Trying to update this blog weekly, even monthly, is so difficult for me! Once you read how busy we have been, you will see why. We are constantly on the run with activities for the kids, their school, holidays and everyday life in general! After Amber made me a book from the first few years of our blog, I am determined to catch up and keep it updated (even if I am 3 months behind!) so that I can print a second edition! What a great gift!!
And speaking of gifts....this is Brad's Father's Day gift that I actually MADE!!! I kept seeing on Pinterest how easy it is supposed to be to etch glass, but wasn't sure what to etch onto what. Of course, I decided to etch one of the most difficult things in the world....silhouette's of my kids profiles along with the year. No, I had NOT been drinking. I was very impressed with the result. Thank you Pinterest and Happy Father's Day Brad!!
Miles is really into The Avengers. He has not seen the movie, but has been watching the cartoons. We have all 4 character's masks, etc. and is loving trying to scare everyone. He keeps telling us he is going to get the 'bad guys'. Ava put down her princess dresses long enough to play with him this day.
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Miles finally learning to eat with chopsticks. Ava has been proficient for a long time. We forgot to bring theirs to the the Japanese restaurant this night and they brought him one of their "starter" chopsticks. I have never been able to eat Japanese food or Chinese food with a fork. It somehow doesn't taste the same! We go to this place so often, the chef at the grill knows Miles and Ava by name. They are very good at trying different foods and a couple of weeks ago ate (with gusto) enchilada stuffed peppers with cheese, cilantro and avocado that I actually made. (Am teaching myself to cook. My Mom fully admits she can be no help with this endeavor.) And all 3 kids ate it up! (I told Miles it was a volcano) :)
I took these pictures the day of her Spring Program. She is holding a photo of her from the first day of school in the same location. (Thank you Pinterest.) We plan on doing this each year!
This is a picture of Ava and her buddy Owen following their teacher to get ice cream on their last day of school. I know she will miss her friends this summer, but several will be in the Mothers Day Out program with her there this summer.
Ava and her best buddy Lily and below with her girlfriend Nadia.
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| Ava with Mrs. Jamie! She had a fantastic year and will miss her SO much! But, she will get to see her as Miles will be in her class in the Fall. Yay! |
More last day of school pictures.
Tommy Terrific came and did magic tricks (and lots of comedy....even fun for teachers/parents) on the last day too. You can see below that Ava clearly enjoyed it!
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| OK, so I know I took the other ones, but this really WAS her LAST day of school. So, I took them again. (I took the others because I thought I might forget on the last day as they had SO much planned!) |
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| Ava at her dance recital dress rehearsal at Robinson Center. It always blows my mind to watch these little girls run out onto the stage and perform in front of hundreds of people without flinching! I was a backstage Mom for her group and they were calm as cucumbers...excited even to get out there. They kept whispering to me, "Is it our turn yet??" Crazy. |
Ava is the last one on the right.
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| This one is probably my favorite one! |
After the show, getting her bouquet of pink roses, was her favorite part.
My sweet, sweet angel!
They created a "Playbill" out of her recital picture! Too cute!!
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| Her precious group of girls! |
Miles' school pictures. He looks so grown up to me....not a baby anymore. :( But he sure is a handsome "big boy"!! I could just gobble him up!
Ava's Spring Program at school. She was so excited to be a flower. And a purple flower at that!
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| Proud parents with goofy-faced daughter. |
They all did such a great job! Thank you Mrs. Jamie, Mrs. Laura and Mrs. Mandy for all your hard work this year and for loving our children so much!
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| She really got into her part. |
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| Mrs. Jamie receiving her end-of-year gift from her class. |
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| It took all the will power I had NOT to buy this for him on the spot at Toys R Us. And believe me, he didn't make it any easier. He just looks like he belongs on this thing (which actually scares me to death). Even the people at the store asked how I could deny him. I told them if it had a seatbelt and a roll bar, I would have taken it right then. (Although, Santa may not be as strong-willed as I am.) |
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| Same day, same Toys R Us. I was talking to a friend I ran into and while we were talking, she kept laughing from time to time. Turns out Miles was behind me FILLING our cart with train toys...it was FULL. He's quite the shopper. |
Recently I told Brad that I really missed getting to just go to the movies any time we wanted. And when we do, it is usually to a Disney movie. Well, all I ever have to do is tell him something like that and Mr. Fix It goes to work! Brad built a tower to hold the projector, blu ray dvd, wireless AT&T box, bass speaker, etc. It still needs a marquee on the front, but I think he did a great job!!
