Tuesday, September 24, 2013

First Day of School! ~ A Little Late ~

This year's start of school has been very non-traditional.  Since we were moving right around the start of school I notified our previous school and tried to enroll in our new school so we'd be all set to start as soon as we got here.  It turned out to be not so easy as I had hoped.  There were quite a few hoops to jump through and forms to fill out and materials to be shipped and it was kinda crazy.  I'm sure everyone at my kids' new school knows me by name I called them so many times.  We actually just got our loaner computers today (laptops, yay!!) and our last box of books that somehow got separated from the others, so we are official now.  We've been doing school for about a week but it hasn't felt like 'real' school because we were missing some books and we were sharing one computer and it just wasn't the structured day that we were used to, but we got stuff done and that's all the matters.  Since we didn't really have an official 'first day' I kinda forgot about taking their pictures too.  So these were a couple days in, but hey, I do what I can.  I cannot believe how big my kids are getting and that my baby is in second grade!  School is actually so much easier I've noticed because my boy is reading better than ever now and can do so much more on his own.  I can't wait to see how well they are both doing by the end of this year.  Here are just a few pics from our first day!

Showing 2 fingers for 2nd grade!  He's getting so big.  A lot of his friends have lost their front teeth so I think he still looks a little young because he has his.  I'm betting he won't lose them until next summer.

4th grade!!  Yikes, my baby girl is growing up so fast!

He does this smile where his eyes are sorta half closed so I kept telling him to open his eyes more and this is the cute face I got.  I love that you can see his dimple so much here!

Pretty girl.

I always have to get one full body shot to see how much bigger they've grown since last year.

As beautiful as this background is, I'm kinda sad that my pictures now don't match from one year to the next. :(  Oh well, get used to it...haha, that's what my kids keep saying whenever myself or one of them complains about how things are different in Florida than Ohio.

The two cutest students ever!!

It's tradition...gotta do the collage of first day shots. :)

I love this one!!

Did one for the boy too!


Here's hoping for an awesome school year!  Better late than never!

Saturday, September 14, 2013

A Day of Celebrating the Birthday Boy

For my baby's birthday this year we didn't have a party.  It would be kinda hard since we hardly know anyone yet.  But his Grandmama did come all the way from Ohio to help celebrate (and to help me a bit too...and I'm sure the fact that we live by the beach had nothing to do with it). :)  Anyway, it was quite different from the normal family shindig we have.  To be honest it was a heck of a lot easier for me and I didn't mind a bit.  And the only complaint from my boy was that he didn't get as many presents as usual, but it could be because some are still in the mail.  He did get one box from his Grandma that he was super excited about, a new putting green!  And we can't forget his $50 from Texas that he was already counting on and was so happy to get.  It's still in the piggy bank for now.

I still wanted his day to be special though so we did do a few things to make it fun.  I hung the balloon/streamer curtain in the hallway to surprise him when he woke up.  Then we let him open one present before my husband went to work.  It was a pretty big deal and if you know me you will know how much when I tell you what it was.  Drum roll please..............................................................................a pet fish!  He has been asking for a pet puffer fish for a couple of years now (which I think is super cute, by the way), but of course, I wouldn't even consider it.  I'm pretty anti-pets.  I'm allergic to everything and I just don't have the energy to deal with what to do with one when we go on vacation, etc.  But...mommy guilt is an amazing thing.  I feel so, so bad about moving our kids so far away from all of their friends that suddenly getting him something that he wanted so bad seemed like a wonderful idea.  Okay, so we didn't get him a puffer fish.  We went to the pet store and got a fish tank and all the decorations and stuff that went with it.  Then you have to set up your tank and wait a couple of days for the water to be okay for fish to live in.  So, we got our fish this morning.  I'm a sucker and we actually come home with not one, not two, but four fish!  Two for each of the kids.  Of course I couldn't not let my girl get a pet too!  I don't have any pics of them yet, but they are cute.  They named them Maggie, Pinky, Blue Laser and Red Laser.  I'll let you guess whose fish is whose. :)

Back to my original story...after he opened the fish tank we got donuts for breakfast.  I let him pick what he wanted to do for the day and he picked, "nothing".  And he meant it.  We sat around all day and did a bunch of nothing and waited for daddy to get home so we could go putt-putt.  Before that we headed to dinner though and he picked Steak and Shake (his new favorite from the survey, I noticed).  Putt-putt was a big hit and then we came home and opened a couple more presents before he went to bed.  I'd say all in all it was a pretty big success.  I think we should do the low key birthday thing more often.  I took a bunch of photos, so without further ado, here they are!

Starting the day off with some fun.

I'm not sure who was more excited about the fish tank, him or her.

During our doing 'nothing' part of the day we got the fish tank all set up.  I have to admit, I really do like it.  I just hope I don't regret it.

While he was doing nothing, I was busy making this cake.  It was hard, but I think it turned out pretty cute.  And most importantly my boy thought it was awesome.

