Hopping Back To Easter

Yes, I realize that Easter was in March - but hey, better late to blog than never, right!! Seriously, I have this smaller camera that I keep in my diaper bag for those "man, I wish I had my camera" moments - and sometimes I forget to download the pictures from it - i.e. some of these Easter pictures!

So above is Easter morning - can't you tell, the boys are still in their PJs. Sorry, Daddy - I didn't even give him a chance to do his hair! And Evan, he's just eyeing his bottle like "hey, I was eating before this silly picture!"

Easter was a little crazy this year because we had just moved into the house, so the house was still a wreck and pure chaos! But let us never be too busy to celebrate the resurrection! And as we always do - we celebrated with our friends, The Bradleys. Of course, our day started with Easter baskets - followed by a lovely service at church, a delicious lunch and Easter egg hunt! Thank you, Aunt Tasha, for putting on the hunt this year as my Easter stuff was still buried in the garage! We have so many special traditions with the Bradleys, this is just one of our annual events...

The thrill of the hunt...





Here's the whole gang... Preston is laughing because I had to set the camera timer and then RUN to get into the picture, literally throwing him onto my lap! Evan is eating, as was usual at this time in his life!



And here we are at the Sipes' house for a grand Easter egg hunt and party! Thanks for hosting all of us - you are such amazing friends to us, we can't imagine not having you in our lives! The Sipes have three boys of their own... we must all drink the same "boy" water because we sure have a bunch of them in our group!



Evan chillin' outside... oh, the days where he was happy to just sit and "be"... they are no more!



Two buddies - Mason and Preston. They have literally grown up together. They are five weeks apart in age and have known each other since birth. I hope that they will always be friends... I have great visions of them going off to A&M together!

Scrapbook Weekend

So, I guess it was about three years ago when my dear friend, Tasha (in the red shirt), invited me to a "scrapbook retreat". And although, at the time, I was not a scrapbooker and didn't know what to expect - I decided to go to just catch up on projects and really just get away for a relaxing mommy weekend! Well, I am so glad that I went and after going to about two retreats I decided that I would give scrapbooking a try - and of course, I have been addicted ever since! And since I never do anything half-way, I have been collecting every whosit, whatsit, gidget and gadget for scrapbooking since I started this madness! I love all the great papers and embellishments too - I would have never thought I would have become such a scrapbook junkie! Hee hee! And even though I am sooo far behind on scrapbooking, it is just a relaxing, creative outlet and a great way to spend time with good friends! Check out these pictures below... this is our view from the crop room, sooooo beautiful.





As you can see, this place that we went to last month was absolutely gorgeous. I guess I've been to about ten retreats now and this is my favorite place. Plus, it is near Canton and we always go shopping while we are there! You can't beat that with a stick! If you've never been on a scrapbook retreat you must go! Even if you don't scrapbook, it is such a fun time. It is a total mommy weekend! We go up on Thursday or Friday to scrapbook all weekend - we have delicious meals cooked for us, we get massages, go shopping, watch tons of movies and are silly staying up until all hours of the night!

Thank you, Tasha, for showing me the world of scrapbooking! You are such a great friend and I know my boys will enjoy their scrapbook pages for years to come!

And here are some of the usual suspects... Ashley, Cathy, Kim, Sheryl, Summer, Susan, me, Tasha, Wendy and Kendra.

Last Day of Kindergarten

Just a couple of pics of Preston's last day of school - it was a fun-filled very short day where the kids just got to have fun and get WET! Above is Preston with two of his best friends... Aiden and Madison. Oh yes, apparently Madison is the "girl he's going to marry"! Ha! But Preston will also tell you that he's got another girlfriend in the SIXTH GRADE! What?!? He met her in the carpool line and thinks she is the coolest! Oh, brother... we are in trouble.

Here are boys drenching each other!

And here I think they've found a bug!

Kindergarten Graduation

I know we are almost half-way through the Summer... but I had to get around to blogging about Preston's sweet Kindergarten graduation. It was so cute and I truly can't believe this first year of school went by so quickly. He has grown and matured so much, and he just couldn't have loved Kindergarten anymore than he did! Thank you to his wonderful teacher, Mrs. Wonsang, and to everyone at his amazing school!

So pardon me if I brag just a bit... but I am so proud of this excellent student! He even got a couple of "excellence" awards this year. He got one in P.E. and then right before graduation he was honored with the "Art Excellence" award for all of Kindergarten. This one was really special because he is so passionate about art and drawing! Way to go Preston! He left Kindergarten reading at a second grade level; and let me tell you that he loves to read. He'll read whatever is put in front of him - novels, magazines, etc... it's pretty funny sometimes the things he chooses to read aloud! We were in the mall a few months ago and he just starts reading a poster, "How To Look Good Naked!", he just laughed after he realized what he had read!

