Chillin' on the Beach!

We headed for the beach this morning. Even though it was very cold and windy, all six kids had a great time playing in the water. They all came home wet and covered with sand! (The adults were a little smarter and stayed out of the chilly waves!). We definitely didn't last too long out there, but we were glad that we went.

A Cute Pair

Allie and Cara paired up often during our time together. They loved playing house - and Allie enjoyed being the Mommy! They were so cute together.

Sweet Springs

While sweet Cara was napping, the rest of the crew became restless. So we headed out to Sweet Springs to hunt for turtles and ducks. The turtles were hard to find -probably because five kids just cannot stay quiet enough - but we saw plenty of ducks and enjoyed a beautiful view of Morro Rock.

S'mores!

It is summer vacation here and we've started our summer with lots of fun! My sister and her family arrived in San Luis Obispo on Tuesday night (via airplane and Amtrak), so the kids and I were eager to see them. We headed to the coast on Wednesday for some special family time. After dinner on Wednesday, we toasted marshmallows on the patio and made yummy s'mores! What a sweet way to begin our time together!

Our Sweet Six Year Old

We celebrated Allie's birthday with our families last night. Grandpa and Grandma Tos, Uncle Ryan, Aunt Angie, Zachary and Ainsley, and Auntie Deb and Jack joined us for a yummy dinner and lots of fun. We let Allie choose the dinner menu and she chose steak! I tried to talk her into having pizza or spaghetti, but she insisted that steak was her favorite. No one complained about that - it tasted so good! Allie enjoyed playing with her cousins, opening gifts and eating her birthday cake. This year her cake was shaped like a strawberry since she chose Strawberry Shortcake plates. It's hard to believe our sweet girl is already six years old. She brings us such joy and we thank God for the beautiful daughter he gave us six years ago. We are truly blessed...

Ingredients for Fun!

Colorful balloons...

plus cupcakes...

plus a craft...

plus playtime...

plus friends...

...equals a birthday party (and a very tired little girl!).

Our sweet Allie girl will be six tomorrow. Where has the time gone?

Eye-Catching Art

I discovered a great website with lots of art projects for kids. Beth especially enjoyed this project, using oil pastels. It's done in the style of Paul Kandinsky's "Farstudie Quadrate" (whom I actually had never heard of before). She had a great time experimenting with color combinations and layout. This particular piece now graces our hallway - I love the bright colors!

Preschool Picnic

The preschool hosted a picnic yesterday for the parents of children in two of the classes. The children sang a few songs and said some memory verses for us, then they joined us for lunch. Phil stopped by McDonald's and Nathan was thrilled with his happy meal (and the prize!). We shared our umbrella and blanket with Ryan and Zachary, which made it even more special. I can't believe my little man is already finished with his first year of preschool!

Beating the Heat

Since the temperatures were soaring this weekend, we headed over to my brother's house this afternoon to beat the heat in their pool. The water is already 85 degrees - which tells you just how hot it has been here. Yuck! It took Allie awhile to decide that she remembered how to swim, but once she started, she didn't want to stop. Nathan and Zachary paddled around in their floaties while Beth swam to and fro. Ainsley loves the water, but everyone has to watch her closely. She'll step right off the edge if you let her - she's not at all afraid of the water! It was fun to get back in the pool and get some relief from the heat.

(proof that I was there, too! I spent a lot of time holding sweet little Ainsley...)

Our Growing Garden, continued...

I realize this information will not come as a surprise to most of you - I think we overplanted our little garden. We were so excited to plant seeds in our 4 x 6 foot garden bed that we got a bit carried away! But we are having such fun watching everything grow. I'm most excited about the cantaloupes. We have a long time to wait for those, but we now have blossoms on the cantaloupe plants Yeah!

ZOOFARI!

Each year, the kindergarten classes study animals and perform a special program for their parents. It was one of my favorite programs during Beth's year of kindergarten. This year, it was Allie's turn. She chose to do her report on zebras and we learned a lot about them. We then had to create a zebra, using any materials we wanted to use. We chose to use styrofoam, felt, wiggly eyes, pompoms, pipe cleaners, thread and a button to create our zebra. Allie was very proud of our creation. Today the classes put on a wonderful performance, singing songs and reciting poetry about animals. Then we went to Allie's classroom, where each student gave an oral report about their animal (with lots of encouragement from their teacher). It was a fun, but tiring afternoon - Allie fell asleep on the way home!

