Category: Our Life

Dear Jonathan, on your Fourth Birthday

Posted on by Lauren Lane

It’s your fourth birthday today! You are so easy to love. I don’t know anyone who has met you and spent time with you that doesn’t adore Big J. You radiate the kind of energy that’s magnetizing. The kind of energy kids and adults want to be around. You are so silly and so unabashedly yourself. It’s refreshing to know and love you, little boy.

Your emotions live close the surface. And even though that’s a really hard trait sometimes in life, I wish I could protect that and nurture it so that it never goes away. It will be your greatest strength when you fall in love, and the hardest part of having your heart broken. But I pray that you live your life with your heart open for forever. It’s what makes you so uniquely you.

Well, that and your adoration of lawn mowers and tractors. You hear lawn mowers from a mile away. You spot lawn mowers everywhere we go. Your favorite weekend activity is mowing with your Daddy. And it’s been that way for years. If you don’t grow up to own a lawn mowing business or a farm, I will truly be shocked. You ask to see people’s mowers when you first meet them. Your favorite play date activity is yard work. You notice a nicely mowed lawn everywhere we go.

Your daddy and I are so very blessed to be your parents. To have a front row seat to your growing up. It is the most magnificent journey, and there are more times than I can count where your Daddy has sat down beside me at night after you go to bed and said, “Man. I didn’t know I needed a Big J in my life, but he is the coolest kid I think I’ve ever met. I love him more than I could have ever imagined loving someone.”

I love you bud. Or as you tell me at night now with your arms wrapped around my neck, “I love you so so so so so so so so so sooooo much.”

All my love,

Mommy

P.S. Yes, you can have a birthday treat. 🙂

7 Quick Jonathan Takes 2024

Posted on by Lauren Lane

A round up of a few things that are so uniquely Jonathan Brooks for your enjoyment and for my memory, so I can recall these things forever.

-1- When he’s playing a sport with Harrison or Nathan, he likes to choose “who” he’s being. Then while playing, he must be referred to by his name. Absolutely do not call him Jonathan or Big J. “I’m BOBBY!” or Vinny….or Reese James.

-2- At four years old, he thrives with a mid-day nap while sucking on his “lovey.”

-3- He routinely reminds us that “Aidy baby is the cutest.”

-4- His favorite dinner is breakfast for dinner. Waffles, french toast, pancakes, scrambled eggs. He loooooves breakfast. And treats.

-5- He loves driving the blue truck, and has the most enviable spatial awareness when he’s backing up. The man throws it into reverse, cranks the wheel with one hand, and looks over his shoulder like a PRO.

-6- He is a farm boy at heart. I think every single one of these I’ve done for Big J includes something about mowing. He loves mowers. Weed whackers. Leaf blowers. Tractors. Trucks. He was meant to be a little country boy. In fact, he now regularly tells me the type of mower….”That’s a John Deere zero turn.” And he’s only asked me specifically for a John Deere ride on zero turn mower for his birthday more times than I can count.

Like any good grandparent, Mimi contemplated making Jonathan’s wildest dreams come true and then thought better of it. 🙂

-7- He is such a second born – he routinely does little “pokes” at Harrison that aren’t outright mean or wrong, but just enough to get under his skin. And then when Harrison blows up, and J is confronted about his actions, he’ll stand there smiling slyly, full well knowing what he did.

My June 2024 Garden

Posted on by Lauren Lane

It surely feels like full blown summer over here! The garden is packed full, and there’s something new to look at every day I go out to explore. This summer, we added a new garden bed around our shed including two raised beds for vegetables and fruits. AND I finally got around to planting the garden bed on the east side of our house that’s primarily a shade garden.

Here’s a look around my gardens this time of year…

You didn’t think I could possibly post any more garden pictures than I had in previous years, did you? I’m always up for a good challenge.

