Wearing green!

Well some years I have done things like have the kids make sugar cookies decorated to look like Irish flags or serve beef stew and Irish soda bread for dinner, but all we did today was wear green clothes. Last year it was warm on March 17, and we were all wearing short sleeves. Although we wore short sleeves a little in February this year, we have definitely been back to warm clothes with the snow outside. It did get warmer today, and a temp of 41 actually felt balmy to us, ha ha! We're supposed to get more snow tonight, and yet in just a few days it will be spring! I haven't started the switch over yet with the kids' clothes. At some point I'll take out some of the winter clothes to make room for some short sleeve shirts, and then eventually over time we'll completely switch out to the summer clothes. Ian has finally grown tall enough to wear size 6 pants. I moved his size 5 pants to Oliver's closet this week. I was starting to get worried that both boys would be in size five pants at the same time. Whew. Nadia's only long sleeve green shirt was a Christmas shirt, so she wore a white turtleneck under a short sleeve green shirt.

Oliver was in no mood to have his picture taken when I tried to get a pic of all three kids together, so I just took one of Nadia and Ian, and then later I had the idea of asking Nadia to take a picture of Oliver and I. Although I'm not crazy about most pictures of myself, I know I need to get in the frame more often. I have a remote and tripod I've never used (oops!), and I also think I can download an app on my phone which would communicate with my camera and act as a remote as well. So I have no excuse. I must give that a whirl sometime this year. It could also come in handy for taking a family photo. We haven't had one of those taken since May 2015.

The kids were glad that they had gym class today. The kids program we planned to attend at church tonight was cancelled. We went to the library and also to Walmart. The two main things on my list were a birthday gift for a boy on Ian's basketball team (because Ian's going to his party on Sunday afternoon) and to get myself some new sunglasses because mine broke a few weeks ago.

 When I go into Walmart I usually stock up on a few food items that are cheaper there than at the grocery store such as oatmeal and sandwich crackers, but as I walked through the store we passed a few clearance racks that caught my eye, and I ended up spending a lot more money than I planned by buying my boys a few things plus a bunch for the Towfighis for future birthday and Christmas gifts for them. As an example, I got Ian a Lego Star Wars pair of pajamas (long sleeve shirt and pants) for $3 which was really marked down compared to the original price. There are times I manage to go into Walmart and only come out with one small thing, but today is more the norm where I end up spending at least $100. Thankfully I don't go in the store that often. Ian was wishing he hadn't ordered a Lego set on Amazon last night because they had it at Walmart, but he'll just have to wait three more days for Amazon to deliver it. He spends all his money on either stuffed animals or Legos. Nadia spends all her money on either apps for the iPad or food. Today she bought a package of gum at Walmart.

Oliver rarely gets money, but he spends his on food. He was wishing he had some money today as he wanted to buy something to eat at the Well while he was playing in the play land. He tried to convince me that I owed him money for when he helped me clean earlier this week. I didn't give him any, but it did make me realize he grasps the concept that sometimes I give his siblings money for doing housework above and beyond their usual chores. Speaking of which, soon I will need to start giving Oliver some chores. Thus far he does three things - help clean up toys, clear his dishes from the table after each meal, and put away his socks and underwear when I am putting away the rest of his clean laundry.

Nadia named this snowman Susie. We even gave her earrings made of leaves.