March Madness...

Oh Spring...how I loathe thee. Such a tease; one day we'll have 60 degree weather and the next we'll have a snow storm. Such is life in the Midwest in March.

Spring means to our family...

Time to interview for a new nanny. Turns out replacing Natalie is pretty tough...as she set the bar pretty high. These are a few of Izzy's questions for nanny potentials:

Celebrating Dr. Suess' birthday...

Sundays at the indoor pool with these guys...

Kindergarten registration for this little girl...

Izzy was beside herself last week because we registered for Kindergarten. Can. You. Stand. It?!?! The week prior we had Kindergarten Orientation (where they littles get to tour the school while the bigs get to meet the teachers and listen to a presentation on what a day in the life of a kindergartner looks like).

After registering we did some more exploring the school together. While my heart dragged behind us along the way.

Aforementioned warm-ish day in March...

Silliness ensues...

Photo bombing is mastered...

Saturday gymnastics remains our weekend kick-off...

Selfies are perfected...

Ribbons are awarded after sessions end...and with the next session Izzy was invited into an "invite-only" class for 5 and 6 year olds. This means more advanced skills will be taught as her past coach has called her out as excelled in her class. Class size goes down while class duration goes up (1.5 hours once a week). We've clearly found this to be Izzy's wheelhouse (for now), as ballet, soccer and hip-hop weren't among her stronger suits. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't proud...Izzy is coming into her own and starting to shine. Makes me beam. No pun intended.

On the weekends during nap time Izzy usually spends an hour in her room reading and then she comes out to join us in whatever we're doing around the house. Sundays during nap time is when I get a little jump start on my work week and am hunkered down at the table with my laptop. Izzy's routine is to come down from her quiet time and craft while I work. This last weekend she asked for math problems (math is her favorite subject at school and she's quite good at it...she's analytical like her parents!) so I made worksheet after worksheet of math problems, both addition and subtraction. She goes to work on them and then brings them to me to correct...her work is about 90% accurate and once again I'm a proud mommy.

CrossFit continues to be a large part of my life...the Open has started and another competition is just a few weeks away so we've started 2-a-day workouts twice a week. My strength continues to build and I am seeing PRs almost every week. This is exactly why my addiction switched from running into CrossFit; I can see gains daily and weekly, not having to wait months until a race to see my improvement. Do I still love running? Absolutely. Running has just shifted from my main form of exercise to my cross-training workout. I'm also a results-oriented, Type A, planning freak that CF feeds into all three of those categories...and I never get bored with it as the workouts are constantly changing.

Kristi and I (and about 8 others from our gym) have taken to attempting our Open workouts twice each week, using the first attempt as a trial/feeler and the second attempt at 110% of our capacity. Each week this has proven successful and we continue to improve upon our scores from earlier in the week.

Last weekend some fellow Perfect Strangers visited us while re-taking the 13.2 WOD. Was special to have friends there to cheer us on, document and give us that extra push we needed to power through a very tough WOD.

10min AMRAP: 5 S2O, 10 DL, 15 box jumps...

A few silly pics of the girls...

Celebrating their 100th day of school...

Fort building...

Mike kept up the McCulloch tradition of making a traditional Irish feast on St. Patty's Day: corned beef & cabbage chased down with Black & Tans.

All the kiddos after a delicious meal...

We celebrated the holiday all afternoon and into the evening...made for a rough Monday morning!

T-minus 10 days and counting until Florida sunshine. Boom.

February happenings...

It always feels like the winter months are very monotonous. Routine. Groundhogs Day, where you wake up and do the same thing you did yesterday. Over. And over. How I loathe the winter. Soooo, we try to get out of the house every day on the weekends. Sometimes that doesn't happen (read: jammy day!) but we always try. For example, Saturday morning gymnastics is a sweet spot for us:

A few weekends ago I left the house at 6:30am to drive up to Chicago. It only took my 3 hours to get there since I bypassed any and all traffic leaving that early. The drive went by fast and before I knew it I was on the Chicago Skyway. For some reason this bridge always reminds me of driving to and from my dad's house for summers and holidays.

 

 I arrived at Jenny's house bright and early. Finally got to meet her boyfriend, Mike. He's just the sweetest; such a big teddy bear. He joked if we were going to craft all day (b/c that's what Jen and I do when we get together). As a matter of fact, we're not going to craft we answered. I quickly asked Jen, "What ARE we going to do? What would you normally do on a Saturday if I wasn't here?" She answered, "Look for stuff." Mkay. So off we ventured to look for stuff. First stop? IKEA!!!

