Thursday Thirteen: Things That Make Me Happy Today

Thirteen things that are making me happy today:

1) Sunshine- I am loving this spring weather!

2) Feeling *good* again. Becca brought home a nasty bug from Winterfest back in February, and it went through the family, taking us all out, one by one. YUCK!! Only John Mark has seemed to escape unscathed... what's up with that? I occasionally heard him around the house muttering, "I don't want to get sick... don't want to get sick..." and one morning, he even made breakfast for all the younger brothers so they wouldn't spread germs in the kitchen. I guess his diligence paid off.

3) April will soon be here, and that means June will soon be here, and that means no more algebra and geometry (for a few short months, anyway):

4) Consignment Sale Season! I managed to get some stuff together to sell, but when I went to the Consignor's Sale, I didn't buy one. single. thing. (!) I figured the kids can't keep what they have clean; why do I want to buy more? Laundry has finally done me in, and besides, you really can't fault that logic, can you? I'll have to take the big kids to buy shorts eventually, but I guess I'd just as soon shop at Walmart.

5) Look- my clean oven!! I went on a cleaning binge during the co-op break in February and cleaned the carpets, the pantry, my closet, the oven... Amazingly, the oven has stayed clean, and it makes me happy.
6) A Clean Pantry! You might not think this pantry looks all that great, so you're going to have to trust me on this one. I threw out all kinds of stuff that's been taking up space (really, if it's been in there for more than a year, are we ever going to eat it? Do we really want to??) My pantry makes me smile.7) My pink mug. I made this at Becca's birthday party, and in hindsight, I think I would have done a better job with it if I could have *seen* what I was doing. The party room at the ceramics place had white twinkle lights that didn't provide enough light and we ended up working in semi-darkness... but the ambiance was oh-so-cool. I decided I would learn to overlook the faults of my mug and just enjoy the things I like about it. If I could only do that with the rest of my life as well...8) My girl! I have four excellent boys as well, but my girl... well, today I'm just particularly crazy about her (and happily, this picture was not taken today!)
9) But these pictures were taken today: Spring is coming! Our poor broken trees are beginning to bud:

10) The Forsythia are blooming too (I love Forsythia!)
11) The Pink Bush is blooming: (anyone know what this is? I don't think it's an Azalea. Rhododendron, maybe?)
12) Even Ugly Bush is getting in on the fun. He gets two weeks of glory each year, and this is it: 13) And our Hyacinths are blooming (they smell heavenly!)