10 Random Things Lately

Posted on by Lauren Lane

I could say that life has been busy lately….that would be an understatement. But I’m guessing you probably presumed that when I disappeared a few weeks ago. Since it’s been sooo long since I shared anything, I thought I’d share 10 random things from life lately…

  • The older boys went to their very first wedding. And they had the very best time dancing, eating, and drinking special drinks. Not to mention that they looked so handsome!
  • Harrison is rounding out the end of his Kindergarten year. That seems impossible to believe…but it’s nearly here! We had his school’s open house, and he loved showing us around the school and everything he’s worked on this year!

We celebrated Harrison’s sixth birthday with friends! AND a Mommy & Daddy date to Top Golf. If you thought he would have the BEST time at Top Golf, you would be right.

We installed and planted two raised beds near our new shed. I’m growing lettuces, tomatoes, cucumbers and raspberries. Crossing my fingers that we’re successful! I haven’t been much of a food gardener until this year.

We all tested positive for strep (besides Nathan) four days before leaving for Florida with my sister’s family. Poor baby Aidan has been on antibiotics for ear infections so often recently that they had to treat him with daily shots this time around. I was just thankful to have found it before we left and got on the airplane! At least strep is an easy fix.

And of course with it being springtime, I am busy planting, planting, planting! And so excited this year to help people with their summer containers. It’s doubly fun dreaming up combinations for customers and getting them installed!

Jonathan has taken to calling adding sugar to your cereal as adding “seasoning.” He routinely asks us for Cheerios with seasoning now. When do we live in a world where kids name everything?

Shortly after Aidan’s first birthday, he started walking. And now we have a baby walking everywhere! He wants to get into all the things, climb all of the stairs, and absolutely does not want to be left by himself EVER. He now has mastered Mama, Dada, and a lot of telling us “MO! Mo! Mo!” while signing “More.” He’s also recently added “yeah” to his repertoire, and we love asking him yes or no questions to hear him say, “Yeah?”

He’s officially moved up to the Toddler classroom at school, and I guess that fully shuts a door on baby years. We have been so blessed to have three sweet, healthy babies and for me to have been able to enjoy six months off with each of them during my maternity leave.

My little business has been growing faster than I had ever imagined! I absolutely love everything about it – from helping with landscape consultations, to full blown landscape drawings and renderings, and container installations. It’s been so much fun!

I’m hoping that I can get back to a more consistent posting schedule, but I think I may need to make it through May before that kind of time frees up!

What have you been up to this month?

Lauren

What’s Up Wednesday {03.27.24}

Posted on by Lauren Lane

Happy last Wednesday of the month! Just one day before our little Aidan surprised us a year ago with his appearance! Ahhhh…I just can’t even believe it.

As always, I’m linking up with Shay and Sheaffer to share with you what’s going on in our life!

1: WHAT WE’RE EATING THIS WEEK: We had a favorite of Nathan and minethis week: Chicken Tikka Masala. The boys like the naan bread. Just a complete shock, I’m sure, for all of you that have had young kids. Nothing but carbs.

We’re also having salmon this week and Sausage Vodka Pasta for Aidan’s birthday.

2: WHAT I’M REMINISCING ABOUT:

I have so many feelings about our last little boy turning one. It truly doesn’t feel possible that it’s been a year with our baby Aidan. He’s just the sweetest, calmest baby.

Watching Harrison really become so protective of Aidan has been so fun, and Jonathan learning the ropes of big brotherhood – which as this point means having the patience of Job when it comes to Aidan messing up whatever you’re trying to play with.

The day Harrison and Jonathan met their little brother in the hospital will forever be one of my most favorite memories of all. How proud they were of their little bro. Just all of the heart eyes for my boys.

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Let’s Look…At What’s in Our Grocery Carts

Posted on by Lauren Lane

Hi all! For those on spring break, I hope you had a great one! We didn’t go anywhere, but I used the good weather to get a lot of client’s seasonal spring planters done. Wow – it feels so good to be out working in the dirt again!

Today is another edition of Let’s Look!

In January, we shared a peek into how we clean our closets.

Last month, I shared the little things I do each day.

And this month, I’m sharing the things you can *almost* always find in my grocery cart.