It is so inspiring and overwhelming to see this little boy grow up before our eyes. He is a great kid and I pray every day that we will be the parents that he needs us to be for him to walk down the path God has chosen for him!

Oh, and I always wondered growing up how kids got perfect attendance!?!? Well, Preston only missed one day of school this year! And he had a pretty good excuse for that one day - Mom's water broke at 5:00am and he was at the hospital welcoming a baby brother into the world! Hee hee! But every morning Preston woke up happy and ready for school! Thank you for that! I'm sure there will be years down the road where it will not be that easy to get a growing boy out of bed for school!!!

Thanks Aunt Susan, Skylar and Trevor for celebrating this milestone with our family! It was very special to have you there - we love you. As Preston said right after graduation, "I'm now officially a first grader!"



And here's Preston with his P.E. coach - Coach Sladecek... he adores Coach Sladecek and P.E. is one of his favorite subjects! I guess we can forgive you Coach for wearing the Longhorns lanyard! Ha!



Can you believe it... graduating Class of 2020!

Evan On The Move

Well, even though so much has happened in the last 8 months, we still can't believe that our little "Baby Evan" is already 8 months old! But let me tell you, he is 8 months going on 18 months! He is now officially on the move and into everything! He has been crawling for a few weeks, but has become more interested in standing and trying to walk these days! He will use whatever means necessary to get to something that he wants!

He is so proud of himself when he is able to stand on his own! He has taken a couple of quick steps, but I'm sure we are still a few months away from walking... PLEASE! Hee hee! He does pull himself up on everything though and walk around the edges of furniture. And if you are sitting he will crawl over to you and grab, claw, pinch his way up on you to get to a standing position! It's hilarious, and quite painful sometimes as he is clawing his way up your chest! Anything to stand... it makes him so happy, he just laughs and gets so excited! And he loves to jump - you'll hold his hands and he'll just jump up and down laughing the whole time. It's a great arm work-out! He does the same thing in his exersaucer, although he'd much rather have you as his jungle-gym.



So I have to talk about Evan's noises... they definitely deserve a paragraph - they are pretty funny. He's got a couple that are trademarks and we have named them appropriately... the first is the "McFly" from the movie Back to the Future... does everyone remember his laugh? That loud, slow "eh, eh, eh".... well, Evan loves making that noise, it's hysterical. He'll just do it over and over - this very dry, loud "EH, EH, EH!". And then more often is his "obscene caller" breathing. He does this heavy breathing when he gets excited - it's the raspy in and out breathing and it sounds like an obscene caller that would call you, breathe and hang up! Or, maybe I've just seen one too many scary movies (they are my favorite)! But of course, on Evan it's hilarious! And he does it ALL the time!

He's doing all sorts of talking, although I know he's not really sure of anything he's saying right now... he does say "dada" and "bubba", but of course they are just babble right now! Preston does get very excited though when he says "bubba". Evan does love copying you... his favorite thing is to smack or click his tongue on the roof of his mouth and he'll have a whole "smack" conversation with you back and forth.... this is the only time I will let my son talk "smack" to me! Hee hee!

Well, that's it for now... as usual I am attaching waaaaay too many pictures below! Enjoy! Love to all!

Just a sweet picture of Evan cracking himself up...



Evan loving his new sippy cup!



"Look, Ma, only one hand!" He loves standing in his bed!




There's no stopping him now... some of his first crawling!



"I can even crawl on my tippy tippy toes!"



One of Evan's favorite things - crawling around naked after his bath! Naked boy!



Still absolutely loves baths... we probably need to move him out of the baby bath! Please excuse the now-public exposure!



In between outfit changes - in just a bib and a diaper bouncing like crazy in his bouncy seat!



"Wheee.... I'm flying!"



Standing and jumping - it's all he wants to do! Can you tell by Erick's shorts that we were painting that day?



Here's about two months ago... Evan trying to crawl, almost...



Oh, I give up... I'm tired...



Big brother rooting him on... "You can do it!"



The first time I fed Evan a "meat" baby food... beef vegetable... he wasn't so crazy about it, huh? Chicken and turkey have gone over much better!



"This stuff is disgusting... but you can still make me laugh!"



More to come soon... still trying to catch up on my blogging!

