Cottage Fair December 2009

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And yet more photos...

The one by the tumbleweed is when we went geocaching with Susan, Lauren and Hailey. We had one successful find out of 3 tries.

More Photos...

APRIL

Here's a run down on our April... Risa' birthday, Risa's birthday party, Risa attends Brownie event, Easter, Brandon's birthday, our Kitty died, Risa gets tubes in her ears, Spring Spectacular at school, Rob has emergency business trip, Brandon attends a birthday party, get new carpet, Brownie event, Risa's field trip (yes, I go too!), Brandon's birthday party, Risa attends another Brownie event and we top it all off with another birthday party for one of Risa's friends. Is it time to sit by the pool and not move for a few weeks??

Spring Break

WOW! I can't believe that the kids only have one more quarter of school left. Risa will be in 3rd grade and Brandon in 1st grade next year. It sounds impossible.

Risa is doing great with gymnastics. She has a great teacher and really loves all she is learning. Risa went to dance camp this week and performed a hip hop dance at the end of the day. She loves dance but we may try to get her into sports this fall. Soccer seems to be the direction she is headed.

Brandon and Risa both went to a Rock & Swim camp this week. They spent a couple of hours swimming with friends and then climbed the rock wall. They both did great. Risa makes it to the top of the wall and is really great at climbing. Brandon made it up over half way and said he's made it to the top also. But I missed out on seeing that.

We also made it to a spring training game. We saw the Brewers take on the Giants at the Giants complex in Scottsdale. It is a beautiful spring training facility.

Winter...

Yes, I know we don't really have a winter out here. In fact, it has been warm all of January. But the cold bugs still hit us. Risa has been fighting with earaches and strep all year and now has some sort of something else going on! Brandon has been very healthy all winter but got hit with flu/earache/strep all in the same weekend. Maybe all of these symptoms are actually strep but who knows!

Other than that life has been continuing as normal with school, brownies, gymnastics and play dates. Brandon has been doing a lot of 1st grade math and loves it. He whips through his math facts so quickly. Risa is a writer and loves to create new dramas in her journals. She is very creative and puts together well thought out stories. It's a lot of fun to read all that she brings home.

Ho Ho Ho

and Merry Christmas. The kids are having a blast with Santa and all the Christmas trimmings this year. Brandon is full of wonder and belief in magic and all things Christmas. He's memorized the lyrics to numerous Christmas songs and has kept the entire Christmas season fun for all of us. Risa loves the anticipation and fun with all of the parties. It's a wonderful time of the year and a wonderful time in childhood! Can you spot the difference between the "real" Santa and the "helper" Santa??

Happy Thanksgiving!!

Happy Thanksgiving! We hope you all are having an enjoyable weekend. I'm taking the time to get caught up around here. So here's a quick run down... Brandon finished tee ball and lost another tooth somewhere along the way... and I love his grin! He's working on his other front top tooth and is hoping to sing "all I want for Christmas is my two front teeth..." Seriously, he loves that song. Risa is still involved in acro-gymnastics. Her Christmas performance is in 2 weeks. Between Brownies and birthday parties Risa's social life is full for the next 2 weeks. Speaking of Brownies, Risa starts selling cookies once again in January. It doesn't seem possible that it's been a year since we passed out all of the boxes from our last sales season!

These photos are from some fun fall activities... Brandon at the pumpkin patch on his 1st field trip, with his tee ball friends, and in school. Risa and Kyra are dressed as their favorite fairies from a couple of their favorite books for Literature day and is playing in the "snow" with Kyra at Brownies. Fake snow is all the rage in Arizona!

I keep hoping to be a more active blogger! I try, Susan, I truly do!! Hopefully, it won't be a month before my next post. Happy Thanksgiving!

Halloween

We have heard "Trick or treat, smell my feet, give me something good to eat. I asked my teacher what to wear... poked dotted underwear" a million times this week! AND IT'S FINALLY HERE!!! HALLOWEEN!!! YEAH!!!

And here are the 2 cutie kids... they went from cute princess and superhero Spiderman to a witch and skeleton. I guess the Halloween gene inherited from Gram Shirley has kicked in! Brandon had a great reason for his...he wants to be a "bone" doctor so he thought a skeleton was a cool idea when he saw it in the store!

We're off to gather large amounts of candy! Happy Halloween!!

Risa plays with the dinosaurs!

