Beg Your Pardon, Yo?

I took Peanut to the gym with me this morning. She enjoys the kid zone there. I also think it's important for fitness to be a part of her daily life and seeing me go will hopefully be a good example. Anywhoooo... after the gym today we rushed home and picked up Skye so I could take them to get their hair did. There was no time for a shower in between. While sitting on the couch in the salon, Michaela turns to me and says "Mom, you look ghetto. You need to do your hair." **Jaw drop** What did you just say? Who's raising this kid?? Seriously. "That is one doodle that can't be undid, home skillet."

Ho, Ho, Ho!

High School Majors???

So...Skye and I attended a parent/student meeting at the high school for all the incoming freshmen. First of all, Skye is going to be a Freshman!!! Second, when did high school becoming so career-oriented?!?! Hoooly. Mooooly. We left there a little excited, a little overwhelmed. The cause of all this confusion? The fact that the classes are divided into 16 "career clusters". Whhaaat? I don't remember this at all from my high school. Which is probably the reason I floated through 4 years taking classes like Mythology and Interior Design, then graduated without a CLUE as to what I was going to do next.

Any-hoosier...in case you're wondering what a career cluster is, it's such things as business, IT, art & communications, hospitality, manufacturing, engineering, etc. Each cluster has a list of classes to take in high school which prepare the student to either enter that field or further their study in college. After a week of reading, studying, pondering, discussing, researching, Skye has come to a decision as to what she would like to "major" in during high school. Ready to find out?? Drumroll please...................

JOURNALISM

Visions of Sugarplums Danced in their Heads

Skye had her Christmas choir concert on Tuesday night. As you can see, I wasn't going to be able to get any good shots with my camera. This was the best I could do. There are 4 choirs in all, this is all of them singing the last song. My little Sugar Plum

Not a Creature Was Stirring...

Not even a mouseMichaela's kindergarten class put on "The Night Before Christmas" this afternoon. They did a great job!

Run, Run As Fast As You Can!

You can't catch me, I'm the Gingerbread Man!

Christmas is upon us! Wooo-Hooo! Michaela has officially taken over as decorator. And please leave the little man in the bottom right corner alone; he's had a rough day.

Our Little Cookie

Fall Colors Have FINALLY Arrived!

Michaela's 6th Birthday!

Peanut's birthday fell on a Friday this year. She shared cupcakes with her kindergarten class, the had pizza with the family. After pizza we went out for ice cream and played at the park. She couldn't look happier, could she?! The library at her school has a Birthday Book Club. We paid $15 to donate a new book to the library, and they put this plate on the inside cover. The bookplate will stay forever and Michaela got to be the first one to check out the new book. It's such a great idea!

Here's a picture of the cool pizza we had for Michaela's birthday dinner...

Her party was on Saturday and we held it at Bouncin' Bears, which is exactly like Pump & Play if you've been there. She had 13 kids from school & church attend- a perfect number.

Michaela & Maryn

Michaela & Connor...

Reiley's 1st Birthday!

Our baby girl turned ONE on October 16!! She would like to thank her fans- I mean grandparents- for her new house. She (and Michaela) love to play with it! Where's the cake??!! She hated it, by the way. We got her a cute baby pumpkin cake which she quickly destroyed. A few minutes later though she just burst into tears. Skye tried to feed her some of the frosting, but she wouldn't have it.

Choir Concert

Skye had her first choir concert a few weeks ago. She's in the center of the back row. The choir did awesome!

The Butterfly Experiment

If you've never ordered a butterfly kit, I HIGHLY recommend it! It was so awesome to watch them grow and change! The caterpillars arrived in this cup and were just tiny little motionless things. Just a few days later they looked like this... A week or so later we had...
All 5 of the caterpillars turned into butterflies which we were able to release in the backyard...

This one sat on Skye's finger before flying away. It was so fun to watch them flutter around before taking off out of sight!

Butterfly #5 only made it this far. He didn't (couldn't?) fly like the others. So we named him Walker John and kept him in his cage until he lived out the rest of his little life. It was so cute to have a butterfly pet for a week :)

So much, so much, so much!

To blog about! I had to take notes just to remember it all! There is more to come later after I upload my pictures, but for now my current complaint is all about Thanksgiving.

Our family is having Thanksgiving alone for the first time in my memory's history. Well, not entirely. Mom works at the temple until 3pm at which time she better be joining us. But after last year's family feast with many, many visiting relatives it seems strangely sad to count so few for our table. But I won't let it keep me down. I've got a plan! Well, not entirely. But I have some ideas for a new tradition...