I thought it was funny because I never take a picture of my grocery cart, but I just happened to take this picture a few weeks back when I was at Trader Joe’s…

How convenient that this ended up being the prompt for this month!

I go grocery shopping once a week. Generally, I will put in an online order on a Thursday for pantry staples and meat for the week. And then I go to one other grocery store for produce because I don’t trust anyone else picking out our produce, and anything that was out for our online order.

There are the ALWAYS, every single week, I’m buying items…

  • Bread – And I’ve apparently created little bread snobs because they will ONLY eat one type of bread.
  • Yogurt – The kids have a yogurt with breakfast every single morning.
  • Milk – I’m about to add another milk drinker to our house as Aidan transitions over to whole milk, and I already can’t believe the amount of milk we go through in a week. At least a full gallon or more – and everyone warns me it’s only going to get worse!
  • Fruit. When it comes to in between meal snacking, we always allow our kids to eat fruit or vegetables. And they always pick fruit. Strawberries, blueberries, oranges, bananas, pineapple, watermelon….we go through a lot of fruit. And of course they prefer berries because that’s what really hits our pocketbook.

Aside from these things, you can usually find in my cart…

Some type of cheese. Shredded cheese, sliced cheese for sandwiches, block cheese for making cheese and crackers. There’s almost always cheese involved every week.

Crackers. We roll through crackers in this house because they’re any easy to grab snack that isn’t completely unhealthy.

A salad mix. And it gets eaten 50% of the time. And the other 50%, I throw it away and replace it with a new one the following week with the intention of having it for lunch.

And lastly, if I’m at Trader Joe’s, you can guarantee that there’s flowers in my cart. Whether it’s a fresh bouquet or, in this case, a potted plant. I can’t resist their blooms!

What are your grocery staples? Have they changed over the years depending upon your kids’ ages?

What’s Up Wednesday {01.31.24}

Posted on by Lauren Lane

First What’s Up Wednesday of the new year! You all know that this is my favorite post of the month. I love to go back and read these as a little scrapbook in time of our lives. A little bit of reading, wearing, family, and work all in one post!

As always, I’m linking up with Shay and Sheaffer to share with you what’s going on in our life!

1: WHAT WE’RE EATING THIS WEEK: I have a confession to make. I was very anti-Cozi family calendar. It got to a point, though, where it was really difficult to track who was responsible for which kid/activity/driving/babysitting/all the things that goes along with keeping track of a family in our work Outlook calendars. So, I gave Cozi another shot. We’ve been using it for four months now, and I love it. Including using it to track our meal plan each week.

This week, we’re doing Sheet Pan sausage and veggies, Chicken Taquitos, and Creamy Broccoli Cheddar Chicken.

2: WHAT I’M REMINISCING ABOUT:

Aidan turned ten months old this past weekend, and man. All of sudden, that first birthday seems REALLY close. And it feels like yesterday that he was this small.

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A Typical Day in January 2024

Posted on by Lauren Lane

A true typical day in January 2024 should show one kid home sick, one kid home because it is yet another snow day or school holiday, and me trying to frantically fit in all of work and home things in between juggling kids at home. Somehow, this random day that I picked to document was our FIRST DAY in a week (and practically all of January) with all children at their respective “schools.”

I woke up early to get my workout at Bar Method in before the kids got up…

As soon as I get home, I get out milk for the big boys and go feed Aidan. Jonathan is always my first kid up.

Then after wrestling a nine month old to get a new diaper on and get changed, it’s time to herd cats getting big J and Harrison dressed and ready.

Happy helper!

Then it’s downstairs for breakfast for the boys!

After breakfast, I do little kid drop off at daycare, and then call my mom on the way home.

At home, I grabbed a cup of coffee, flipped on my work computer, and grabbed the boys’ laundry. It was boys laundry day.

I sorted dirty clothes while doing a work call. Then got some work done on my computer while the first load started.

