Sock Hop

For the kids meeting their AR (I forget what the AR stands for; but it is a reading program) goal in school this fourth quarter they got to go to a sock hop at school. It happened to be the day of Anna’s birthday and since I was bringing cupcakes to her class I got to take a few photos of the sock hop. Just wanted to share.

 

Sorry it is blurry, but I was taking photos with a phone with one hand and trying to hold on to Luke with the other hand.   The first photo is Anna, with her friends Josie and Emerson (and Isabelle sneaking into the photo), and the second photo is Isabelle, with her friends Skylar and Jada.

Anna’s Sixth Birthday

Wednesday, May 25, 2011 was Anna’s sixth birthday. She was so excited! I think it is the first time that she showed just how excited she was. She told everyone at school that it was her birthday and I brought cupcakes to school for her class during snack time.

 

She has come out of her shell a lot this year, but she still doesn’t like having attention called to her. When they sang to her she just put her head down (I don’t know where she gets that from)!

Later that night we had some cupcakes to celebrate as a family and she got to open two presents. Her face says it all! She could hardly contain herself.

 

On Memorial Day we had Anna’s party with a few of her friends. Anna was less than a week old when we had a bunch of people come to our house in Picayune, MS to meet her for the first time and it was on Memorial Day too. I think that will always be her first birthday party even though there wasn’t any cake.

 

Here is Anna with her birthday cake. She wanted a Tangled party and since I didn’t want to make the tower, we decided to try to match her shirt that she loves and then just stick the characters on top. She loved it!

I think these next two are my favorite pictures of the day. I didn’t crop the second picture, but I wanted to include it to show how silly Luke was being in a room full of girls. He had them all laughing every time he’d put his head down and act bashful.

Anna wanted a play dress to match her Minnie Mouse doll, so we had this one made by some lady in Mobile, AL that can make anything. Anna was thrilled with it!

Here is Anna blowing out her candles.

Here is the gang coming in from the pool getting ready for cake.

Instead of ordering pizza (and since there wasn’t too many kids), we decided to let them all make their own pizza. And I think the adults (me specifically) made more of a mess than the kids did.

Here they all are in the pool.

Here is a close up of the cake for those of you that didn’t see it on Facebook. I am so glad that I get to make my kids’ birthday cakes. Thank you Aunt Sister for teaching me how to decorate cakes.

I think Anna had a very happy birthday! Thanks to everyone who came to the party, called her on the phone, sent gifts, cards, or balloons, celebrated with us in any way, or helped in any way to make Anna’s birthday so wonderful!

Isabelle’s Field Trip

Last Friday we went to the Gulfarium in Fort Walton Beach, FL with Isabelle’s First Grade class. The kids all had so much fun! Since our tickets were good for the whole day, we decided to stay a little longer and let the girls finish looking around. 

 

Here is Isabelle petting a turtle named Squirt! They think he is about seven years old (which is how old Isabelle is).

Here is Isabelle with her friends Skylar and Jada.

Isabelle and her teacher Mrs. Floyd.

Isabelle and Jada at the Sea Lion show.

They are still working on the big Dolphin tank, so they did a small dolphin show in this smaller tank, but the girls still thought it was wonderful.

Here is the beach overlook. It was so pretty from this point, that we decided to take a walk on the beach after we left the Gulfarium (but I didn’t get any good pictures at the beach).

Isabelle and Jada as a sea horse and blowfish.

After the walk on the beach we stopped at Baskin Robbins for some ice cream. I was introduced to their Jamoca flavor and I have been craving it ever since! It was fun, and I am glad that we got to spend the day together.

Isabelle’s First Science Fair Project

Where oh where is my Uncle Charlie when I need him?!?!?!?  I STILL don’t like doing science fair projects. And the worst part is, I am not sure how much of it I should be doing and how much of it I (and by I, I mean my obsessive, perfectionist self) should let the second grader do by herself.

 

For the past two years, Isabelle hasn’t even brought up doing science fair projects (as they are not required at this age) so we have been lucky until now. When she brought it up I tried to talk her out of it, but her daddy said, “I’ll help her, she can do one.”  Then he went into the hospital and had about fifty other things come up. So after changing what she was going to do her project on three or four different times, we finally settled on seeing how much time affects your ability to correctly recall information. Isabelle learned about how the brain stores recalls memories.  She showed a group of people a video, gave a test to half of the people immediately, and then gave the test to the other half the next day.