Family Photo Day

Well, we haven't had any family pictures taken since before Christmas - so I figured it was time before Evan gets any bigger! I've told him that he can't grow anymore! We can't believe that he is 8 months old now and crawling around and standing up in his crib. Boy, it flies by.

We had another session with a dear sweet friend, Dee. She takes really great pictures and she is so reasonable. And even though mom (me) tends to stress out a little bit for family photos (it's hard getting kids dressed, smiling, posed, etc...), she always gets some great shots! If you ever need someone great, please call her! Her website is www.cocoriahphoto.com.

I love the first photo at the top - it just makes my heart melt. These brothers are so in love with each other. I know there are probably some disadvantages to having kids six years apart - but I haven't found any yet. They are so great together - Preston is such a helper and doesn't have a bit of jealousy or competitiveness towards his brother. And Evan just thinks that Preston is the greatest thing and loves playing with him and studying him.



A beautiful big brother... looks just like his Daddy! Preston will be 7 years old in August - WOW!



And here's Evan at 8 months old... looks almost identical to his big brother, seriously! I'll post more about what this little man is up to in my next blog! But what a sweetie pie!




Okay, so Dee took this picture below... but of course, this was a shot that Mommy had to get and set up... who else would torture their kid in a cold, silver pot! hee hee! We got the same picture of Preston as a baby too!



Our Family... love to all!

Go Vipers

You have never seen a happier kid than Preston playing soccer! In his words, "he lives to play soccer". He just finished his fifth season of socccer!

We couldn't ask for a better team , better coach or better parents! It is a joy to go to practice and the games every week. Thank you Robert and Krista for another awesome season! And even though they are still "non-competitive" and don't officially keep score.... the whole team knew that we were undefeated this season! Whoo hoo! Yes, Preston gets the competitive side from me... uh oh!

The picture up top is the nice team photo and then below is the boys cutting up... Preston is in his "ROCK ON!" pose. Oh, the joy of boys!



Below is Preston getting his trophy from his awesome coach, Robert. He keeps these boys in line and teaches them teamwork. He is so patient and yet expects these boys to play hard every time! Thank you for all the hard work, Robert!



On the run for the ball...




And but of course, little brother was always on the sidelines cheering big brother on! And he was never short for visitors on the sidelines as all the kids loved coming to say hello to Preston's little brother.



My handsome boy... great season, Preston! In the Fall they finally get to move to the bigger fields - oh, yea!

Backyard Bliss

So, people have asked - "are you so glad to be out of the apartment and back into a house?" Indeed we are, even though some parts of apartment living were pretty convenient - it wasn't all bad. I mean, there was no yard work, no water bill, and you could clean the whole thing in like an hour! But definitely, it is great to be back in a house... and my favorite thing - this picture below. Finally - a yard for my son to play in again! And pretty soon - both sons... although Evan already enjoys just going out there as the breeze blows through his hair, but soon enough he'll be kicking the soccer ball with Preston! And I can't tell you how excited Preston is about THAT!

It has been so great to have people over and let the kids go play outside together. Let's pray for a mild Summer so that we can play outside every day (yea, right, who are we kidding!).

And yes, we are working our way down our list of having all of our friends and family over this Summer! We are going to fore go a "housewarming" party so that we can have you all over at special times and really visit and catch up and the kids can play too!

Awana Award Night

I know Awana isn't as well known as some other clubs (it sure needs to be, spread the word!), but it's a great Christian club that our church so wonderfully hosts. It's a super club that teaches children to be servants for the Lord and for His people. This is Preston's second year in the club. But this was his first year in the "Sparks" program, which starts at Kindergarten. Awana really focuses around teaching children the Word of God, which means memorizing and understanding bible verses. Preston got a new red vest this year and a BIG book of verses that he had to learn in order to earn his patches and jewels for his vest!

Well, when they first handed out the book I looked through it and thought - wow, this is going to be tough this year. The verses Preston had to memorize were pretty long and challenging. But it is amazing how much these little brains can soak in and retain... I am so proud of Preston for finishing his book, learning all of his verses and receiving all of his crown jewels!

Oh, boy - it wasn't easy. Every week you'd have the two most hard-headed people (Preston and myself, of course), trying to learn these verses. It definitely tested our patience with one another, but it was worth it. And honestly, I was so excited to learn these verses myself; it grew my faith and taught me. And Preston was so great to put in all the hard work - he absolutely loved Awana. I pray that learning these verses and being part of Awana will help lead Preston to fully accepting and understanding Christ as his Savior.

"Way to go Preston, way to go... wooop wooop!" (All of you Awana parents will know this cheer!)

Here's a pic of our full crown...