* Run in a turkey trot (I've talked about it for several years)
* Volunteer at a soup kitchen

What traditions does everyone else have for Thanksgiving (aside from the usual cooking)??

Mojo

Us after enduring ZZ Top and waiting for Tom to really start the night. Ooooh! The excitement!Check out Skye! She was SO happy!

Mmmmm....Tom...

Mike Campbell.

The Waiting really is the hardest part. Tom had to reschedule his May performance in Houston due to Mojo's release date being pushed back. I FINALLY got to see him last Friday. As always, he was A*M*A*Z*I*N*G!!! Since he rescheduled to a weeknight, Mike had to work so I took Skye to her very first concert. She enjoys Tom enough to make it worthwhile to give her my extra ticket. We were row 14 (my closest yet), but way to the side. It worked out well though because we were right under one of the large screens- which is why the pictures on my camera phone look so good. Skye said it was "the best night of my entire life!!!" Glad I could help.

Look Out, Sista...

there's a new diva in town! Michaela got out the camera tonight to take some pictures (her new favorite hobby). All she had to do was aim it at Reiley and the Bug immediately turned and gave her this shot. SO FUNNY!
Sisters...

The Cockroach Crawl

Daddy & Reiley

This is Reiley's Justin Beiber look...(sorry about the leftover food on the face)

We just think this is funny...


And this is the video proving Reiley is now mobile! I call it the cockroach crawl because it's exactly what she resembles with one leg out like that. I think though that it is her clever way of handling the dress issue.

First Day of School, and Other Stuff

Other parents are rejoicing in the fact that school started this week, but I feel like I'm treading water with all the stuff I have to juggle. And the homework hasn't even really begun yet. I think I can, I think I can, I think I can...

So enough of my complaining. On to the excitement of the first day of school! Michaela started Kindergarten! Walking to pick her up I had visions of us holding hands all the way home while she told me every detail of every moment of her first day of Kindergarten. Here's how it really went...

Me: "How was your day??!!"

Michaela: "Good!"

"So what was your favorite part?"

"We got to go outside to play!"

"Yeah, recess is so fun!"

"What was your next favorite thing?"

"Lunch time. Because we get to talk and eat. **singing now**talk and eat, talk and eat."

"Fun! What else did you like about the day?"

"Rest time!"

Ok, I see how this is going to go. She then tripped on the sidewalk, wailed (I mean wailed) at the new boo-boo on her arm, and continued to cry all the way home in front of every other kid & parent on the street. But all & all, a great beginning!

1/2 an hour after picking up Michaela, we pile into the car to go pick up Skye from her first day of 8th grade.

When we arrive, Skye is busy chit-chatting with friends. But she stops immediately when she sees me and runs to the car. She is smiling ear-to-ear. Her reaction to the first day...

"I LOVE my classes! I LOVE my teachers! I LOVED seeing my friends. This is going to be a great year!"

Oh, I love it when they're happy.

We drove up to Dallas Friday night to see some family. Aunt Mary & Uncle Ray have a little farm. I think I've posted pictures about Dolly the Goat before. Anyway, the girls rode horses- Michaela for the first time. Isn't this a great pciture??



And we thought this would be a great photo...The beautiful blonde is my cousin, Catherine. She has 3 boys and I have 3 girls. Get it? :)

Kayaking the Bayou!

If you're not a native Houstonian, you may be surprised to learn there is a bayou running through the center of the city. I was. Mom & I found out that we can kayak the bayou! It was so great. We took along 2 of mom's friends, or rather I got to be included in their plans because they needed a fourth person. :) Whatever. I was just happy to go kayaking! The trail we rode was 8.4 miles. Apparently there are more (3?) paddling trails in the city and several oustide the city. I see my future.

This picture was taken near the end of the 2 1/2 trip...

This is more typical of what we saw all along the way...trees. It was beautiful and reminded me a little of Michigan; except the water was so muddy gross.
This is where we landed. Awesome!


Here is Mom & I at the end, having survived the bayou!

Feeling Creative?

A most noteworthy blog has come to my attention. Check it out, then let me know if you can ever take a normal picture of the kids again.

http://milasdaydreams.blogspot.com

Finally! An Update...

So I'm still being blog-lazy, but at least it eventually gets done.

Papa & Tutu and the grandgirls...

Tutu bought Skye a "Team Jacob" shirt. This was the reaction...

One of Skye's recent drawings...

My pretty girl...

My other pretty girl, licking the brownie bowl...

My other other pretty girl sleeping cutely...

I am so blessed to have such an amazing family!!!