School's Over!

The reason I created this blog is for our family, but a huge part of my life is being a teacher too.  I won't post about them often, but school got over yesterday and I just thought I'd make a quick mention of it.  Like every year, there are wonderful kids that you hope your own kids are like when they are 5th graders and there are kids that drive you crazy.  Overall though, they were a great group and I will miss them.  One of the nice things about being a 5th grade teacher though is that I'll get to see them next year.  So, Mrs. Day's class of '08-'09, here's to you. :)

My class after we finished the dance festival.  The boys did the haka, the girls did a hula, and they all danced to a polynesian song together.

Zero

For Christmas we got a dog, whom Emily named Zero (from the dog in Nightmare Before Christmas).  Ashley fell in love with him almost immediately and can't get enough of him.  Every time she comes home, she comes in and "hugs" him, which basically consists of putting him in a headlock and sitting on him.  She will chase after him to hug him.  A couple days ago we left her alone with him for a second and then couldn't find either one.  This is where we finally found her.  This was definitely our laugh for the day.

I wonder what she thought she had done wrong to get sent to the kennel. :)

She was laughing about as hard as we were

Sidewalk Chalk

Ashley's new obsession is sidewalk chalk.  She LOVES it!!  Every time we go near the garage she scream, "wok, wok" (her way to say chalk) and runs to get the chalk.  Emily is a nice sister and helps Ashley draw.  This is their newest creation, a flower.  If you look carefully you can see Ashley's addition (i.e. white line) to the flower.  Not bad for a four year old on the sidewalk.

Mother's Day

Over the past four years since I've had kids, Mother's Day has been pretty uneventful because my girls were so little.  Kenny did his normal things, which are nice, but I was so excited for the day when my kids were old enough to do something for me.  Well, it came this year.  Emily was so excited to make something for me and kept telling Kenny all the things she wanted to do and then would say, "Shh, Mom don't listen, it's a secret."  This morning when she woke up and came in to our room she said, "Happy Mother's Day" and then proceeded to go downstairs and start making my cards.  She spent quite a while on them and kept saying, "Mom, no peeking.  I'm not done yet."  Finally, (I don't know who was more excited, her or me) she folded them in half and with Daddy's help yelled, "Happy Mother's Day" and presented me with the paper.  I was so happy to get something simple yet wonderful from my sweet four year old for Mother's Day.  This has been my best one yet and hopefully just a taste of what is yet to come!

Not bad for a four year old--by the way, the duck looking thing at the bottom is supposed to be a heart, so cute!

She drew a picture of Ashley and Emily for me too

Mother's Day Gift

For my Mother's Day gift this year, Kenny is planting our garden and putting in our flowers in our front area by the stairs.  Emily is old enough this year to be excited about helping so she went out with Kenny and "helped" Daddy plant the garden.  It was quite amusing watching Kenny dig a great hole and then Emily coming along to "smooth it out" (in other words, fill it back in).  At least she was willing to help and had a great time with Daddy helping him do something for me.

I found the camera so here they are:

Doesn't her hole look smooth? :)

ABC's

So Emily is our 4 year old and she has learning her letters, numbers, and sounds over the past couple years.  She is doing really well and can identify all the letters in the alphabet and probably about half the sounds, but when she sings the ABC's she still mispronounces some of the letters.  This is actually so cute to Kenny and me so we decided to video her tonight singing them.  This is one of those times that I created the blog for.  Moments that we adore about our four year old that in just a little while we'd probably forget.

The Zoo

Sitting together in the boat by the crocodiles

Emily was finally brave enough to sit on the big elephant

Emily coming down the slide--a zoo favorite

Ashley coming down the slide--her favorite too

One of the few perks about Kenny's business being really slow right now is that he can sometimes take the girls places together.  On Wednesday he took the two girls to the zoo.  He said they had a blast and Ashley was saying all the animals' names and sounds as they went throughout the park.  An accomplishment for Emily was that she walked throughout the whole park.  According to Kenny it was a very fun day.