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| He also built a refreshment cart complete with popcorn popper, candy stand and hot dog roller. It is on bicycle wheels, so it is easy to cart in and out. God bless that man! |
He also built the screen. He ordered the material online and he and Jim bent the pipes with Jim's pipe-bender. It is 9 feet by 5.5 feet and mounts onto our deck. This night was a trial run to see how high to place the projector on the tower (he was in the process of building it). The kids were instantly hooked. But wait, are we STILL watching Disney????
Ava is taking after big sister and reading herself to sleep each night. I love that she loves to read.
Ava at her friend Lily's party. It was super hot!
Ava the day of her recital pictures. She LOVES her new dance studio!
Miles and Mommy on Mother's day at his old school. He decorated the vase and picked flowers to go in it. He is such a little sweetheart!
Going to the store with the kids is always thrilling. But then throw in a thunderstorm and it just adds a whole other level of fun. Each one had to have their own umbrella and Miles kept holding his in front of his face so he couldn't see where he was walking. Traffic obviously came to a screeching halt for the three of us crossing into the store. Sassy britches was quite proud of herself as you can see.
Another day at Wal Mart and Ava catches sight of these razors. (Razors that we took pictures of last year and texted to Santa to bring to them......which SANTA obviously FORGOT.) Ava reminded me of the texts and wanted to know what happened??!! I took full credit and told them that Santa had texted me that he was all out of razors and would I please pick some up at the store for them....and I obviously forgot, so it was TOTALLY my fault. In which they replied, "So we are getting them today right?" ......right. So here is my guilt purchase that I wasn't expecting this day.
On the playground that I used to play on
across from Uncle Bill's house. It brings back so many memories when I
am there. I like to take the kids there because it is completely shaded
and always empty, as no one knows it's there!
Miles in yet another mask. He is in a mask a large amount of the time now.
Ava's first soccer season. She has watched Miles take for 3 seasons now and decided that she wanted to take too. Lucky for us, the same club that Miles takes soccer from decided to offer classes at her school one afternoon each week. So she gets to take with most of her friends from school, which she really likes.
She is so stinkin cute! She told us recently that the reason that we need to have one more child is because 2 + 3 = 5. I told her we already have 5. She said Kinley didn't count because she doesn't STAY. So with Mommy and Daddy as 2, we need her and Miles and another baby to make 3, so we can have 5. When I asked her why 5, she held up her hand (showing me 4 fingers) and said, "Right now we have 4, and that hurts my thumb. If we have 5, it won't hurt my thumb."
That's a GREAT reason to have another child! We'll get her a puppy.
The coach said that he has great form and has a future in sports. OK, I guess we will scrap pushing for the academic scholarship and go for sports! HA! (JK, of course)
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| He is pretty easy to pick out in any group! |
He never seems to take his eye off the ball. He LOVES playing soccer!
One thing we have noticed in a lot of his pictures is that he sticks his tongue out like this when he runs, like he is concentrating or something.
He really does have good control of the ball for someone that is 2 1/2 years old.
I sometimes forget just how small he is until I see a picture like this.
I love watching him run, which he does A LOT. He just looks like a runner.
Recently, Ava had adenovirus and it was a truly horrible week for us. She had fevers of 104-105 for an entire week. Tylenol and Advil couldn't keep it down. She said that the worst part for her was missing school/her friends and missing her end-of-year gymnastics program. Her classmates each made her get well cards and sent them to her. She sat at one doctor's appointment reading each one over and over again. She was so excited about them. She was also super bummed to have to miss her cousin Hayden's birthday party. She and Miles had pirate "attire" and were so looking forward to it!
Her teachers and gymnastics coaches arranged for her to receive her medal and certificate when she came back to school and had a "mini" medal ceremony for her. I was excited that I could be there as I had planned on being at the original program/ceremony.
