Swimming Lessons 2012

For the month of May the kids took swimming lessons at our local Y. It was a first for all of them. 

For Lillie who is a natural fish in the water and has basically taught herself to swim it served to refine her skills and she is now awesome in the water! She can go to the deep end by herself now and swim around for hours without me having to worry. I am so proud of her! 

For Samuel and Grant it really helped to alleviate their fears of the water. 

Samuel will now jump into the deep end as long as I am there to catch him. He swims underneath the water like a pro. He completely has the skills to take of himself in the deep end now he just needs to build up his confidence!

Grant did amazingly well with his lessons and really grew to trust his teacher. Before his lessons I couldn't get him to go into the pool unless he was in a life jacket and clinging to me with all four limbs. After his first lesson her learned to trust his life jacket and now paddles around the pool with the best of them! He is also comfortable now with water going on his head and will go off the slide into the deep end as long as I am there to catch him. 

I'm so proud of you guys!

So in Samuel's class there was a little girl there that was smitten with him! After the lessons the kids would go to the splash park right next to the pool. On the last day of lessons this little girl runs up and grabs Samuel's hand and drags him around for about 15 minutes. There was even a point where she forced his hand to her hip and held on to the other one and tried to teach him to dance with her. The entire time he kind of followed her around in a daze. He had an attitude that said "um, I don't really know what's going on here. I'm not sure how I feel about this. I guess I'll just let this girl drag me around. What is happening to me!?!" When she left he stood in the same spot and stared into space for a minute or two. He seemed so confused by what had happened poor little guy! 

Here you can see Grant coming to the rescue. He kept poking Samuel and saying "hey, what wrong?" until Samuel broke out of his daze. Too funny!

Last day of Kinder and 2nd Grade

The last day of the 2011-2012 school year was a lot of fun. All of us were very, VERY ready for Summer to start! On the other hand both Lillie and Samuel had a great year in school and it was hard to say goodbye to such wonderful friends and teachers. 

The kids made artwork for their teachers for the last day of school.

Samuel's Kinder teacher was Bonnie Miller and we were so blessed to have her to teach Samuel his first year in school. She loves teaching and you can tell that she truly loved each of her kids. She even made the special effort to come to Samuel's soccer games. Under her tutelage Samuel became the number one reader in the class and he is almost passed the reading level that he needs to pass 1st grade! This year Samuel's favorite thing to do in school was computers and he ended the year saying that he wants to be an engineer. I think he means structural engineer because he is always taking things apart and then trying to build them again. We'll miss you Mrs. Miller! Thank you for giving Samuel and wonderful first year in school!

Here is Samuel's Artwork for her:

I love how Samuel titled her as "Miller" Too cute!

Lillie's 2nd grade teacher was Melitsa Pena and we absolutely loved her! She was a perfect fit for Lillie. She loved her and she loved to teach her. She provided lots of challenges and opportunities for Lillie and we saw Lillie grow and shine even more this year in school. This year, as in all previous years Lillie's favorite thing to do in school was art. 

Here is Lillie's letter to Mrs. Pena:

This last picture depicts and Oklahoma University football helmet. This year at their school Lillie's classroom represented OU. They became pen pals with them and learned all about going to college there. 

Samuel and Mrs. Miller

Their college for the year was UCONN and Samuel is dead set on becoming a real UCONN Husky one day :)

Samuel and his best friend Jose

Grant and Lillie enjoying the last day of school party

Lillie and Mrs. Pena

Lillie and her best girlies. From L to R: Abby, Sophia, Seraiah, and Lillie

Mrs. Miller presenting Samuel with his Kinder diploma:

Lillie and some of her classmates:

Girl Scout Bridging Ceremony 2012

At the end of the school year Lillie had her Girl Scout bridging ceremony. It's where you move from being a daisy to a brownie, or a brownie to a junior, etc. Lillie didn't technically "bridge". 2nd and 3rd graders are brownies but she was the only girl in her troop not moving up so her troop leader bought her a new sash to fill up next year. 

Lillie just started Girl Scouts at the beginning of 2nd grade, but she has loved it! Of all the extra-curricular activities that she has tried this is the only one that has stuck. She has a great troop leader and has really gotten close with all the girls in her troop. 

Here they are saying the girl scout code:

All of Lillie's activity patches. The patches that she receives for passing off things with her troop are on the front but the back is for individual achievements.

Lillie with Ms. Vicky receiving her new sash:

Some of Troop 3023.

L to R: Lauren, Lillie, Delylah, Ms. Vicky, Emmaleigh, Cedar, Lizzie

Missing: Lumina and Saihke

The girls made life size artwork of themselves. 

What a fun year. We can't wait for Girl Scout camp in August!

Memorial Day BBQ

Our friends the Hardman's invited us over to their house for a backyard water party and BBQ. Our entire family had a great time visiting and playing with friends. Thank you for hosting Rulon and Lori!

