Here I Go Again

I was given the book Here I go Again by Jen Lancaster to review as a part of the BlogHer Book Club.

I was excited to read this because I was familiar with Jen's blog Jennysylvania, most notably her hilarious Twilight reenactments.   Seriously...go check them out!

This book revolves around Lissy Ryder, queen bee of her high school and as far as she is concerned, the rest of her life.  There is basically one word you can use to sum up Lissy and I won't use it here b/c this is a family friendly blog.  But you can guess! Then take that word and multiple it ten times and you have a glimpse of what Lissy was like in high school.

 Lissy hasn't changed much as an adult and even as her life crumbles around she is still blinded to the fact that it is the natural consequences of her selfish self centered life style.   She attends her high school reunion oblivious to the idea that her high school power and influence no longer exists.  Basically everyone except Lissy has grown up!

It's a this point that Lissy starts on an incredible journey that takes her back to high school gives her the chance to change the course of her life.  But how easy will it be and will she even want to?  

Honestly I enjoyed this book more than I thought I would, mainly because it wasn't as predictable as I thought when I started reading it.  The hardest part of it was pushing through even though it's kind of difficult not to hate the main character for a good chunk of the book!

Overall it's a quick read, takes you back to your high school days, makes you think about what you would do differently if given the chance.  

Just the usual, I was compensated for this review but all the opinions are my own

Thanks!

Matched

I read the book Matched by Ally Condie as a part of Blogher's Book Club.  It's definitely a book that is right up my alley because the quickest description is Young Adult Dystopian.  So basically think Hunger Games, Divergent, Delirium - all books I've read and enjoyed and recommended!

I have to admit though, it's hard to read a book that reminds you of other books you really like and not draw comparisons.  That is one reason I hadn't read Matched before this and I may never have, if it hadn't been for the book club.

I'm really glad I did.  The love triangle and romance are the part that most people will enjoy, but I really love trying to understand the society in which Matched takes place.  Watching the main character Cassia grow and change and start to awaken was what I really enjoyed.

The society in which Cassia lived is seemingly a peaceful, organized and all about the good of the people and the society as a whole  Of course what you quickly realize is that it's all about keeping the citizens under control and closely monitored, their food portions are individually delivered, every activity is scheduled and approved, and you have to actually where dream monitors on certain nights.  It's all in the name of keeping the citizens healthy and performing their duties successfully.

Another interesting aspect is that when the society was formed the took all of the art, literature, music, etc and picked 100 of them and rest are discarded.  Permanently - as in no longer exist.  Children are no longer taught to write, there is no ability to create.  

It is in this setting that we find Cassia about to find out her Match - the person who will be her husband, who she will have a family with.  Her Matching banquet turns out to be wonderful as well as the reveal of her Match, but it's also when the stage is set for the main plot of the story (Seriously, I can't give away things, even though you could read about this on the back of the book!).  

Another major experience in Cassia's life happens early on as well, involving her grandfather and it is one more thing that is pushing Cassia to think, to question, to wonder...to open her eyes and really see what her world is like.

It's just the beginning of her journey, you'll have to read it to find out any more - I think you'll be glad you did!  Come join me over at BlogHer's Book Club and join in the discussion and hear from the author!

Disclaimer Statement: I was paid for the book review, but the opinions are all my own!

The First Husband Book Review

The First Husband by Laura Dave is the most recent book I read as a part of BlogHer's book club.  It's a quick easy summer read without being flighty or silly - for lack of a better description it's chick lit (hate that!) with depth.

The First Husband is about Annie Adams, a travel writer based in LA who is seemingly content with her life with long time boyfriend Nick.  When Nick suddenly ends things Annie is left to pick up the pieces of her life and reevaluate all that she thought to be true about herself and her hopes and dreams for her future.  She quickly gets swept down a totally unexpected path and has to make some tough decisions about what is truly important in love and in life.