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| Our cousin Amber, Hayden's Mom, was so sweet and sent the kids party favors and pirate cookies with their names on them all the way from Springdale. As you can see in the picture above, they LOVED them! I can't imagine how much fun they would have had if they could have gone to the party! |
And speaking of parties, this is Ava's class with their teacher, Mrs. Jamie, on her birthday. We love Mrs. Jamie!!! Lucky for us, Miles will have her next year!
Ava, Kinley and Morgan (our 4th child) make sure that they aren't bored at Miles' soccer "games". They were "performing" for Ava to keep her entertained as well!
He is so much fun to watch on the soccer field. Several other parents have said that they catch themselves watching him instead of their own child!
Easter this year was very low key. The kids' cousins weren't able to come down and they had been on Easter egg hunts at school and in our neighborhood (our property owners assn. is great and throws big events for the kids for Easter, Halloween, etc.), so they were all but Easter egg-hunted out.
I have a similar picture of Ava from the past 3 years finding an egg in this exact location in Grandmother's yard. She just keeps getting bigger (and her hair keeps getting shorter!). I also have pictures of ME hunting Easter eggs in this yard when I was her age. Wow.
What you can't see is the candy in his hand that he is so excited about!
On our way over to the Easter Egg hunt in our neighborhood. We don't have sidewalks, so the kids travel by wagon to be on the safe side. They love it. It's like their own little limo.
As you can see, it was quite sunny that day and apparently my kids simply cannot walk anywhere....we are always in a full sprint! Maybe that is why they are so skinny despite eating me out of house and home.
Ava was creeped out by the big dude in the Bunny Rabbit costume. I can't say that I blame her. Miles, however, thought the big guy had more candy-filled eggs to give him, so he was all in.
Just a random picture of Miles when I was picking him up at school. He is just so cute with his little backpack on. He refuses to let anyone help him, even when he sometimes looks like a dog chasing his tail to get his arm in the other strap!
OK, so they don't actually HIDE them at his old school....Miles kept waiting for them to go HIDE them, but once he realized that this was the plan all along, he went and grabbed as many as he could hold.
I was SO thankful that I bought those Titanic 3D tickets in advance online IN CASE it sold out!
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| Kinley in her 3D glasses and her Kleenex (which she didn't use). How do you NOT cry the first time you see this movie? I want to know what in the world these kids are watching these days that would desensitize them THAT much???!!! |
Brad built the kids a nice, big sandbox to play in complete with a bench seat for me and a toybox to put their sand toys in.
Ava practicing her soccer moves with Miles in the backyard.
This is one of my favorite videos of Miles ever. He plays the drums on his drum kit at home all the time. And he plays the "air drums" constantly in the car! His favorite song to drum to is a song from an Icelandic band called Jonsi. You can hear it in the background. They play it in the movie, "How to Train Your Dragon". His big, proud grin at the end is PRICELESS!!
Ava with her buddy Owen right before their first soccer lesson after school.
She loves getting to play soccer with her classmates. She has watched Miles take for 3 seasons and felt like she kind of had a leg up on what to expect.
She looks so serious here, listening to her coach give instructions. We are still getting used to her hair being so short. That is how she wanted it cut and she is happy with it so we can't argue with that. She is truly beautiful inside and out no matter what length her hair may be.
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| OK, I think that looks means "No More Pictures Please". |
I just had to throw this picture in from her yearbook. It was from the beginning of the year and they all just look so small compared to how they look now. (tear)
In the picture above, Miles' coach had the kids sitting on their balls giving them instructions as to where they were going to go/what they were going to do next. When he blew the whistle, I swear I heard the Chariots of Fire theme song in my head as Miles' head turned to look at me in slow motion and then he was GONE! He was yards ahead of the next closest kid. He is so flippin fast. When we got to the other field, his coach said to me, "This kid has a future in sports". I found myself thinking, "Yes, but he has to finish college too." I'm such a parent.
We can't get enough of the picture above. His little calf muscles are so defined. It's crazy!
Not one to be outdone, Ava was showing us how fast she could run during Miles soccer class.
Tackling the rope ladder used to trip him up his first season, but now, he owns those ropes!
Hopefully it won't be three more months before I update this again. The kids are growing and changing so fast that I can hardly keep up!
