MAY BIRTHDAYS!

May is full of birthdays in our family!

On May 1st - my baby turned 2!  I can't hardly believe it, time has gone by way too fast.  In my mourning of this day, I forgot to take pictures.  I know I'm a terrible mom - but to my defense - Jimmy (who is usually the photographer in our family) also forgot.  So here's a picture of Ries wearing his Tigers shirt and reading his animal book that he got from his Aunt Joell.  

He was so excited that I brought him balloons - it was his favorite gift!  With me being gone everyday at school, him and his Grandma Jo became best friends.  He was more excited to show her his gifts than me.  (I'm hoping to change that now that I'm home more this summer!)  

Some of the things I think are great about Ries are:

- He loves animals - especially dogs.

- He loves to play baseball, and uses everything he can find as a bat.

- He learned how to climb - and climbs everything!

- It's so cute to hear him talk, he repeats everything we say and is so proud of himself.

- But most of all he is the sweetest kid!!  He loves to give kisses all the time and to EVERYONE!

We Love You Ries!!  HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!




May 4th is my Birthday. Which, being between my boys' birthdays, I kind of forget about it. But this year my friends came by EARLY in the morning to wish me a happy birthday. I have such great friends whom I love dearly!! You know they're true friends when they're willing to wake up at 5:30 in the morning to make sure they catch me before I exercise and go off to school. Thanks ladies - you made my day!!





MAY 12th is TJ's Birthday. He turned 10 this year and we celebrated with his friends swimming and having a barbecue. TJ also has some great friends and it was fun to have them all over. TJ is also such a sweet boy, very tender hearted, but a true boy loving sports, video games, scouts, playing with his friends and playing the violing and piano (I wish). TJ has really grown up this year and it's been nice to rely on him to help me. I've even started leaving him in charge of the other kids for an hour at a time during the day. How nice it is to be able to run to the store and not take all three of my kids! We're really proud of the choices he makes and the kind of person he's turning out to be. We love you TJ!!

CONCERTS & RECITALS

The end of the school year is busy with school programs, concerts and recitals...

ORCHESTRA CONCERT:

TJ decided to try the violin this year at school. It started off kind of rocky with him complaining about it. But by the middle of the year he started getting the hang of it and by the time of the concert he was really enjoying it. He even told me he might want to play it next year too (we'll see)! We're really proud of you TJ for sticking it out through the year and how you've tried hard and improved - Way to Go!!





















LET'S PLAY MUSIC RECITAL:

This was Josie's first year of doing "Let's Play Music". My good friend, Amber, who lives across the street teaches it and all the kids Josie's age on our street were in the class. It's such a great program, giving the kids a wonderful foundation for their music learning. At the end of the year, they combined with three other teachers and put on a recital at Poston Junior.


















DANCE RECITAL:

The yearly dance recital is again, something we look forward to and then so happy when it's over. It's a lot of work with extra practices and pictures, but it's great to be able to see how far the girls have come and improved. Josie is a good little dancer, she loves it and really tries hard. This year was great because her cousin, Kami, was in her class again. Her other cousin, Mallory, had dance class at the same time so the three of them spent the year together on Fridays going to dance (and to the dollar store after)!

Little League 2009

Another year of baseball season has come and gone.  We get so excited for it to start and then again, so excited for it to end.  For two months we spend four nights a week down at the ball field for a ball game, on the off nights TJ usually would have practice.  But it was a fun and exciting season!  

It was TJ's first year playing Minors and he did a great job.  His team was excellent and ended the regular season tied for first place.  When the tournament came though, they had a bad game and lost, which put them out of the tournament, ending the season in third place.  We're so proud of how hard TJ worked and is really becoming a good ball player!

This was Josie's 2nd year playing T-ball. She really improved this year! She wanted to play infield rather than outfield, that way she could talk to the cute boys running the bases. We'll see how she likes baseball next year when she has to be on an all girls team!

Ries also enjoys going to the ball games! There's room to run and play and of course playing in the dirt!

Our New Puppy DAISY!!

We seem to be a home that lost dogs drift to.  TJ had found a little chihuahua in our yard.  So once again we took in a dog trying to find the owner.  This was the first dog that we weren't able to find it's home.  So after two weeks we took it to the Humane Society.  Our kids cried and cried and cried, they were so heart broken.  Since they did do a good job taking care of that dog and are getting older, we decided we'd start looking for our own dog.  We wanted a bigger dog that could be outside, one that the kids could throw a ball and play with and the kids wanted one that would swim with them in the pool.  So after a couple of months looking, we finally found a beautiful yellow lab puppy.  The kids named her Daisy.

  She's a sweet dog, very friendly and playful.  And she loves loves loves the swimming pool.  When the kids are swimming, she wants to join them and play.  The problem is she tries to climb on top of them in the pool.  So right now she can only swim when the kids are out of the pool, but she loves for them to throw a ball in the pool and she goes after it.  She is just a puppy, so the chewing is a little out of control.  She's chewed up our drip system in the back and torn everything out of my vegetable garden, even though we tried to put a fence around it.  She's torn up our rug outside and if she can get a hold of the beach towels, she tears them up too.  So we've still got some training to do, but she's learning fast.

The kids are still a little worried that she'll do something that will make me get rid of her.  But hopefully she'll actually be a family pet to last!!

JOELL'S VISIT

In March, Jimmy's sister, Joell, came to AZ with her kids to visit!  Jimmy's dad was celebrating his 70th Birthday and she wanted to surprise him!  It's always great when she comes, and this time it had been way too long since we had seen them!  Our kids are close in age and love each other so much!  It's amazing to me that they hadn't seen each other for a year and a half and soon as they're together they're all instant best friends again - I LOVE IT!!  It was a short visit but we had a great time together (my kids especially liked getting out of a few days of school too).  We enjoyed going to the zoo, the park, had bday party for Jim and swimming in our freezing pool.  We thought those thick blooded Michiganites wouldn't have a problem swimming in 68 degrees, but it turned out the Arizonans handled the cold water much better - go figure.  Thanks for a great time - We miss you guys tons!!

Battle of the Books

4th Grade has been a wonderful year for TJ.  His teacher, Mr. Collins, was the perfect fit for TJ.  The year was full of incentives and rewards for hard work, which was the only way to get TJ to try his best.  Every quarter they had a "4th Grade Challenge" where each class competed against each other in various activities.  The last one was the "Battle of the Books".  Each class chose a 3 member team to compete in a jeopardy style game, where they were asked trivia questions about many different books.  TJ was priveleged to be on his team of all boys.  The other teams were all girls.  TJ's team won the challenge!!!  Where they each received a t-shirt, a certificate and a book.  And the class received the trophy for winning the challenge.  This has been great motivation for TJ and he now FINALLY enjoys to read!  GOOD JOB TJ - WE'RE SO PROUD OF YOU!!

CUB SCOUTS!!!

After starting school, I was released from the primary and put into the cub scouts.  It's so fun to be with TJ and  the boys!  So we keep busy, a few things we've done lately.......

BLUE AND GOLD BANQUET

For Blue and Gold this year (which is the birthday celebration for Cub Scouts) we went to a farm in Lehi.  Everyone had a wonderful time! Petting the horses and playing around.  The awards and recognitions were held in a barn.

WIND CAVES

Every year we have a pack meeting where we go to Usary Park and hike up to the wind caves.  The boys love it.  The whole family is invited and after we hike, we bbq and the boys set off their bottle rockets they made.  All the siblings get a chance to set them off too, and they love getting wet as the rocket shoots in the air and the water in the bottle sprays all over.