Catch Up Part 2: Birthday

Audrey turned SIX this month - hard to believe!  The same week she turned 6, I got a notice that it was time to reserve Bridget's spot for Pre-K next fall.  Talk about being punched in the gut twice in one week - quit growing up so fast kids!

Audrey was telling me early in the month about a conversation that she had with a classmate that cracked me up.  Her friend said "I only know one person with a birthday in December."  Audrey "Yeah... me!"  Friend: "Uh... I was talking about Jesus."  Audrey learned that December isn't all about her! ;)

She ended up having a 3 day long birthday celebration.  Her class did their holiday party on her birthday, so Andy brought in doughnuts for the class in the morning and I went at noon for her holiday party, where the kids sang and we decorated gingerbread (graham cracker) houses.

Out of the blue on the week of her birthday, she mentioned that she wanted an American Girl doll.  As much as I didn't want her getting into AG stuff, I didn't have any great ideas for her birthday gift, so after work, we all headed down to the mall so she could pick out her very first AG doll, who she named Britney.

On Saturday, we had to hurry from ballet, to Tyler's 9th (!) birthday party at Sky Zone, back home for Audrey's party.  Here is Bridget at Sky Zone - the place is pretty cool - it's an indoor trampoline place, but it was packed so it was a little overwhelming for the girls.  They were only brave enough to venture out on the big trampoline and skipped the foam pit and dodge ball (I don't blame them for that one - they were the only girls at the party and would have been clobbered!).

Audrey wanted a sleepover for her birthday, but she is a little to young for that, so we decided to do a pajama party.  We invited her BFFs over to watch a movie in their jammies and it turned out to be so much fun!

They didn't actually do a lot of movie watching, but that's ok!  At one point, they were trying to sneak up on Andy and were crawling on the floor under the desk giggling - pretty sneaky!  Here are the rest of the party pictures:
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Her 3rd birthday celebration was the family party on Sunday since the cousins couldn't come to her girls only jammie party!  I was a little tired of celebrating her birthday at that point! ;)

Last Friday, Bridget had her Christmas party at school where they sang and did a book exchange.  Bridget ended up with the book we brought in, but she didn't know any better, so that's ok!

A couple of weeks ago, Audrey came up to me and in a sing-songy voice, said "You need to tell me congratulations!"  She had lose tooth #3!  It was one of her upper front teeth.  Since then we have discovered that she has 3 more loose teeth - I don't know how she's going to eat soon!  That first upper tooth hung on for dear life and finally, last night, she got brave enough to let Andy pull it.  She looks so cute and talks funny without that tooth!

And finally, I have some cutesies instead of funnies today!

Bridget was singing and Audrey told her to be quiet because she was hurting her ears.  B got real sad and said "Audrey, you hurt my heart." :(

Audrey was being sweet with Bridget and I heard her say "I feel like I could just hug you all day.  You have been infected with cuteness!"

We hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas!

Catch Up Part 1: November

OK, so I am way behind on the blog!  Let's start back at Thanksgiving....

The holiday started with Audrey's class program.  The entire kindergarten was in the cafeteria and put on a little play and sang a couple of songs.

Her class has 2nd grade reader buddies who helped them type up "How to Make a Turkey."  There were Audrey's instructions.

And her drawings of what she is thankful for:

Her class learned about the Mayflower and had to draw it and write something that they learned.  She wrote: "It was dirty.  No bathrooms."  :)

Bridget's class didn't really do anything, but here is a little B brag - I am so proud of her letters!  Audrey couldn't do most of her letters until after she was 4 (and her handwriting is still pretty bad), but Bridget is doing so well with her penmanship!

We decided to host Thanksgiving this year because I have never roasted a turkey before and wanted to try it.  It turned out pretty good it I do say so myself!  I forgot to get a picture of it, so here is an adorable picture of the kids table instead!

On the last day of November, we heard the door bell ring and when we answered it, Kevin had arrived from the North Pole!

Santa Store

I still have to do a Thanksgiving post, but I wanted to get this on too...

