gram were joined at the hip from day one. Gram even taught Stell to bark like a dog (Holly would demonstrate and Mei would mimic)

Gram taught Aston how to play "Red Light Green Light" and "Mother May I?". Here he is following her direction in "Mother May I?". He had to ask permission to take giant steps, frog jumps, baby steps, or umbrella steps (twirl around in forward motion)...he probably made her play this with him 12+ times in the 3 days she was here

Holly and Mei became fast friends. Holly loves Mei because she's gentle with her unlike Mr. A:) and Mei loves Holly because she's a dog and Mei LOVES dogs/animals of all kinds (except cats apparently...she was all kinds of scared of the Willette cats when we went to visit Baby Eve the other day)

Gram brought Easter presents...some new "hop into bed" pjs for Mei...

And a new lavender scented yellow lab stuff doggy...which as you can see Mei loves to snuggle with it:)

Mei snuck out the back door when no one was watching and she was all proud of her sneakiness:)

Aston is saying "look Mei has a flat tire!". Her wheel was stuck (not turning):) He insisted we bring it in and have the pit crew fix it for her:)

I love this one because Holly insisted on being included...

BB and Babs came over on Sunday night and brought some sauerbraten that BB made...scrumptious as always

Mei finally brought her car into see Aston the Mechanic. He found the problem plaguing her wheel. It was a pesky twig wedged in the axel:)

Eat your heart out Camilio:) Stell frequently does this stance on the green because she doesn't like how prickly the faux grass feels. She does her best to keep as many limbs off the surface as possible and sometimes it looks like the Camilio Villegas spiderman pose:)

I think she has a leg up on him though, literally:)

Oh and Gram insisted we have a dry run Easter egg hunt. So we put together a dozen eggs and spread them throughout the kitchen area. It was a perfect afternoon activity. Pop videoed all 13 minutes of the hunt:) Picasa wouldn't let me embed the video so...if you have lots of free minutes...Click here to watch the egg hunt video.