Goodbye Summer! Hello Fall!!

As I sit here and write this I think back to just how FAST our summer went by!!! Splash pad, pool, hot sun, and ice cream quickly turns into coats and sweaters, heater, cloudy days and pumpkin pies!! But hey, who am I kidding? We live in the good ol' South. The only place you can wake up to 50 degree weather and have to wear winter gear just to shed it off by noon because the 50 degrees has climbed to 75! Oh I love it. And wouldn't have it any other way.

So, just because the official "fall weather" hasn't really begun does not mean fall activities cease to start! Soccer, dance, socials, festivals, fair, pumpkin patches, halloween, oh I am getting so excited!

We began our soccer season with some not so high expectations. We (Jason and I) really thought that Christian was going to display his "old man run" (which isn't a run by the way) the way he did in baseball. Boy were we ever wrong. Christian has taken to soccer like nobody's business. That boy is tearing that field UP!!! I am so proud of him. I do believe we have found our "sport of choice".

We are having some difficulties in explaining to Christian that he has to "get mean" on the field. I sometimes want to get out there and "get mean" myself but hey they are just kids right?! HA! Let me tell you. There sometimes are kids out there that are like a foot taller than the rest and they are good. Makes me think they are a year older than the rest of the children. Well when one of those kids get out there they dominate the ball. This past Saturday as a matter of fact was such kid. He dominated the ball. No one else ever had a chance at the ball. Well the moral of the team was falling because of that. Both of the teams. Once that kid went and sat out a quarter, the rest of the team (again both sides) had a chance at the ball and they started playing good! Said kid kept jumping in front of Christian and stealing the ball away from my baby. And what makes it worse is the fact that he was elbowing everybody out his way to get to the ball, even knocking Christian down one time! OH!!! Ask my mother how her arm feels by the way. I grabbed my mothers arm and squeezed hard!! That kid made me so MAD!! (did I mention I have anger issues?) I wanted to go snatch that kid up! OHOHOH!

But on a lighter note, I can tell a BIG difference in Christian's play on the field since the beginning. We are 4 games in and my baby is good. :) I am going to post a video from his first game in another post.

I have no pictures of Grace dancing yet. We aren't allowed to watch. Her dance company has something called Parent Watch Night which is self explanatory. But that doesn't start until November. I will be switching Grace to another dance company next year I believe. I haven't been impressed with the customer service at this company and several other reasons.

Grace has grown SO MUCH lately. I can't believe she will be 3 soon. Where did my baby go? I do not remember Christian flying up to the age of 3 this quickly! Not to mention he will be 5 in a couple of months!!!! WHAT!?!?
Grace is a mess. Plain and simple. A mess. She is talking so much now and can say just about what she wants. Oh and that attitude comes out. I wonder sometimes if she takes after me with that. I'm trying hard to tame my attitude and having trouble doing so, so how in the world am I going to tame hers too?!?!?! God help me.

So that leaves me with just one question: Diva or Devil? You decide.

The "firsts" of the summer

Well, I'm sure this isn't all the firsts of this summer but it's a few. The first couple of pictures are of Grace at her first dance lesson. She takes 15 minutes of ballet and 15 minutes of tap. They do not allow the parents in the room but like once a month for Parent Watch night. All the other nights you have to sit in the lobby so I didn't get any pictures of her actually in the class.

Christian's first "big big boy bed" His race car bed was his "big" boy bed. Now this is his "big big" boy bed. Twin. :) He loves it. We tried to sell the race car bed but Grace claimed it. So now we have the twin which Christian sleeps in and the race car bed pushed up against twin bed and Grace sleeps in that right beside her "bubba". They watch TV together until the sleep timer goes off. We have had many successful nights with this strategy of them sleeping in their room all night and not coming to mom and dad's room. :)

First day of 4K

Isn't he handsome? Of course he is! First day of 4K. He was so excited to get back to see all his friends and teachers. I was a little nervous since he was going full days this year instead of the 2 hours that he went last year. But he is doing fantastic. He was sent home the 3rd day b/c he pooped his pants. But they sent him home because they thought he was sick with diarrhea. Nah, he was just nervous about using the toilet. He was fine and returned the next day.

