Wednesday, August 11, 2010

School Days

My Elle is starting Kindergarten in a little over a week. I have very mixed feelings about this. I am not ready to have her gone for all those hours a day. Once school starts, I feel like I hardly see them. On the other hand, she is going to LOVE it. She constantly asked when she will get to start. Today we went to see her classroom. It is so cute! I wish I had a picture. I am sure I will post about the first day with pics of her and the teacher later. We saw the class list on the wall too. Get this!! Of 16 kids, there is an Elle, Ella, Ella, Ali, Ally. Try that tongue twister! There is also an Elijah and an Ethan. I pity that poor teacher! My mom thought maybe she could just assign them numbers and then call them that...Hey #5, get off that counter...not so sure about that. There are a multitude of reasons that I am thankful I am not a Kindergarten teacher. We all have our gifts and coralling 16 five year olds isn't my idea of a good time!

Sunday, August 8, 2010

Overnight with Ali

Ali invited us to come to a movie in the park, spend the night and then go to the zoo the next day! My kids think that anything with Ali is the best.

Don't they look excited to go! Actually, this is when we were having a little van trouble on the side of the road. They were not impressed. Soon I figured out that we actually ran out of gas! Can you believe in this day and age that someone could run out of gas!! There was a sunglasses case in front of my gauge and gas light. Bummer. Thankfully, Ali called Holly, and Will came to the rescue with some gas!! Thanks guys!!
Only Aunties have cupcakes with sprinkles that the kids can put on themselves...

What a crew! It was fun to be with A. Denise and Sue and some of the Thames/Schroeders joined us. It was a great chaotic supper!!

Little Arawen loved her cupcake!
Movie in the park. It was $0.50 to get in to see Monsters and Aliens on the big screen! How fun!
Reese was convinced she was 16. She sat by Suzanna for a while...
...then started bugging Hannah...
...then got by Caralee too! Once I looked down and Reese was watching Hannah, who was watching the movie! Yikes! At least the Thames girls are wonderful role models so I hope Reese looks up to them as she gets older!!
The kids playing with Brian's Bible study materials. (sorry Brian!) I think Elle was preaching and Graham was typing in words and the machine was pronouncing them. I am thinking we have been very effective birth control for them! :)

When my kids have the camera, people make great faces b/c they think that they may get deleted. No such luck, Ali! You make me laugh.


Peoria zoo. We happened to go on FREE day! Yeah!! It is a great zoo and a fun day with Grandma and Ali. It was heat index of 107. We spent a lot of time in the fountain. Unfortunately my camera died and missed the soaking kids but we had a great time despite the oppressive heat! Reese's favorites were these little creatures. I don't know what they even were. They were at her level and the first time one came running at the glass, she high-tailed it back to me whining! She soon learned they couldn't get her and sat there for a long time waving at them. She kept saying, "Hey, buddy buddy buddy" over and over.
The ever famous wing span. Miller Park zoo doesn't have this any more. I have pics of it from when I was a kid. I was sad to see it was gone. At least we can still do it in Peoria!!

Thanks for a fantastic get away, Ali! The kids will remember this for a long time! It is so special to have you guys close by and I am so thankful for the example you guys are to them. We love you!!

Summer!

At this house, we are serious about summer. In my opinion, there is no reason for winter. I would love it if it would get COLD, which means it would drop from 60 to 30 overnight and snow for about a week and then the temps would go back up! A week of winter! What a wonderful thing!! Someday, I have plans to have that week of winter and then hit the road like a committed snowbird and return with the crocuses! Enough about winter...we are thoroughly enjoying our summer so maybe winter won't seem so bad.

After supper one night, the clouds came rolling in and I asked them to go out and get the bikes in. It started to sprinkle just as they were finishing. Then it "dumped buckets" according to Elle. They were safe and sound in the garage with barely a drop on them but the rain looked so fun!! They had a great time running in the rain!


Yes, Reese had been stripped to her "unners". Maybe we should move to the country!!






They then got out scooters and rode all around. Soon the bikes came out. Yes...those are the same bikes we were trying to save from the rain in the first place!!

We got some tickets to the Cornbelters game from the library reading program!! The girls and I didn's see very much of the game. We went to the bathroom, bought sweet corn, made hats from the Discovery Museum, rolled down the hill and jumped in the bouncy houses. It was a beautiful evening and we had a great time!