And that's all I want to give you because I'd rather you read it and not have me give away the whole story!

Overall I really enjoyed the book.  I wish it had been longer because certain parts of the book happened too quickly for me and I would have liked to have more time with the characters and exploring their relationships with one another.  At times I would get frustrated about situations that Annie would find herself in, mostly because I am an over communicator and it kills me when things get all messed up and confusing simply because people don't sit down and talk.  But again, that's me, maybe that's just me!

I hope you'll check out the book as well as all the discussion going on over at BlogHer.

BTW - I was paid for the book and the review, but the opinions are all mine!

Photo A Day May

So I've decided to jump on board and do this month's photo a day challenge.  I've always wanted to and then I miss the first day or two, can't find the list and then before I know it it's mid way through the month. 


It's a fun way to be creative and pay attention to what I'm seeing throughout the day- I love having a little challenge (yes, I know, taking a picture a day should not be a challenge, but calling it that adds motivation!).


I won't post every day on here...maybe I'll weekly summaries.  But I will post every day on Instagram and Twitter.  If you're feeling up to it, join in.  Click HERE to find out more about it!


Just to prove that I actually did the first day.....here is my picture for May 1st - peace.  It's 9:00, the kids were in bed and I had my kindle by my side, about to start some reading....

Can I just say that after that I got distracted, went downstairs, did something else, and didn't get back to my reading until after 11!  But in that moment....there was peace!

Easter 2012

We survived the busyness of Easter week and Spring break and overall had a really nice week.  On Good Friday we did our traditional egg hunt with our friends - such a great group of kids....

and a great group of friends!

That evening Matt and I walked the girls through the various stations of the Cross that had been set up as a part of our Good Friday gathering at church.  I had gotten to walk through them on my own the night before so I really enjoyed being with the kids and helping them experience a bit of Jesus' journey starting with the Triumphal Entry and ending with the Cross.  Each station had an action they could do in response a reading, Scripture and reflection.

Here was the Last Supper and The Lord's Table and they were writing their thankfulness for Jesus' sacrifice. 

My favorite part of the whole thing is walking through curtain to the Cross on the other side.  It is just so powerful and moving.  When you get to the Cross you are able to write something you want to leave behind on a piece of paper and nail it the cross.  I was trying to explain to the girls that it could be a habit, a fear, an addiction, etc., when I heard Catherine say "I don't like seagulls...?"  I almost laughed out loud - "No Catherine Jesus can't get rid of seagulls for you!"  :)

Saturday was so nice and relaxing.  We dyed Easter eggs - you know, better late than never.  I don't know about you but after years of buying the little kits I have reverted to the old school childhood method of using food coloring in hot water in vinegar.  Seriously - it is so much easier, there is little mess and it looks great!

We also got to see a cute little show featuring Jack and Annie of the Magic Tree House at a local book store.  Catherine is super into the books these days so it was perfect timing!

Easter morning is always busy for us.  Matt is out the door before 7 and for some reason it seems to take longer to get me and the girls looking our best.  Not that we don't usually go to church looking decent but the bit of extra effort that Easter seems to inspire makes for a hectic morning.  

I was determined to get a halfway decent family picture this year.  Actually the decent part wasn't super important, but I just thought it would be nice to get a family picture.  I had to crop the heck out of it to hide my super white winter legs but hey, it's a family picture on Easter!!  And a few more just for fun....

I hope you all enjoyed the beautiful weekend and celebration of the Resurrection!  

Spring Break

This is the first time in a few years that we haven't lost most of our Spring Break to snow days so I was super excited for Tuesday to be the last day the kids had school for a week. 

We had no set plans but managed to have some fun.  Our first day we went for a 10 mile bike ride that involved lunch in the middle.  Never underestimate the power of food to give your kids incentive and energy!  

