Ellie's 5th Grade Awards Ceremony and Big Bash!

Ellie got 10 awards today at the fifth grade award's ceremony!

Ellie volunteered for the Safety Patrol, the Environmental Club, the School Store, and the Broadcaster's Club this year. She also got on the honor roll, and received the Presidential Award for Academics. She was one of only 4 students who received the Presidential Active Lifestyle award for fitness. After the award's ceremony, they had a 5th grade brunch and then did their final walk through the halls of High Shoals Elementary. Later that afternoon, they had their BIG BASH, which consisted of free hotdogs (of which Ellie ate 3!), a water slide, carnival games, music, dancing, hair dying, and a watermelon eating contest... followed by getting sprayed by a fire truck!

Ellie had a bone scan and blood drawn at the endocrinologist... What a brave girl!

My neighbor's son, Wesley, just got training wheels on his bike and had to come down and show them off to me. I was his swim instructor and he's my little buddy. I told Rene that she should put us down in her will to take her kids, ya know, just in case her and TJ died or something. She was like, "Oookaaay". What? Just look at that little face, doesn't it melt your heart???

Emma's art project

Okay, well maybe it was "mommy's" Art Project too, but it was so much fun!

Sam came for a visit this weekend...

Sam (Sandy) came to visit this weekend and we had a ball! The weather was gorgeous! On Saturday, we took the girls to riding lessons and let them show off for us. Afterwards, we dropped them off and went shopping. Later that afternoon, we went to the annual "Movie in the Park". The movie ended up getting rained out, but at least the girls got to play on all the blow up stuff before it rained. It turned out fine because we took our chicken home and had a carpet picnic and watched a movie together.

On Sunday, Mother's Day, all the boys and their gals came over for a cookout. We played bocci, sipped wine on the deck, a few of them took the little ones fishing and caught a bass in one of the neighborhood lakes. The weather was in the 70's... just magnificent!!! The kids gave me cards and flowers picked from their yard and even wrote a poem, which of course made me cry. Sam and I took a long walk on the golf course for the perfect ending of our Mother's Day weekend!!!

Disney on Ice with Suzanne!

Suzanne was able to get 4 Disney on Ice tickets and 2 Mulan dolls through connections at work. So last night we dressed the girls in their Disney princess costumes (luckily, it just happened to be the girls' Halloween costumes this past year.) and took them out to dinner and to the show. The seats were fantastic! The look on the girls faces was priceless. The show had scenes from Cars, Tinker-bell, Little Mermaid, and Toy Story. I wish I had of taken more photos of the show so I could post them here, but instead I took mostly video footage. Of course during intermission, Suzanne couldn't resist spoiling the girls with snow cones in Disney collector's cups and fancy straw/spoons and a big bucket of popcorn. It reminded me of when our boys were about this age and we took them to Medieval Times. What sweet memories we have made together.

Emma's 1st Grade Musical

Emma did a great job in her 1st grade musical! She was bunny #5 and had a speaking part. She remembered all her lines and I think was the loudest one! There were 2 showings, one at 9:00 am and one at 7:30 pm. Keith was out of town, so he couldn't be there, but we taped it for him. Alex and Laurel came to the morning performance since Alex had to work that night. Tyler, Emily, Drew, Haley, and Daniel Sires all came to the evening performance. Laurel and Haley have finals this week. It was so sweet of them to take a break from studying to make it to the musical. Alex and Emily were celebrities. All the kids know Alex from his job with the parks and rec. I think they thought he came to see them. The parents and kids that graduated from Emily's class were thrilled to see her there. Of coarse no family event would be complete without a mop fight, lol. We went out the back doors of the auditorium to avoid the crowd and low and behold there were mops just waiting to be used as swords. Afterwards Drew, Haley, and Daniel came over for a bite to eat and a dance party, of coarse. Shoot, I should have gotten pictures of that!