Just hanging out.  I have since cut his hair and he looks so much older now!  I need a new picture.  

I love the hats they give out there.  Too cute.

When we headed over to putt putt she forgot she still had her hat on. :)  She's checking out...

...these guys.  

Putt putting in paradise.  She still hadn't noticed the hat yet. ;)

I've seen these so many times down here and they are just so beautiful.  I love that tropical flowers like this that cost a fortune at home just grow around here like a daisy or something would back in Ohio.


Can you believe this tree growing out and turning at a right angle like that?  So cool!


These trees are everywhere down here and I cannot even explain how beautiful they are!  I love them so much.  My goal is to get some awesome photographs of them.  They are all around our condo complex.


She was bouncing the swinging bridge like crazy so that I couldn't cross.  I love my silly, wild girl.

Back at home and shirtless (of course) and opening more presents.  Grandmama got him a new swimsuit.  He didn't even unwrap it all the way when he realized it was clothes.  Just dropped it in the floor.  Boys...  I appreciate it though and it's totally a cute suit from Janie and Jack. :)

Opening a little Lego set from his sister.  He said, "Now that's more like it!" when he opened it. 

He really wanted Lego Galaxy Squad and Grandmama pulled through with her other gifts.

One happy boy.

He was even building them while blowing out his candles. I'd say he had a pretty great day.

Happy Birthday to my baby.  Yep, my big, giant seven year old baby.  He'll always be my baby!

Friday, September 13, 2013

Turning Seven

Yesterday was my boy's birthday and he turned seven!  I seriously cannot believe that my baby is that old.  It is going way too fast.  I want my squishy toddler back.  Not that I don't love watching him grow up, but man, I miss him being little.  He is getting so big and changing so much but it's fun seeing him turn into a big boy.  I was telling him yesterday how I didn't want him to be seven because I want him to stay little so he can sit in my lap and cuddle me and he told me, don't worry mom, I'm not even 10 yet.  So at least I've got a few more years in his mind at least. :)  He is still the sweetest, cutest, smartest little boy I've ever met and even though I keep teasing him about growing into a big stinky man (he hates when I say that) I am proud of the boy he's becoming and can't wait to see the man he will become some day.  I took some photos of him yesterday on his birthday and I wanted to share them.  We did a bunch of fun things as well, but I'm gonna blog them in a separate post.  Oh, and I did the same little survey I did with him last year on his birthday.  You can check out his answers from when he turned six here.  It's fun to see what changed and what didn't.

~~Dean at Age 7~~
~What is your name?  Dean
~And how old are you? 7
~How does being 7 make you feel? Happy
~What do you want to learn this year? How to get back into Monkey Quest because it used to be really fun and Mommy forgot the code.
~What was the best thing about being 6? Playing Minion Rush on Grandmama's tablet.
~What did you do today?  Opened presents and I'm going to go putt-putt and play on the computer and have cake.
~What is your favorite color? Yellow
~What is your favorite food? Cake and cupcakes
~Who is your favorite person? Ben
~What grade are you in? 2nd
~What is your favorite thing to do at school?  Music
~What is your favorite game to play? Minion Rush
~What do you like to do with Daddy?  Play Monopoly and Chess and stuff.
~What do you like to do with Mommy? Hug her and kiss her and cuddle her.
~What do you like to do with Ava?  Play with her. I like when we play legos and stuff and when she throws Big Bean in my face.

~What’s your favorite thing to do with the whole family? I don't know...movie night?
~What’s your favorite store? Toys R Us
~What’s your favorite place to eat? Steak and Shake. It used to be Culver's but they don't have shakes.
~What’s your favorite book? Fast Food
~What’s your favorite song? I don't have a favorite song.
~What’s your favorite thing about God? That He loves me.
~What do you want to be when you grow up? I don't know, a guy...just a guy who sits there and watches tv (Ava is laughing hysterically and so is he) and go to work. I asked what kind of work he's going to do and he says "play video games and I'll get paid for it".



I love this photo. I love his little smirk. It's so him. I took these photos in the courtyard of our condo building. Condo living is definitely different, but they do have some awesome landscaping that we don't have to take care of...I do like that perk.


My cutie sitting by the fountain. His hair is so long! He wouldn't let me cut it before me moved because he kept saying that if we are moving to the beach he needed to keep his beach hair. Then once we got here he kept saying I couldn't cut it until after his birthday. So guess what I'm gonna do today?


Always jumping. :)


This is his super fake smile, but I still think it's cute.

Have I mentioned we live in a tropical paradise?  It's funny how different these feel than our usual birthday pictures.  It still kinda feels like we are on vacation!


A much more real smile. There was a huge clap of thunder as I was taking these photos (we were only outside for less than 5 minutes) and so we finished up really quickly and he totally cooperated at that point! :) The storms here are crazy and they come and go so quickly. And we also live in the lightning capital of the world (or the US or the state...not sure which). The lightning here is crazy cool.


Seven. He's so happy.

Check back soon and I promise to post about all his birthday fun!

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