After the bike ride the kids got to take an impromptu trip to the zoo with their friend.  Since they weren't there until later afternoon they each got to pick their must see exhibit and I learned that Catherine's favorite animal is the giraffe and Ella's is the polar bear.  They were delivered to back to me at the church around 6:30 and Ella got out of the car in tears begging to go home.  Seeing as how we had first left the house for our bike ride at 11am I knew she was exhausted.  I promised her would eat dinner quickly and head home.  One meatball sub later and she was back to bouncing off the walls, wrestling and doing wheelbarrow races with her friends.  Seriously - the power of food...amazing!!!

Today Ella was ice skating with her girls group (parent lead alternative to girl scouts) and Catherine got to play with some friends.  Ella needed the bar because this was basically her first time skating and after  a lap or two I encouraged her to go with one of the parents and try without the bar.  I am excited to say that she can now ice skate! It was so cool to watch her improve the way she did over a small period of time.

(No, I did not ice skate.  I don't own skates and I have vivid memories of how sore my ankles were after using the rentals.  I came close but I just couldn't bring myself to do it.  I was just moral support on the sidelines!)

 

I am a big fan of Pinterest and I love finding a simple fun activity that involves stuff I already have.

We took pans of baking soda, cups of vinegar tinted different colors and medicine droppers outside and played for 45 minutes making fizzy foamy mixtures.

Tomorrow we have an egg hunt and lunch with friends and we'll finish the day off with a wonderful Good Friday gathering.  I am looking forward to taking the girls through the various stations on the journey to the cross that are set up around the church.  Tonight we were helping with a few final touches and the girls each wrote on a paper palm leaf words of thanksgiving to Jesus at the Triumphal Entry station.  Ella didn't show me hers but I had to help Catherine so I got to see hers - she wrote "I like how you rose on Easter. Thank You.  (smiley face) Catherine"  Made my heart melt!!

Hope you are enjoying your week - so wonderful to have extra time with my girls during this Holy week - I know we are all so mindful of their little hearts as they soak in the events leading up to Easter. What a blessing it is to have your children truly understand how special Easter is!

Jump Jump

Something new and fun just arrived in our backyard.  And by just arrived I mean Matt spent pretty much an entire day putting it together!

I am looking forward to lots of this...

And definitely lots of this....

Check out Ella's smile!  Without a doubt we'll have lots of those...

I know I will have fun taking all sorts of cool jumping pictures - it is harder than you think for the inexperienced photographer....

The kids are already having a wonderful time jumping, being silly and burning off energy. 

The big kids seem to like it too!

A Fault in Our Stars

I was given a copy of A Fault in Our Stars to review as part of BlogHer's Book Review.  I jumped at the chance to review it because a friend had just raved over it and I was excited to check it out.

I'm not ashamed to admit I read a good bit of Young Adult fiction.  There are a lot of good books out there that have main characters who are considered" young adults" and there is something about that pivotal time in one's life that really draws me in.  This book is definitely not your typical YA novel.  It was not your typical girl struggling with her identity meets boy who is different and challenges her to think outside the box and live life differently.  In one way that could be a vague description of the plot but the specifics are what make it so unique and also emotional.

The main character of this book is not your average teenage girl.  Meet Hazel, diagnosed with stage IV thyroid cancer at the age of thirteen and was pronounced terminal.  After a horrific near brush with death she was entered into an experimental drug trial that shrunk her tumors and bought her extra time.  The book begins when Hazel is almost 18, out of school the past three years because she is terminal, never knowing how much time she has left, living life to the bare minimum solely to keep her parents happy.

I know, I know.  You're not running out to pick it up right?!  But stick with me here, I promise you'll be glad you did.

Hazel meets Augustine, and 18 year old cancer survivor, at her cancer support group, which she grudgingly attends to give her parents some allusion of a social life, and her life beings to change.