This morning I had a long overdue haircut…

Finally feeling more put together 🙂

Back at work – fold a load of clothes while on another call and pumping…

Then very non exciting work happened…but I listened to part of this book while I worked on mindless tasks

Grabbed a protein bar as interim sustenance…

More work…then a pump break and bottle prep…

Followed by elementary school snack prep for the next day and dinner prep…This little tool has saved me so much time chopping vegetables. Highly recommend.

Another little snack to tide me over until dinner…

Around 5, I took a quick shower, put the kids’ clean clothes away, and was ready to go do pick-ups. I had a couple of new clothes to try on…

I usually pick up Harrison from school in the evenings.

Once we got home…

It was time to start dinner. Harrison wanted to help make dinner this evening.

Chaos…I mean the little boys arrive home around 5:30 or so, and then we sat down to eat as a family.

A family favorite, the ever popular TACOS.

After dinner, I clean up the leftovers and load the dishwasher while the boys play. Then I’m in charge of baby Aidan’s bedtime.

Bath & snuggled up in his towel!

One last bottle, and he’s ready for bed!

Then it was Jonathan’s turn to go down for bed, and finally Harrison…

He chose the Chiefs book to read this night because his dad had refused to read it the night before…

After the boys are down, I usually make myself a treat or a cup of tea. This night I picked hot chocolate…

And I watch a little TV or read before it’s time for bed!

I read this day back, and it sounds exhausting. Because it is so tiring. It is a constant pace of doing to make it to the next marker in the day. To breakfast, to kids out the door, to bath. I find myself wiped by the end of most days. The thing I long for most these days is more time to do things for me. Things I’m passionate about.

But reading this back also made me remember how much I love this life. This life with these little humans that’s so loud, demanding and chaotic. It is magical. And in the scheme of things, so fast.

Just the other day Harrison showered himself and got himself ready for bed. And we did nooothing. And that was both thrilling and sad. Another end and a clear sign of my babies growing up. It’s hard to remember in the slog of the typical days that they’re growing up. And someday, we’ll bathe our babies for the last time. But that engine of time churns on. Ready or not. And I have a feeling when I’m old and gray and my babies have long since left the nest, I’ll be glad to go back and read this post of what life looked like when they still needed me for everything.

Thanks for sticking with me.

Happy New Year!

Posted on by Lauren Lane

We are back to the normal grind this morning. Back to work, back to school, and baby Aidan starts daycare today! It feels like all of the things all at once, and I’m bummed that the holidays are over. We had a really good break. Christmas was lovely. People were healthy (all of the praise hands!!!). And I slept sooo much, and it felt so good.

Sharing some of the pics from our holiday season as we get back into the swing of things around here!

These boys were excited for Christmas morning!

Christmas morning with the boys!

The big boys got big kid bikes. Jonathan literally learned to ride a two wheel back on Christmas day.

Many new sports jerseys were opened…

We saw family on Christmas Day, and got to celebrate Christmas with both my parents and Nathan’s parents on Christmas Day.

We enjoyed a “kid free” date night with the big boys sleeping over at Gigi & Pops.

Just this little guy joining us for drinks and dinner…

There was lots of playing at grandparents’ houses over the break.

And we celebrated the New Year (a bit early because Jonathan was fading fast) with all of the boys’ favorite treats. Little smokies, chips and dip, and popcorn

And we hosted my family for our annual New Year’s day “Good luck bean soup.”

We had such a wonderful break. Hope you all had a good one too!

Merry Christmas! Love, the Lanes

Posted on by Lauren Lane

It’s time for me to sign-off for the year and focus on a magical Christmas and restful New Year’s. My to-do list to get ready for the holidays seems forever long, and I know come December 26th, I’ll miss all of the excitement and build up. But I also just love resting and the promise of time to just be in January.

Aside from all of the holiday fun, I’m planning on working on a potential new venture, kitchen renovation planning, and blog post planning! If you have any ideas of things you want me to write about next year, let me know!

Until 2024, thanks for sticking through this off and on crazy 2023 in blog world. As always, I am so thankful for all of you.

Love, Lauren