Audrey got to shop in the Santa Store at school. I gave her money to pick out presents for me, Andy and Bridget. Just as I suspected, she was SO excited by her gifts that we had to open them tonight. She picked out a stuffed walrus for B, a tape measure/level for Andy, and some gorgeous earrings for me!

The Artist

You've gotta love an almost 6 year old with an iPod touch!

The Write In Candidate

Audrey: "I'm voting for Mitt Romney on Tuesday."

Bridget: "I'm voting for McDonald's!"

Happy Election Day!

Fall Fun

We had a busy October!  We decided to try a different pumpkin farm this year because we didn't have the time to drive all the way to the mountains to go to Bert's.  We went to a local farm called the Kinsey Family Farm.  There were some animals to feed and pet, a hayride (which we didn't do) and of course, pumpkins.  They didn't have any of the cool big pumpkins like Bert's does, but we got our pumpkin and some yummy local honey.

I helped Audrey decorate a cutout as Rapunzel and then went and painted pumpkins with her class one Friday (personal brag - I drew that Pascal on Rapunzel's shoulder). :)

Bridget also brought home adorable Halloween artwork:

She had her last soccer practice last week.  After loving the first week, she cried every other week and was very happy that it was her last practice.  They played a 3 on 3 game during the practice (B's first and last soccer game!) and then got little medals for participating.  When I asked her if she wanted me to sign her back up next season, she yelled "NO!"

She started taking ballet at the daycare and is loving that, so we now have 2 little ballerinas in the family. This is a picture that the daycare director took for me - what a sassy ballerina!

Last weekend we had a neighborhood Halloween party and hayride, and then Andy and I went to a Halloween party in downtown Roswell.

I drug Andy and a few other folks to the Roswell Founders Cemetery at midnight, but we didn't see any ghosts!

The girls raked it in while trick or treating.  Poor Bridget came home from daycare with a slight fever that day, so I gave her some Tylenol and had Andy bring the wagon.  Sure enough, she ended up getting in the wagon about half way around the neighborhood.  Audrey's bag got heavy towards the end and she told Andy that she was done and was just going to go up to the doors and tell people "Hello."  He told her that she can tell the neighbors "Hello" any time but this is the one day that they will give her candy!

Last but not least, Amos got to go trick or treating for the first time.  He was the official wagon-puller for the night!

Kindergarten Conference

We had our first parent/teacher conference with Audrey's kindergarten teacher today.  She said that Audrey is doing really well and is really starting to blossom.  She said that needs to work on her reading comprehension - if she asks her questions after a story, Audrey can't tell some of the points of the story (setting, plot points).  We also have to work on some handwriting issues (no spaces between words) and she said that Audrey likes to make her letters look fancy by drawing swirls on them, which is cute but not what she needs to be doing in class!  She also said that Audrey is quiet in class (she must save all of her talking for home!) and that when they do group activities, Audrey will just grab her stuff and work on it by herself instead of working with the group, but that is probably just her personality.  Personally, I would rather work by myself too!

All in all, she isn't worried about Audrey having any issues this year.  She said that she is a very sweet girl and she enjoys having her in her class!

Kindergarten Post

We are about 2 months in now and Audrey loves kindergarten!  Here is one of my favorite pictures from her at the bus stop because she doesn't look like such a big girl - she looks more like my little baby.

They knew what they were doing when they put Audrey in Mrs. Pierce's class because her teacher is a science lover like Audrey's folks!  Every Friday, they have science day.  Audrey has a little notebook that she writes/draws about the experiments that they do. They even have to form a hypothesis before the experiment.  She comes home talking about how fire needs oxygen and it lets off carbon monoxide and about how vinegar and baking soda make a chemical reaction - pretty big words for a 5 year old!

She also loves music and art class.  She came home with this picture of Rapunzel and Pascal (he is eating a fly).  The lines in Rapunzel's hair are the braids and ribbons.

 For this one, the art teacher told them to draw an owl and then draw something funny with it.  There is a girl sitting on a stool playing a harp and a disco ball with Audrey's owl.  :)

Her teacher's assistant told us on curriculum night that she is an art major and loves Audrey's drawings because they are always so colorful and detailed.  She said that she doesn't even have to look at the name on   the pictures to know which ones are Audrey's!