You get to watch their relationship grow and Hazel begins to feel comfortable being herself and being known but yet also struggle with the realities of her own diagnosis and how that will affect her relationships.  Hazel and "Gus" have a rather unusual and intense relationship which makes sense given their shared experiences with cancer.  But they are still at the core a boy and a girl who are falling in love.

I don't know if I can adequately describe this book in a way that will make you want to read it, but I want you to trust me!  As a parent it was pretty emotional to read.  Most books you read that deal with this type of illness are from the perspective of the adult towards their child.  Hazel's worry about her parents and what their life will be like after she dies is rather heart wrenching.  She often does things that they think will help her, i.e., support group, only because she wants them to worry less.

Yes you will cry.  But you will find also yourself laughing at their callousness towards their cancer and the sparks of humor that are present regardless of the difficulties in the bigger picture.

I think this would be a great book club read as well as just a good read for adults and young adults alike.  Whether you relate more to Hazel, her parents, or both you'll be glad you took the plunge.

Head on over to BlogHer's Book club and check out the discussion going on about this book.  You'll learn more about the author and his writing as well as hear what others thought about it.

Just a note that I was paid for the book and the review but the opinions expressed are completely my own!!

No shame

Sitting here watching The Voice and saw my little blog on one of my bookmarks and figured I should fire up a new post.

Not even attempting to do any catching up, just sharing a little ongoing saga of mine.

A few months ago the driver's side window on our van stopped working. It won't go down at all. This stinks of course. It really stinks because the passenger side window doesn't work either. If you put it down there is a good chance it won't go up again. This isn't horrible in the summer, but this time of year I really don't want to get stuck with a window down driving around in the snow (what? snow? yeah, still hoping for one big snowstorm before spring).

So it should go without saying that I often feel a bit claustrophobic in my car.

But the whole driver's side window adds a whole other dilemma. Can anyone guess?

Anyone? Anyone?

Ever try to go through a drive through without being able to put down your window?

I have! It's super fun!

My sister in law shared with me over Christmas that the same thing happened to them in their van (different models, don't worry) and she said because of it she doesn't go through drive through fast food anymore.

It was at that point that I realized that I must have no shame. Because it hasn't stopped me at all. I have not stopped making trips through the Chick Fil A drive through, in fact I added the occasional Dunkin' Donuts and McDonald's run but that is purely due to my Keurig being on the fritz (that could and should be a post in it's own) and Wawa discontinuing their any size coffee for $1 deal.

In fact I usually completely forget that I can't put my window down until I get up to the pick up window and have to remember to pull up an extra six inches or so so they can open the window and I can get the goods.

Yeah, I've perfected it! And yes, I've realized that I clearly have no shame.

Deep down I'd like to think that they remember me with fondness.

2011

It's 2012!! Where did the year go? 2011 was certainly NOT the year of the blog over in my neck of the woods. I think it's the year I blogged the least since I started years ago.

I'm trying to get back to it so I thought it would be fun to look through the pictures on my phone from the past year and pull one or two off from each month. No real criteria, just whichever one(s) I felt like sharing!

January

This is one of my favs of Catherine and I can't believe it was a year ago. Love her!

One of the many snowstorms and a cute picture of my three favorite people. I realized that there is a better one of Ella but I believe I actually already posted it (surprise!) so I'm ok using this one.

February

My two girls heading to school on Valentine's Day. It's rare that they dress alike but it's something we all love.

March

March bought tooth drama. I was so tempted to post the picture I took of Ella mid wail as we tried to figure out how to get her tooth out (never seems to get easier for her). Instead I was good and posted a smiling (sorta) after shot.

April

This is basically the best picture we got this (and every) Easter since Matt is gone well before we are awake and gets home after us. I made Ella put her skirt back on in an attempt to create some sweet holiday picture. I actually love how disheveled it is - that's definitely more the reality!

May

In May Catherine graduated from PreK with her best buddy Nolan. I love the two of them together!