Lillie and her friend Asher playing in the pool

Landa Park Aquatic Center

We had a BBQ and went to this great Aquatics center with the same group of friends that we go to the beach with. Here are some of the manly men BBQ-ing the manly meat:

 After lunch we went over to the water. They have got something for everyone there. They have a lap pool and a kids are. But their biggest attraction is the river pool. A clear as glass river runs through the park and they captured the river to make this huge pool. The entire thing ranges from 6 to 9 feet deep. You can't tell in the pics but the water is clear and you can see pretty far down into it. The boys had life jackets and Lillie is a good swimmer so we had a nice time. Here is Lillie coming down the huge slide:

 The boys on the little blue slide:

G:

 S:

1.  Tim with some of the Young Men that came. They spent a lot of the day racing, and trying to outdo each others silly dives into the water. It was a super fun day and a great way to start out the summer.

Fun Projects

Refinishing furniture is one of my favorite hobbies. Lillie got some of my furniture from when I was a little girl and had this dresser to get rid of. Unfortunately I did not take any before and after pics. Picture a 23 year old white dresser with 80's flower decorations and brass hardware. I made it boy for my 2 big guys. They loved that I was painting this for them. They loved even more when I went to Hobby Lobby and bought colorful handles for it. But what they loved the most was filling it with their clothes and organizing all of their Hot Wheels and wooden models on the top. Have fun boys! And please don't climb on top of it to see out of the window. It will fall over. You will break something on your body. 

 At the same time I was painting the dresser I re-did these end tables. I found them as a dumpster dive. What was even more awesome is that they were bare wood so I could do anything I wanted with them. They each had a corner that had been chewed up by a cat or dog but hey, that just adds to the character! I didn't want to spend any money so I just used whatever paint supplies we had in the garage. They now sit on either side of our desk and have helped to clear up lots of space around the computer. I love it when people get rid of perfectly good stuff that I can use!

Mother Daughter Trip to Ohio

Lillie and I took a trip to Ohio for 7 days in May. We went to visit my Best Friend Dale and help her out. She was diagnosed with Breast Cancer in February and has been going through Chemo treatments. The chemo that she is receiving now is not nearly as toxic as her first round and it doesn't have all of the terrible side effects of it either. But it does make her extremely tired. So I went to visit and help take care of her kiddos for the week. She invited Lillie to come as well and it was great to bring her. It was pretty special to take such a big trip just the two of us.

Here we are in the plane as we head out of SA:

 Dale has a little girl named Lauren that is the same age as Lillie. They were shy at first but by the end of the car ride from the airport they were the best of friends. They stayed up late every night and Joe (Dale's Husband) ended up with the nick name "The Enforcer" as he would sit by their bedroom door each night to make them fall asleep. I caught them early one morning down in the basement playing kinectables. 

 We went garage sale-ing and found matching angel costumes for $1. They ran around in these all week and put on lots of "shows" for us to watch.

 I took the kids to see the movie "Mirror Mirror" while Dale got some much needed rest. They loved the movie but the best part was at the end when the credits were rolling. The girls and Dale's son Jacob started dancing to the music a little. Then they started dancing more and more and more. They ended up moving out into the aisle following the dance moves of the characters on the screen. They were dancing up and down the aisle completely oblivious to the fact that the audience was watching them and not the screen. It was pretty cute!

 The girls helping Joe plant a vegetable garden

 Jacob as Batman. The kid ran around in this costume every single day. He also had a Robin costume that I had to wear a lot. We were good crime fighting buddies!

 As the week went on Dale's tiredness began to wear off and we were able to do some fun things together. Here we took the kids to the Columbus Zoo:

 This Polar Bear was so cute and entertained us with a lot of water tricks.

 These bats are called Wolf Bats (I think) and they were huge! It made me think that if Vampires were real and they actually turned into bats then this is what they would look like. 

 Took a drive through the OSU campus

 ...and couldn't resist getting a shot with Brutus.

Here we are, Batman and Robin, the unstoppable duo!

 Audrey and Dale. Twelve years ago a cancer diagnosis for one of us would have felt unbelievable. To me it still feels unreal. But Dale is one of the bravest people I know and a serious fighter. Her friend summed it up best when she said "Cancer picked the wrong person to mess with!" She is right. I don't know anyone more competitive than Dale and she wants to win this fight bad. She does everything that she can to give herself and her family the most normal life possible right now. And spending time with her and seeing her perspective has helped me to cherish my own life even more. From the scans that she has had it looks like all of her treatments are working and the tumors are shrinking. She will be done with Chemo at the end of June and have a double mastectomy in August. She will then have to be scanned every three months and have to wait a year to be deemed cancer free. When that happens they are throwing a big cancer free party and I told her, "I will be there!" I love her so much and I am so grateful that I know her!