Risa took a trip back in time to the land of the dinosaurs! Her class went on a field trip to see the"Walking with the Dinosaurs" show that is currently traveling the country. I was a lucky parent that got to tag along. It was a really cool experience! The dinosaurs were HUGE! The kids loved the show! Everyone loved watching the dinosaurs "fight" to save their babies and defend their territories and went wild when the T-Rex came roaring out! The narrator was walking around with the dinosaurs so it gave us an idea of how truly magnificent these creatures were.

Tee ball has begun!!

Brandon is on his way to baseball stardom. Our switch hitting dude has begun his baseball career at the sweet age of 5. He hits off a tee, makes it to first, as he's running to 2nd he may get distracted and stop half way there. On the way to 3rd Brandon has to avoid the cluster of kids from the other team but zig zags his way through! Finally, he rounds third and makes it to home plate. Which he promptly stands on wondering where to go next! When Brandon is playing in the field... literally, playing... kicking dirt, talking to the other kids ... there are moments of brilliance as he joins the herd running after the ball. Yes, all 13 kids run after the ball each time it is hit! At least they understand someone has to get the ball back to the tee. Unless it is just a quick game of tag that has broken out and we just pretend they know to go after the ball! We remind ourselves that even Chipper Jones, ARod, Manny Ramirez and all of those other baseball dudes started this way. Go Dragons!!

Special Kid

Brandon was selected to be "Special Kid"! This is a great thing for kindergartners. On their Special Kid Day they go to the front of the class and every learns neat things about them. The entire class learned to spell Brandon's name, they yelled his name, whispered it, chanted it, said it fast and slow! Then Brandon tells everyone how old he is (5), what his favorite food is (spaghetti), and what he likes to play with (cars). Then Brandon put together his name puzzle. After all of this the kids go to their tables and draw pictures of Brandon. The coolest thing is that everyone adds a compliment to their picture. Some of the compliments were that his friends like his shirt (dinosaur shirt), they like his hair, they think he's really good on the monkey bars. Some kids said they like the way he sits. Obviously, that's an important thing at this age!!

Brandon was so proud to walk to the front of the class and get all of this positive attention. He got to bring his book of portraits home and we love looking at all of the great pictures and reading the compliments!

Baseball Game Fun!

We have the luxury of having friends in high places to get us great seats to the ballgame. Which means we can sit behind home plate and not pay for the tickets! Yeah!! The kids had lots of fun. I don't think they watched much of the game but entertained themselves with hot dogs, popcorn and the biggest snow cone I've ever seen. It was a great choice on Brandon's part. It kept them occupied for at least 3 innings! The fashionable colors of their tongues were the end result!!

Caring Older Sister

Risa has taken on the responsibility of getting Brandon to the playground okay. I drop them both off at the Kindergarten playground. Then Risa helps Brandon put his backpack in line, plays with him for awhile and when Brandon goes into class Risa heads over to her playground. It has really been a huge help for me and it helps Brandon with the adjustment to Kindergarten!

Risa loves 2nd grade. Lots of new kids in her class and cute girls to have as new friends. She wants to go on a shopping trip with her new friend Lauren so they can wear matching outfits to Cottage Fair in October. I thought it was hard enough shopping with Risa but now she wants to mix in a friend! It may take an entire day!

Sweet Baby Boy

Brandon came home from school yesterday and pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket. I asked him about it. He said it's the note I put in his lunch box. He put it in his pocket to remember that I'm thinking about him! Is that so sweet? Brandon has his first snack time around 9 AM so he had it with him most of the day!!

Brandon is doing great but it is an adjustment to the longer school day. When he finishes his work he likes to move on quickly to something else instead of waiting for the group to finish. So he thinks he's bored a lot of the day!

1st Day of School

The Cutie kids were so excited to start school today. Risa, of course, had no problems and was right back into the routine. Brandon did great. He got a little nervous when it was time to go into class. I think that was because of the others kids crying more than anything! His teacher did tell me that about half way through the day he said he wanted his Mom. But he carried on and is excited about going back tomorrow!

End of Summer

It has been an exciting 7 weeks of summer break! We have gone swimming in the Pacific, spent countless hours in our own pool, taken trips to the zoo, seen many movies, eaten boxes of popsicles, and spent lots of time with friends and family. Brandon lost his first tooth, the kids went for a ride on a camel and Risa enjoyed Dance Camp.

It all ends this week with the start of the new school year! Risa and Brandon are excited with some nervousness thrown in for Brandon. He'll be starting at a new school with a whole new routine. Risa will be moving into 2nd grade but gets to keep the same teacher. She'll have her hands full with all of the 1st graders moving into the classroom.

And what will Mom be doing?? I get the pool to myself!!