While visiting my Aunt, my dad decided to take a spin on her son/his nephew/my cousin's (apparently it was important you understand the family tree with this) Harley. I'm not posting the video I took, but I basically scream "slow down!" every time he rode by. It was slightly nerve wracking, but my dad had fun and didn't wreck.

June

This was an early highlight of our summer, Matt and I, thanks to his sister waiting in line to get tickets, went to see Mumford and Sons in concert. It was an amazing show and I am SO glad we got to see them.

The next day the girls and their cousin got to go get feathers in their hair. Little did we know that this was to become quite the fad that summer. Apparently we were ahead of the times and everywhere we went people commented on Catherine's bright orange feather. It stayed in for months and is in every picture we took. That aside, I love the cousins together in this picture.

July

I just love this picture of my mom reading to her grandkids during our beach vacation. She takes every opportunity to read to them and instill the love of reading in another generation.

I had to share this since it's one of my favorite iPhone pics. A few years ago who would have believed this was taken on a phone!

August

Another beach trip and another iPhone picture that is just cool. I caught this lightening strike while watching a storm roll over the skies at the ocean.

Ok, that's all I have posted for now. I want to say that I'll finish the rest of the year, but you know what happens when I say I'll be back....basically if you believed that then we only went to Disney for one day! Baby steps, baby steps. I'm working on it and hopefully will get some more regular posts this month.

Catching Up

So there is no way I can catch up on the past few months - I still hope to, but man, blogging just has fallen off the radar for me a bit. I still really enjoy reading yours though!! I think the hardest post is the welcome back post after an unintentional hiatus. So this is it, the put on your shoes and get out the door post....using a running metaphor!

This fall flew by at warp speed. We started school. We went to Disney and the week of our lives. We coached and played soccer. Each of these events deserves its own detailed post. I'd like to think that will happen some day. Didn't say it will.

I lead a Bible study, organized a nonprofit event and taught Sunday school. Matt ran around like crazy, trying to keep his many many plates spinning. He started building our outdoor kitchen area (you know, in all his free time). We had our big annual fall

fest, biggest one yet, and people got to admire the half finished outdoor kitchen area.

Ella excelled in reading and grew frustrated in math. Catherine loves Kindergarten and her prereading skills are taking off!

We went trick or treating with the girls as Princess Leia and Queen Amidala from Star Wars. Thank you Disney World for turning my girls into Star Wars fans!

The teachers and parents knew who they were more than the students.

Someone even called "I love you Princess Leia!"

I still read tons of books and have become a bit of Young Adult junkie! It's just so fun and easy to read, but every now and then I mix it up and read something matur

e and somber like Still Alice.

Catherine lost her first two teeth with no drama at all. We weren't expecting this because it creates such fear in Ella. Catherine pulled one out on her own and popped the other one out opening a water bottle at school. She was quite pleased with herself - Ella agreed that losing a tooth at school would be a big no no for her. Ahhh my two unique girls!

toothless Catherine

We had our second big church community Christmas celebration (called Joy) and then the day after Ella turned eight! How is it possible that she is eight years old? She had a fashion/makeover party that was so much fun, especially because I had a group of friends there helping with the makeovers. That definitely deserves a post because there are so many fun pictures.

We enjoyed a wonderful month celebrating Advent. Every morning the kids beg to go open the Advent calendar and Catherine kindly suggested that I put in the activity the night before. Imagine that!! I think my favorite activity was family game night when we played Christmas charades. The kids chose hard things like "Santa Baby, Hurry down the chimney tonight" (Ella) and "I want a hippopotamus for Christmas "(Catherine). For local friends, can you tell we listen to a lot of B101? And Mariah Carey Christmas Pandora station.

The hardest part is ending a very disjointed and random post. There's no real way to tie it up. So I'll post some pictures!

random October snowstorm - that's all Catherine wants right now

and she keeps wishing we could have pushed this snowstorm back a few months

getting ready to dance at Joy - love her beautiful smile!

look closely, can you tell I'm a Star Wars fan too....