A couple of weeks ago they had a Fun Run to raise money for playground equipment and library books.  You could either make a flat donation or donate per lap and to be honest, I didn't think Audrey would run too many laps, so I just made a flat donation.

 I went to watch during my lunch break and Audrey surprised me by taking the run very seriously.  She would not pose for a picture for me and when I left an hour later, she was still running!  There were a few kids who were in tears and whining after about 10 laps but Audrey was a running machine!

This past week, I volunteered as a classroom helper.  On the day I was there, the kids were having reading groups and Audrey goes to another class for her group.  The group I worked with was still working on drawing upper and lower case "A's."  Audrey came back from her reading group with the following sheet (they are writing sentences and then illustrating them).

She is picking up so fast on her reading that she is now reading bedtime stories to me and Bridget.

Here is one last photo of my pretty girl from Hat Day:

Soccer Pictures

I just wanted to pop in real quick and post a link to the rest of the soccer pictures!

Soccer pictures

Soccer Star

This will be another short post because our wireless box is dead so I am typing this on my phone!

This summer, Bridget told us that she would like to play soccer. Neither Andy or I have any interest in soccer, so we don't know where this idea came from, but we signed her up. She has been telling people "I playing soccer!" for weeks now and her first practice was finally on Friday night.

She got some new pink sneakers and tells everyone that they make her run super fast. She then demonstrates by running in a super fast circle! Her little pink shin guards go half way up her legs but they don't slow her down.

At this age, soccer practice is mostly just an introduction to the sport. Andy got a lot of cute pictures of her out on the field kicking her little ball, but I will have to upload them when we get a new wireless box. She had a wonderful time and has been asking when she gets to go back!

Also, while I'm bragging on B, she brought home the worksheet below from preschool and I thought she did a great job on her letters!

Pinterest Project

This was my Pinterest inspired project for today. Each girl has a box to save special school work in with folders for each grade. Bridget will have to quit after 9th grade though because I ran out of tabs. ;)

Camping

We took the girls on their first camping trip last Sunday night.  Bridget was SO excited on Sunday morning and got dressed in a camo shirt and khaki cargo shorts.  My little diva, however, did not really want to go camping.  "I think I see rain clouds.  I don't want to see a bear.  I'll just have someone babysit me.  And I am not wearing camouflage or khaki!!"  She insisted on wearing a skirt camping and in the car on the way to the campground, she said "I am never doing this again!!"

After all of the drama, she ended up having a great time!

It was kind of a rainy night, but some how we lucked out on getting rained on too bad.  We went on a hike on the Appalachian Trail.  The girls like to pick up acorns and pretty rocks while in the woods, so they had their little bags and were collecting "treasures" along the way. (Side note: Bridget collected a bunch of acorns on our trip.  On Tuesday, when I picked up the girls from daycare, Audrey said "Bridget, I got you something!"  She reached into her pocket and pulled out 4 acorns that she found on the playground at VCE and grabbed for her little sis - so sweet!)  Bridget had a foot growth spurt recently and the only shoes that fit her were some floral Mary Jane type shoes and Crocs.  Not thinking, we took a hike in the Crocs, which led to a blister.  We had to turn around on our hike sooner than planned because of this and it started pouring down rain as soon as we made it back to the tent.

It let up long enough for us to make hot dogs over the campfire, then it poured again.  We got another little reprieve from the rain long enough to make smores.  Audrey ate one and then asked if she could just eat the chocolate.  Bridget ate the marshmallow that was squishing out of hers, threw the rest to the dogs and asked for some chocolate too!

Since we were confined to the tent, we had to find stuff to do to keep the girls occupied.  Audrey and I recently started our first chapter book, so she and I read that.  Andy taught Bridget how to play War, which in B's rule book, her cards are always higher!

The next morning, we went fishing in the lake we were camping off of.  Here was our big catch - I told Andy that he could brag to his friends that he caught a fish on a Disney Princess pole!

I think the girls both enjoyed their first camping trip and as a bonus, Andy realized that campgrounds with bathrooms are not necessarily a bad thing!

Enjoy the rest of the pictures - I have lots of stuff about school to post when I get a chance!

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