 After several hours (and many scores!) at IKEA Jen suggested we go to my favorite restaurant, Garibaldi's. Now those of you who knew me growing up knew that I worked at Garibaldi's for several years in high school, taking the summers off to lifeguard. So Jen drives us to good old Barrington Square for lunch. Wait, where's the $1 movie theater? Where's Menard's? The Square just didn't look the same. But I was thrilled to see Garibaldi's did.

 As soon as I walked in the smell brought me back. Hours behind the register taking orders and sneaking french fries. I was floored when I saw a woman working that I had worked with. Twenty years ago! Crazy. Anyway, I ordered my favorite steak & cheddar with cheese fries. Oh yeah. Talk about a cheat day on Paleo!!! We sat in my favorite booth and talked about high school memories. Man, that place takes me back.

 Jenny then proclaimed that we were going to drive by my childhood home. She said we just had to. So off to Cornell Place we went. She and I walked to old front door and reminisced about our favorite times there. I made note of what a far walk my mom had with groceries. Then showed Jen how I would sneak out at night. She said she had two fond memories: my mom always having snacks at the ready for her when she visited and sitting in my room the summer before high school listening to Extreme's 'More Than Words' single over and over and over to memorize the words. Yep, sounds about right. And here is the tree in front of our old place that I started climbing when I was 7. I knew this tree so well. Where to place every foot and hand to get to my favorite spot. Was a special visit.

That night we spent hours at Jenny's boyfriend's bar. We had some of the deepest conversations and also some heated debates. But this is one of the many reasons why I love Jenny so much; no matter what we stand for or what we believe, we are the best of friends. I know she will always have my back even if we don't see eye to eye on all topics. She fights hard for me to see things her way, but I do the same. We have a healthy banter that I cherish...she truly makes me think outside of my cozy little comfort zone I live in.

 The next morning I left early to get back to Mike and the girls. A massive wind turbine farm is on the way home and on this particular day every single one of them was at a stand still. Hundreds of them. Just staring off into space. Freaky deaky!!!

 I was excited to share all my treasures from IKEA...my favorite is my new blanket for the couch. Black and white? Pretty much obsessed right now.

 Valentine's day is one of the girls' favorite holiday. Decorating cards, packages in the mail, candy. The latter never enters their mouths. Instead, I bring all of their goodies to work with me. I know, I'm so mean. But this house needs another cavity like we need a hole in our head.

Sandi was gracious to invite us to her house for some Valentine card painting the night before (while the boys were at the Butler game). I became obsessed with the water colors and made several of my own. Going to frame a few of these beauties!

Izzy also got to decorate her own Valentine box. I let her scavenge through my craft drawers to pick out supplies...here's what we came up with:

The holiday wouldn't be the same without a fun package from Roo!

 Every year since I received this gift from Jaime I wear this on Valentine's day. And every year I'm reminded of 1. How much I love this sweater and 2. How much I love gifts from Jaime.

That evening I spent with some of my favorite girlfriends celebrating Bri's birthday. And of course Jaime rocked the same sweater. Every year baby. (And you KNOW when we buy something for the other person we also buy one of the same for ourselves! Pretty much every gift I find for her I also find for me!)

 What do we do when we're stuck in the house with all the hours in the day to fill? Get silly! Laney's best silly face is also my best silly face...

Mikey taking his first baby for a stroll...

 For my birthday/Valentine's Day Mikey got us tickets to see one of our favorite bands, the Old 97's. Some of our close friends are also super fans so we invited them along. The evening started (early!) with our favorite Sakura sushi. We've been patrons here for over 10 years and the staff is the exact same. So is the delicious sushi!

 Devoured.

 The concert was at the Vogue, which is always nostalgic for me. One, my dad grew up near there and said he used to bring a nickel (a quarter?) to the Vogue and spend the day watching cowboy and Indian movies. Two, part of my bachelorette party was spent here. Complete with my step-mom and her sister up on the boxes dancing. Three, we've seen some pretty incredible shows there...Willie Nelson is just one of them.

Rhett Miller not only rocked the stage for several hours, but he also opened for them. Holy hotness.

 Lots and lots and lots of dancing. And signing. And laughing.

 'Someday somebody's gonna ask you. A question that you should say yes to. Once in your life. I've got a question for you.'

 And the rest of the days we fill being crafty...

 And being lazy.

The. End.