This is awesome

Some friends of ours just found out they are having twins. 

Check out the awesome way they announced it to their friends and family.
Man, I wish I was that creative!

Abby's Last Day of School

The last day of school was bittersweet for Abby. She has been at American Heritage since kindergarten and we have decided to attend the local public school next year so it was her last day at the school as well. We will miss American Heritage and the friends, teachers, administration and spirit that is there. They really have some great programs and are truly a unique school. We have decided to switch for various reasons (we actually moved Max over last April) and, who knows, we may be back in a year or two. We are very excited about next year. Abby is excited to attend school with all of her neighbor friends and even a cousin! She also tested in to the Accelerated Learning Lab and we are looking forward to the challenge that will bring. I am looking forward to an extra 10 hours a week because I will not be commuting to the school... yeah! For now, Abby is looking forward to enjoying a nice long summer.

Working in the garden

We decided to expand our garden this year. 

I'm pretty sure they were supposed to be helping.

Maybe they were lending moral support?

Piano man and his biggest fan

We've Got Teeth!

Finally!! Most babies get their first teeth at 4-7 moths (I looked it up)... Cole finally got teeth at 8 months. So cute!! I love the toothy little grin. I also love that we won't have to deal with drooling and fussiness anymore... at least for a little while.

A close up for you:

Hmmm... maybe we shouldn't let him do this anymore.

Poser

So maybe I've been spending too much time working with my camera. Afton has become quite the poser. While I was playing with exposure one day she gave me these gems... totally unprovoked!

Science Project

Abby was so excited to build this volcano at school in her science class. We made the clay at home and sent it to class with a water bottle. At school all the kids built their volcanos and then they made them erupt. When she got home we did it again as a family. Pretty cool project for a 2nd grader!

National Golden Gloves Boxing Championships

In May Chris had the opportunity to sing the National Anthem for the National Golden Gloves Boxing Tournament. Of course he did awesome and the best part was that we were able to stick around and enjoy the evening... ringside VIP seats too! Let me start by saying that I am definitely NOT a boxing fan. I have never watched it at all (unless you count the 'Rocky' movies) and I've always thought it seemed like a brutal sport. Well, we had a blast. I was so impressed. Just a little background, Golden Gloves has been around since the 1930's and is a program for young men (teens and early 20's) to train. This program is what has created some of the biggest names in boxing... I was surprised how many I recognized. Also, I have NEVER seen such polite young men and great sportsmanship. They were polite to everyone around them, their opponents, the refs, each other. The fans and coaches as well, no arguing with refs or other coaches... It was amazing and actually made me a little emotional. I am so glad there are programs out there where young men can learn a skill and do something they love while learning to be gentlemen as well. I also think these are kids that would probably end up in the wrong crowd if they didn't have something like this. It was an awesome night... very fun and something different.

Green Belt

Abby tested for her green belt in early May. I didn't get any pictures of her actual test (long story), but here is her belt ceremony and then we had her do her form when we got home. She is really doing so well in Taekwondo and I am so glad that she has found something she really loves to do.

Keep up the great work, Abby!

Just Cole

In April I attended a lighting demo with one of my favorite photographers Nicole Hill. I have attended a few of her workshops and have loved every one of them... she is awesome. The next day after church I decided to get out my camera and experiment. Cole just happened to be around and so he got to be my subject. I wasn't really trying to get great shots, I just wanted to play with my camera and see what I got when I tried different things. The plan was to delete them all. However, when I looked through them they so perfectly captured who Cole is right now... at almost 8 months old. So here are some of my favorites... even the fuzzy and dark ones!

Cole is a very fast crawler and uses his skill to get into a lot of mischief!

Look at this face. He makes it all the time and it totally cracks us all up. He breathes really heavy while he's doing it, too, which only adds to the hilarity.

Ugh! This is a little habit I do not love. Cole has a bad habit of eating dog food and playing in the water. One of those bowls is gone now because Cole picked it up and threw it! We now keep the bowls on the counter and only put the food down at meal time and the water down when Cole is asleep, trapped in his high chair or not even home. Poor Roxy.

He is constantly trying to get up the stairs. He learned how to get up pretty quick... he has yet to master going down!

I love those eyes. I also love all the drool... it was because he was teething in a major way that week.

You may think this picture is cropped pretty weird. I actually did it on purpose. I wanted to remember the rolls in his thighs and around his wrists. There is nothing cuter than a chubby baby!

For about a month Cole played with this cup more than any other toy. It's so funny to see what they get attached to. He would examine every detail of that thing and tried very hard to get the Mickey Mouse sticker off that someone put on back in 1999.

Again with the eyes... they get me every time. I'm pretty sure I'm in trouble with this one. He'll be 16 and batting those eyes at me and I'll cave every time! Maybe it's because none of my other babies really had eyes? (see current photos of each child on the left)

His cute smile.

Another one of his scrunchy face 

(Abby used to make this face, too.)

The end... thanks for humoring me!

Faux Hawk

Remember this post? As most of you know, our sweet little Afton has not been blessed in the hair department. The picture in the aforementioned post was taken when she was 20 months old and I was thrilled to see just a little hair on top of her cute head. Well, since then it has definitely been growing VERY slowly. She has had 2 haircuts (and is due for another one soon) just to even things out and make it look less stragley (is that even a word?). Anyway, while I was taking pictures of my niece my sneaky nephews, Jaremy and Aaron, did Afton's hair.

I was just so excited that it was so high!! There is hope for us!!

"Always leave room in your garden for fairies to dance"

That is a quote that is on a plaque in my mother-in-law's garden... except it says angels instead of fairies. One warm Sunday afternoon, Abby picked these vines off our grapevine and made these adorable wreaths for Afton and her to wear. They pretended they were fairies and danced around the backyard. I couldn't help but think of that quote as I watched them. They were so sweet dancing and giggling together... and they looked so beautiful in their hand-made wreaths... it was one of those moments I was very grateful to be a mother of daughters.

Vegas, Baby!!

We decided to head down to Vegas for a couple of days during Spring Break. We had a blast. We arrived Thursday night just in time to check in to our hotel, grab a bite to eat and go see Afton DelGrosso's show 'LaReve' at the Wynn. (Afton is a former student of ours and is currently engaged to our nephew, Zack. We are so excited for her to join the family. We have always loved her and even named our Afton after her). The show was amazing!! We all loved it and for the next few days our Afton kept saying things like "Did you like my show?" and "Are we going to my show now?" because we kept talking about 'Afton's show'. (Photo to come... I have to get it off Chris' iphone.)

First thing Friday morning we did a little sight seeing. We like to get an early start to try and beat the crowds. We hit all our favorite spots: 

We walked the strip and admired the cool hotels.The Lion's at MGM. 

This was the coolest Lion I've ever seen there... 

it seemed like he was actually posing for us!

m&m world... where we spent $20.00 on 2 pounds of m&m's just so we could get them in odd colors. We also enjoyed the Coke Factory. By then we were dying of heat and the babies needed naps so we went back to our hotel for some time in the pool. That night we had dinner at Benihana's... so good. The kids were exhausted so we went to our room and watched a movie (we hate being out on the strip at night anyway). Saturday we swam until we had to check out (see swim pictures above.... it's a mix of both days) and drove home. It was a great way to get away for a couple days.