Dad is SO silly. Love the look on both Dad's and Christian's face here. I think dad was going for the "tough guy" look. That's more of the "I gotta take a poop" look. Sorry dad. Epic fail! LOL Oh well. it made Christian smile. :)

I have several memories that I want to record from his first day of school. First is when I dropped him off, I walked him into the gym where all the teachers meet with their children every morning. He got a little separation anxiety and wouldn't let me go. So I got done on my knees to speak to him. While his little arm was wrapped around my neck, we talked about the children sitting against the wall that would be in his class. He saw a little girl that he knew from last year but said he didn't want to talk to her because "she doesn't listen to the teacher". (poor girl is going to be remembered as the girl who didn't listen!) lol so we started talking about the little boys and how he should go introduce himself. So he saw a little guy sitting there and said he wanted to go talk to him. As soon as he sat down beside him they started chatting and smiling immediately. That is the picture that I have in my head as I left my baby for his first day.

When I went to pick him up from school I asked him how his first day was. His response? "It was the coolest day EVER!" Success!!

AWANA Awards

We had the AWANA awards night for the kids not to long ago. They make the kids feel like they are movie stars that night. It's awesome. This first picture is not the best. The lighting was horrible in there. But any ways, Pastor Bill is giving Christian his award and saying something to him.

Walking the Red Carpet. :) You can tell he is a happy boy!

Parents got a special award that night too. For being so diligent in getting our kids to AWANA every week and helping them with their verses week after week. I am amazed at what Christian has learned so far!!!
My babies being silly of course! They are such hams.

Opposite Day

Just like that episode in Spongebob, the school had what they (and Spongebob) called Opposite Day! No, I don't think the school did it because of Spongebob but I'm just clashing the two together I suppose. :) In case the title doesn't explain itself, on Opposite Day, you do everything Opposite!!! For the day at school, they were to wear their clothes on backwards or inside out or wear non matching socks, you name it. So with Christian what we did was put his shirt on backwards and inside out. He pants were inside out with one pant leg up. His shoes were different and one side of his hair was spiky while the other side was flat!!! That was a fun dress up day!!!!

Better picture of his hair. :)

Baseball Season!

So this is the very first thing that I guess Grace thought of Baseball.We had Opening Day Ceremonies at 9AM in March. It was COLD. So we had to dress little man in a long sleeve shirt and then all his gear. Our coach this year sucked and we didn't get our uniform until that day. That was also the day we took pictures of the individuals and the teams. This is the team out on the field being introduced.

Our little ball player with a helmet that is way to big for those tiny heads.

He swings! He MISSES!

So try again!!!

I do believe he slammed it that time. Oh and to see him run. I should have gotten video but I tell ya. That boy is in no rush whatsoever! The coaches used to tell him to "HUSTLE BUZZ HUSTLE!!!!" But that did no good. We even told him Grace was chasing him or there were ants on the field. All that generated was him yelling at us, "NO THERE ISN"T!!!!" LOL Oh and that's another thing. He had all the coaches, parents and team players called him Buzz. So I got some iron on letters and spelled Buzz on the back of his jersey. :)

Alot of catching up to do

Oh boy. It seems I've went and done it again. I've gotten so far behind that it's going to take me several days to get this thing caught back up. I have a bad habit of doing this. Oh well. You will take it late versus never right?? Okay good. :)
So here are the things still to cover. Fuss at me now if I don't get this done over the next week!
-Easter egg hunt at school/home
-Grace's potty training
-Christian's hospital stay
-Random pics of kids
-Some of Christian's baseball pics
-Spirit week at school
-AWANA awards ceremony
-Strawberry patch pictures
-Recent zoo trip

Okay, so it may take me a little more than a week with as hectic as everything is for us right now. Matter of fact, baby is crying now (the one I babysit) so I better get my tornado energy up, here I go!!!!

PS Some of those above don't have pictures associated with them so thankfully some of those subjects can be combined in the same post! :) See you soon!