Getting close to Summer!

Academic Fair at school. 5th graders each did a presentation on a state. Bella chose Wyoming since we are going there this summer.


Graydon and Curtis also had presentations, but I'm kicking myself because I forgot to take pictures of them. Graydon had an ipad presentation that he researched on John Adams. Curtis had a digital book report on "If You Give A Moose A Muffin". Both did excellent.

Andy went on a field trip with Graydon's class to the recycling center. It ended up being a good thing that he was there. Graydon's allergies flared up and his eyes got so red and itchy that Andy had to take him away and get some medicine. After a bit he was feeling better and was able to rejoin his class.


We were given some tickets to the Indianapolis Indians game, so Andy and I took the boys to a game (Bella was at a sleepover).






The boys moved up in Cub Scouts!


















Our elementary youth group went to play laser tag. The place also had this magnetic spider wall that the kids enjoyed.

Mabel is ONE!

Our puppy turned ONE on May 20th! Here are some highlights from her first year.

Mabel has such a fun, playful personality. She's a little shadow. If someone gets up from a room she is in, she gets up too and follows them to wherever they're going. She loves to get her belly rubbed and if you pet her, she lets you know by rolling on to her back. Every once in a while, crazy Mabel comes out. This is when she starts running at full speed, bangs in to the wall or door and then immediately heads in the opposite direction only to bang off of that. That can last for a minute or two and always makes us laugh. She's great for getting the kids out of bed when they're moving slowly in the morning by jumping in to bed with them and licking their faces. Her best command is "stay". Sometimes we have to repeat ourselves with the others, but she usually gets "stay" on the first try. She has the biggest grin and we all love to see her smile. Mabel has brought a lot of laughter and craziness to our lives and we love having her in our family.

I made her a special doggy cake for her birthday that made from an egg, peanut butter, flour, and carrots. Only the batter looked more like cookie dough, so I just formed it in to balls and topped them with melted peanut butter. She loves peanut butter.


She waited so patiently while we sang "Happy Birthday" to her.




Time to dig in! She licked the plate clean. :)


Happy Birthday, Mabel!

Mother's Day

I woke up on Mother's Day to this card on my bedside table. It was all Bella's doing and it led my on a little scavenger hunt.


My first stop was the bathroom. She made me some heart-shaped bath bombs!


The next clue led me to the kitchen where she had flowers and another card. The 6th graders at school were selling flowers as a fundraiser for a field trip. The sneaky girl bought some for me and then hid them in her backpack until we got home.  She sure knows how to make her mom feel loved!


Our church service was early that day and we were home by 10:15am. That is unheard of on a Sunday. And, we had the whole day completely open - no evening church service. Plus, the weather was absolutely perfect. There's been a lot of rain lately, but we couldn't have designed a more perfect day for Mother's Day.


We had a pizza lunch on the deck. I drank a mimosa.


I took the day off from doing any school work. I'm in two condensed eight week courses right now and the workload is high - especially with my job and our kids' busy schedules. It was nice to take the day off.


The boys made me some really sweet cards and then everyone brought out my new gift: a Blendtec! We've been making a lot of smoothies for a while now and I've been wanting a high-powered blender to really blend up things like kale and nuts. This thing is awesome and exactly what I wanted!

We played some noodle tag, baseball, and then got out the slip n' slide. Lots of quality family fun. It was the kind of day where I was already missing it and it wasn't even over.






We tried a new restaurant for dinner that evening.


And I got a back rub that night. If I could have figured out a way to stretch out time, I would definitely have done it on this day.

May Days

Baseball/softball season has officially begun! All three kids are playing this year!






Curtis had a little more fun playing in the rocks than watching the game.


The boys are on the same team this year.


Strike a pose!


And another.


Our school got some new playground equipment.


A field trip with Curtis's class.




This is the look of a very distraught boy whose fidget spinner was supposed to come in the mail that day. He had counting down the days since the confirmation email said it would be arriving only to come home from school that day and find out that it would be delayed another five days!


The boys finally camped out in the tent.


All three kids participated in an Elementary Fun Run. Bella was our main kid who wanted to do it and the boys kind of went along with it.




The boys' race was 1/2 mile. Neither of them have much experience with running. I think that both took off a little faster than they should and wore out in the middle. But they both finished strong!






First and Second graders raced separately. Now it was Graydon's turn.






Bella was in the 5/6th grade race. She has a little more running experience than the boys. She joined a club at school called Girls On The Run. They meet twice a week after school and they've been training for a 5k. Unfortunately, we'll be out of town for the 5k (Bella knew that even before signing up, but she still wanted to do the club). Since she couldn't do the 5k, we decided to sign her up for the Fun Run.




She ended up finishing in the top 5 girls and got a special ribbon!


Later that afternoon, Graydon went to a birthday party at a roller skating rink. There was a limbo contest and he won! Sometimes being a small, skinny guy has its perks! He got a free soda out of it.