 

Here was her finished project.

AWANA Awards

We had our AWANA awards ceremony this past Sunday night at church. This is our third year doing AWANA at church and we have seen some amazing things happen through this program. God sent us the people that we needed to implement this program and from it, order was brought to our Wednesday night program, adults have stepped up to help, children (and adults) have memorized scripture, and last but not least, kids have met Jesus and committed their lives to him.  We averaged 90 to 95 kids each week from our Cubbies up through our Journey program (new this year). With any program, we had our ups and downs and off nights, but God saw us through and we survived another year.

 

This year was Anna’s first year in Sparks and she completed her book to receive her "First Book” award. Isabelle received her “Sparky Award” for completing ALL three Sparks books in Kindergarten through Second grade. She worked hard and I am very proud of her.

 

Here is their presentation of the Sparks theme song.

 

Here is Isabelle and Anna with their awards. Isabelle also got her Second Book award because she finished her second book at the first of this year.

2011 Spring Musical

Our children’s choir presented their musical last Sunday night at Jay First Baptist Church. The kids had a good time and did well. Anna cried for forty minutes before we went because she didn’t like the dress I made her wear. She is not a fan of long dresses, but since she was on the front row, I wasn’t taking any chances at her showing off her new Minnie Mouse panties that she got for Easter.

 

I was amazed, because after crying all that time, she decided that she would entertain everyone with her dancing and antics during the show.

 

Isabelle had a singing part and was very nervous so she did not seem very happy. Here is Isabelle’s solo in the song, He Is My Light.

 

Here is the children’s choir singing Stop and Think. It is a cute song and shows a little of what Anna did.

 

This is Anna and Josie being goof balls and showing off for the camera during their rehearsal time.

Anna’s Field Trip

Recently we went to the Japan House at the University of West Florida with the Kindergarten class from Jay Elementary. The teachers and students at the Univ. West Florida teach the kids how to bow to show respect, make origami people, and dance a few cultural dances. The kids had a great time. For lunch we went to the Tokyo Dining for lunch.

 

Luke was not thrilled with this flame. In fact, we had a hard time keeping him at the table after this. The flames were HUGE!

 

Here is Anna and her friends when the flame at her table went up.

Here is Anna’s pink and purple origami person.

Anna and Josie are making their origami people.

Here is Anna and Josie attempting the dance that the ladies showed them.

 

Here is a video of Anna ‘dancing’ with the ladies.

 

Here is a video of Anna doing a three count bow.

 

JES Track Meet 2011

Last week Jay Elementary School held its annual track meet.  Anna got fifth place in the 50 yard dash and first place in the 100 yard dash

 

Here is the video of Anna’s 100 yard dash race. 

 

 

Anna and Josie pose for a picture after the 50 yard dash.

 

Isabelle got fifth place in both the 50 yard dash and in the 100 yard dash.  Here is the video of Isabelle’s 100 yard dash race.

 

 

Jada and Isabelle pose after the 50 yard dash.

The girls enjoyed their race day!

Mother’s Day Weekend

For Mother’s Day we decided to go camping about 30 minutes away at Munson. Because it is so close, we left Thursday afternoon and drove back and forth for school and church. We went with some friends who are always a big help and also make our trips more fun for the girls! Thanks to the Lowry’s!

 

One of Luke’s favorite parts of the weekend was feeding the ‘feesh’ as he calls them. At one point there was so much bread in the water that the fish weren’t even hungry anymore. But Luke continued to throw the bread in anyway.

Anna and Isabelle enjoyed swimming in the ice cold lake. It was hot enough outside that they could get in and cool off and then get out for while to warm up. Luke however, was having no part of that. I put his feet in and he stuck his arms up and didn’t want to be in the water.

Isabelle decided to make a ‘funny’ face for this picture.

We all took bike rides around the campground (I had to push the bike up some of the hills) but we did it. Will had Luke in the bike trailer for this picture so you can’t see him or Will.

Luke was a little tired from this particular bike ride.

We also discovered that like most boys I know, he is a pyromaniac. He loved throwing things into the fire. He even threw a plastic toy shovel into the fire that I had to get out real quick.

We took some pictures as a family.

And as a group.

Luke spent much of his time in his little fence. He really enjoyed it when the girls got in and played with him.

All in all it was a spectacular trip and we have plans to do it again. Hope everyone else’s Mother’s Day weekend was as much fun as ours!