The children also made Alphabet Animal books and brought them home today. I just loved some of Allie's illustrations and thought I'd share a few with you! She is becoming quite a little artist.

J is for Jaguar

K is for Kangaroo

Z is for Zebra

I is for Iguana

Mother's Day Moments

I am truly blessed to be a mother to three beautiful, smart, kind, loving children. They are each so special and unique! I am blessed to have a mother who is one of my best friends - and a sweet mother-in-law as well. Today I was blessed to be with my family on a beautiful May afternoon. Seeing our kids interact with their cousins, aunt, uncle, and grandparents just makes me smile. What a gift to share time together! My cup overflows...

Beth with Great-Grandma

The kids loved hanging out by the pond.

Grandma and the girls

Expect the Unexpected

Recently, Nathan discovered our old potty seat (which I had been saving for Ainsley) in the bathroom cupboard. Suddenly it became a novelty to sit on the potty seat again. Tonight, during dinner, Nathan announced that he had to go potty and ran off to the bathroom. Several moments later, we heard a very calm little voice call out, "Mommy, can you help me get this off my head?" I walked into the bathroom to find the potty seat stuck on Nathan's head. He had gotten it over his head but couldn't get it back off! After several attempts to free him, it became clear that Daddy's help would need to be enlisted and we headed out to the living room to continue the saga. By this time, Nathan realized that removing the seat would cause some pain and he decided that he would just live with it. "It's okay," he said. "I can just sleep with it on my head. It's okay!" The girls were very concerned and Beth came up with a good idea - "Just smear butter on his head and it will slide right off!" Finally, Daddy just yanked it off - but not without trauma. Nathan screamed and cried (so did the girls) and he lost some serious skin from the tops of his ears. Poor Baby! As for me, I was a bit concerned, but also was trying not to laugh. And, as any good mother would do, I got the camera and took a picture. Look at those sad brown eyes. Five minutes after the potty seat was removed from Nathan's head, he was sound asleep in my arms. I seriously doubt he'll try putting another potty seat over his head - but our potty seat went right to the give-away pile!

Fun Friday

Ainsley spent the day with us today, as she usually does on Fridays. Today it was a special treat to have Allie home as well. Her school was having "Kindergarten Roundup" for incoming kindergarteners so she had the day off. Allie absolutely loves playing with Ainsley and spent most of the day playing with her. She is a very nurturing little girl. Ainsley loves Allie too - whenever she's crabby, all I have to do is show her a picture of Allie and she lights up and says, "Aah-yee! Aah-yee!" So she loved all of Allie's attention throughout the day. It was so sweet. I even managed to get Ainsley's hair into pigtails, but they only lasted about five minutes before she pulled them out. But they looked sweet anyway!

Mother's Day Lunch

Allie's kindergarten class hosted a Mother's Day lunch this afternoon. The children sang some special songs and recited a special poem for all the moms. Then they presented us with a lovely flower card and a clay handprint - which this mommy always loves! We ate salad and calzones while the kids ate pizza. Then we had yummy strawberry shortcake too! It was a fun time to spend with my special little girl (who doesn't like being referred to as "little" anymore!). She is just so much fun. Yesterday I told Allie that she was silly and she said, "No, I'm not, Mommy! I'm just the kind of girl you need!" And she's right - she's exactly what we need - an adorable, loving, happy, kind, silly girl! I'm so very thankful for her.

Self Portraits

Lately the kids have been spending a lot of time at the art table. Nathan could usually care less about drawing or coloring, but has been a little more interested in fine-motor activities lately (but in very small doses!). I asked each of them to draw a picture of themselves, mostly because I just love kids' artwork. It's fun to see their growth in their drawing as they get older!

Nathan's first self-portrait. In orange, of course!

Allie didn't want to be bothered with drawing what I asked her to - she had too many other ideas of her own. She quickly drew this self-portrait and then got back to more important endeavours.

Beth chose colored pencils for her drawing. And, just in case you couldn't tell, the wind is blowing from the left to the right!