The Prelude....

The girls knew that they were going to Disney World. It was a trip with my whole family to celebrate my parent's 40th Anniversary. I know, quite the celebration, huh?! But I decided awhile ago that all the details about the trip were going to be a surprise. Most specifically - when we were actually going!

They asked a number of times in September when we were going to Disney and I said later this fall. I kept having them believe that it was still a long ways away. Unfortunately the hard part about this was that everyone knew we were going and everyone I talked to knew it was a surprise but I still was paranoid that they would say something about Disney and someone would respond with "oh, your parents told you, aren't you so excited?!" or something like that and totally give it away.

I was right and wrong to be worried.

Right because I know of at least three times people said things about "Disney" and "this weekend when you leave" right in front of them.

One of those times it was Matt! Can you imagine how paranoid I was that we wouldn't pull off the surprise if their own dad was almost giving it away?!

Wrong because as clued in and somewhat suspicious the girls usually are (especially Ella) they didn't catch on.

The funniest/worst-at-the-time was the night before we left and we were having dinner with our friends Jon and Renee. They kept throwing little hints on purpose to drive me crazy, like telling the girls, that no, they couldn't do a sleepover that night, but they promised them they wouldn't sleep at home the next night, and after Renee painted their nails she told them looked as pretty as a princess. Not so bad. But Jon followed up with "you look pretty enough to meet a princess!"

I was kind of freaking out - it seemed so obvious to me - but the girls never picked up on it. I was so relieved when they went to bed that night, knowing that we would get to surprise them in the morning.

I knew that the best decision for our girls would be to tell them as close to the actual trip as possible. We told them three hours before we left. At one point in the morning Ella said "why did you tell us so early, I want to leave NOW!"

Ahhh....momma loves being right!

Coming up - Day 1!

Amazing

We are recovering from an amazing trip to Disney. I have been neglecting the blog these past few months but this trip is one I must record!!! (I can't forget back to school and birthday posts as well)

This week I'm gonna start with a Disney post...promise!!

Summer Catch Up

I have badly neglected my blog this summer. It has been a busy summer, but that's no excuse! We really have had a lot of fun and I can't let the summer pass by without sharing some of it!

Starting with....Vacation!

I know I did a mini post on our beach vacation with my family but I added a few more pictures because everyone knows that's where the real fun is!

It was a great week. The weather was great, we were right on the ocean, close enough for the older kids to walk to and from the beach by themselves (assuming people from our group were already there - I'm not that low key), the cousins all played together wonderfully - no fighting all week.

It was very relaxed - we stayed late at the beach, ate late dinners, watched World Cup soccer, went for ice cream, went to the boardwalk, drank wine, watched the sun set, watched the full moon over the ocean, dug holes in the sand complete with steps for the kids to walk down, snuggled babies, watched fashion shows (bottom right is an example), flew kites (no that is not a giant bird attaching Matt, that is our super cool dragon kite) and much more.

To sum it up, it was a treasured week of time with my whole family. So thankful!!

Back to the Beach!

For some reason I couldn't post this at the beach, the laptop kept giving me an error code. So it is a bit depressing to publish a post that was written early in your vacation when you are home and unpacked. But oh well...here it is!

We're on vacation for the week, enjoying time with family and fun in the sun.

I'm getting time with my nieces and nephews

The kids are enjoying story time with Nama

Much much water fun

Lots of cousin time - this is the first picture of all four girl cousins together...

And it's only Tuesday! More great times to come - currently I'm sitting at the beach house with a great view of the ocean, enjoying some time before I head out into the 90+ degree heat. Four of the kids are out on dates with grandparents or dads and the rest are quietly playing.

It's a good day!

1st Book Review

My love of reading is finally being put to use as I am now a part of BlogHer's Book Club! (Check out my new little badge on the lower left of my blog - click on it to go the book club and see other reviews) I get to read and review a book for you all, which is basically combining two things I love the most, reading and sharing stuff I love with people.

The book I reviewed was called Girl In Translation by Jean Kwok.

Curious what I thought of it? Then please go check out my review - leave a comment and let me know you think and maybe I'll get to do more of these!

Memorial Day Fun

I hope you all are enjoying this lovely Memorial Day weekend. We've had many hot sunny days in a row and the girls have enjoyed many days of swimming.

This was on Friday...

By Saturday she was swimming around with no vest on at all! Can't believe we have two swimmers now. Another big milestone for us as parents :)

Matt and Ella swam up to the edge of the pool so I could get a picture (mostly to document Matt's hairiness)...

And then this guy joined them....

It was pretty hilarious because they weren't expecting it and the dog was right on the edge angling down towards the water. Matt was trying to stay really still so they didn't knock him off while also turning the tube so the dog was facing the deck and could jump off. Eventually he just climbed over Ella to get back to dry land. Imagine how much she enjoyed that!

We really had a wonderful weekend - plenty of time just the four of us and plenty of time with friends. Now it's Tuesday morning and back to the grind with school and work...but we're counting down the days until school's out!

Special Days

For a few days last week Blogger was down. You couldn't create posts or edit posts. I didn't know this because I had a blog full of pictures sitting on my desk top and hadn't gotten around to doing anything to them to know that I wouldn't have been able to anyway. When I went to close it down and realized it wasn't saving I realized "oh....that's why I've been seeing grumbling messages about blogger on facebook and twitter". I was pleasantly surprised to see that a few days later my post had been restored (seriously though, how hard would it be to add the pictures again....apparently for me it would have been tough!) and I didn't have to start over.

I just wanted to highlight a few special things from the past week (now two weeks ago). Note: This is not in chronological order. I know that's annoying but so is rearranging the pictures!

On Mother's Day I had the most wonderful gift of watching Ella and Catherine dance in church. They performed a beautiful dance, choreographed by Renee, to David Crowder's version of "How He Loves". It is such a beautiful song and watching my girls dance to it on Mother's Day definitely resulted in some tears! I love watching them grow as they get old and more comfortable performing. They are both so different on stage. Ella gets a little nervous and is very focused on getting the moves right. She loves it so much and I am so proud of her for doing it and not letting that little nervousness hold her back! Catherine doesn't mind being on stage at all - in fact she'll make eye contact with you if she can (if it's me, I'm usually mouthing back to her, watch Nay Nay, watch Nay Nay) and flash a big smile and just dance her heart out, even if she's not always going in the right direction!

Here are two sweet pictures of them waiting to perform....

A few days before I got to attend a Mother's Day Tea in Ella's classroom. Her teacher did an amazing job organizing this and the kids worked so hard preparing all the activities.
I love any chance I get to be in Ella's class (and man it's been a lot this year!). It's great to see how she's doing and have her show me all her "stuff". I love getting a sense of the class "dynamic".

The kids did a poem, a song, and a book. They made a little book about their moms and a card with their picture and handprint on it. We also did a little craft together and the teacher came around a took a picture of each kid and their mother (it's not the one above, but it's one of my favs of Ella and me. I'll have to scan it in and post it)

Then the kids served us tea, little sandwiches, fruit and chocolate. Pretty nice tea party if I say so myself!

Finally, but not really, because it too place earlier that day. That morning on the same day Catherine's class had an open house. She got to show us all around her class and point out all her favorite things.

I was glad Matt was able to zip over from work and join us.

Then we made a craft together (crafty day for me!) and the kids performed some of their favorite songs.

I love that picture because everyone is getting situated but Catherine saw Matt with the his phone up and went into camera mode! Love it :)

Then the kids all served us drinks, doughnut hole and other treats.

It was a busy day but such a special day to see both girls in their school environments and enjoy some extra time with them.