Fabulous Friday

Just thought I would share a couple of pics of my favorite little people this Friday evening.  They have been so sweet today.  Kate was super chatty when I picked her up from school and told me all about her day and her favorite color (of the day).  She is not always chatty so I just soaked it all in.  

 And this little guy is just the bomb!!  I did reading buddies at his school and he asked me to stay and have lunch with him. Made my day!!!  I loved hanging out with him and his friends.  First grade lunch is always interesting.

Have a great weekend!  I know I will because I get to hang out with these people (and their dad).

Ben's Fortune

Sunday we hit our favorite little local Chinese restaurant after church.  The kids are always excited when they get their fortune cookies.  Well, this was Ben's on Sunday...

We all had a good laugh because it is at least 20 years premature.  One day his wife will look at this blog and love seeing Ben's 6 year old fortune about her.

A Snow Day (Sort Of)

Well, the school delay this morning didn't turn out to be nothing.  We actually got a little snow.  We were not expected to get any but around 8 am it started snowing.  My parents invited us over for breakfast since school was delayed.  We enjoyed a big breakfast and a little run through the dusting of snow.  

 Kate preferred to stay warm by the fire.  It is frigidly cold.  Sure do wish we had a working fireplace.

 It snowed on and off all day.  Nothing big but enough that I did slip a couple of times driving from work to pick up Kate from school.  Thankfully it is nothing like it is south of us.  Numerous friends are stuck on the road or in shelters in Birmingham.  I can't imagine!!

 I enjoyed snuggling with my little ones on this cold afternoon!!

Chilled Out Weekend

This is pretty much what our weekend looked like...

It was super low key.  We had just a few things on the calendar which was nice!  We just hung around the house and played and relaxed.  It was great!  Ben had a basketball game and we went to church.  I ran 8 miles on Saturday and again Sunday.  But other than that we just had some fun family time.  I love low key weekends.  The weather was also much warmer which was great.  After a long week of freezing temps it was nice to see the sun and be able to get outside.  Unfortunately, the cold weather is back.  School delays have already be announced for tomorrow.  Hoping we get some snow to go along with the cold temperatures.  I guess we will try to stay warm all week again.

100th Day of School

Today was a super big day - the 100th day of school.  And when you are in first grade that is a big deal!!!  Ben was so excited for all the fun that was the 100th day.  He had several projects he had to do leading up to today.  He had to cut out 100 words that he can read.  He also had to make a hat with 100 things on it.  

 They did fun 100 day activities all day but he most exciting was getting to sing the 100 day song on HCTV.  Ben could not wait to "be on TV."  He was so worried we would be late for school and he would miss it.  I heard they did a great job and Ben says he is now a TV star.

So proud of our little guy for doing so good his first 100 days.  Now just 80 more and it will be summer!!!

Baby Ben With Glasses

So this morning while I was taking a shower I started thinking about the day that Ben got his first pair of glasses (I know totally random thoughts that I have in the shower).  We were so worried because when we were trying glasses on him he would not keep them on.  I had no idea how we were going to keep them on him.  Well, when we put his glasses with the prescription in them on him he said "wow" and started looking at everything.  He could see so much better!  It was such a cute moment.  I will never forget the look on his face.  He was just 12 months old - it was just a couple of weeks after his first birthday.  

Now almost 6 years later his glasses are just such a part of him.  I think he looks funny when he doesn't have them on.  

I thought I would share a few pictures from that first day of him having glasses.  He was such a cutie!!!! 

Wordless Wednesday

Chattanooga Part 2

Due to the time change everyone slept in a little bit which was nice!  We then headed out to Panera for breakfast.  It has been so long since we had all been to Panera.  We love it!

 Then we headed across the street to the Children's Museum.  It was an amazing place.  So much to see and do.  The kids had a BLAST!!!  There was just room after room of fun things.  It was the highlight of the trip.

What a fun little getaway it was.  So nice to just be able to relax and have a good time together!

Chattanooga Getaway Part 1

Matt had a 4 day weekend and the kids were off from school today so we decided to go on a little getaway.  We headed just up the road to Chattanooga.  We used hotel points and food gift cards to make it a pretty inexpensive trip.  The kids were so excited.  They love anytime we get to stay in a hotel!  We left Sunday right after church.  Our first stop was the Tennessee Aquarium.  

 The kids really enjoyed the ocean side and seeing the sharks.  We got to see divers in the big tank.

 My favorite was the wall of amazing jellyfish.  So cool!

 Kate made friends with this little turtle.  It would follow her every move.  It was so cute!

 We realized we are  not big aquarium people.  But that's ok.  We still had lots of fun things to do.  Our hotel was right in downtown so we were able to just walk everywhere.

 We enjoyed dinner at a fun diner and then hit the indoor pool at the hotel.  The kids were so excited to get to swim!

 They were both little fish in the water.  Those swimming skills are still going strong!

 The diner where we ate dinner had amazing desserts so we got a piece of M&M cake to go.  The kids loved eating it in bed.

 They then curled up and watched the iPad.  So cute!  It was a long day full of fun!!

Basketball 2014

Ben had a game today and team pictures.  I don't ever buy the pictures so I took my own.  He is loving basketball this season.  His team is the Spurs and they are doing awesome.  So far at about the halfway point in the season they are undefeated.  They have some really good players on their team and they all work together well.  Ben has done really well playing defense and rebounding.  He has also had some really good shots along the way.  We are proud of how hard he works and what a great team player he is.  He is always cheering on the other players and excited for them when they do well.  

Girl Drama

So we learned very quickly 4 years ago that little girls brought lots of drama with them.  I mean from day 1 Kate has been nothing but drama.  For the most part it has been fun but there are moments.  Last night there was a big moment...

Kate is notorious for making a huge mess with her toys.  Her room is always so very messy.  Well, a couple of days ago she had gotten in trouble for getting out play dough in the play room without asking permission.  She got a warning and was told never to do that again.  Yesterday she goes up to the playroom for a while and we wonder what is going on.  Yep you guessed it.  Play dough was everywhere.  I mean all over the play room.  It was ground into the carpet.  Ugh!!!  So needless to say there were lots of discussions.  

We got the play room cleaned up and I decided to take a cue from my very wise father and institute the Gary East method to get a little girl to clean her room.  Growing up I was also I little hard to get to clean my room.  So my dad would grab a trash bag and start bagging up things he found.  I am sure there was lots drama then too.  Well I grabbed a trash bag and went to work.  I bagged up all of her new Polly Pockets.  You would have thought I had cut off her arm with all the crying that went on.  It was drama, drama, drama.  But hopefully it will do the trick and we will have a much more clean room soon and then she can get her Polly Pockets back.  

Even with all the drama I am just so in love with this little girl.  With the drama comes lots of fun and lots of laughs!!  

BSF Family

Ben started BSF this week with Matt. I am so excited that we are all doing it now!  We have enjoyed sharing what we are learning.  I love this picture of Matt and Ben working together on their lessons!!  Thankful for the opportunity to study God's word together. 

Our Reader

We are so proud of our Ben and how well he is doing reading these days.  I had worried some last year and at the beginning of this year that he wasn't reading as well as he should (you know the crazy thing that kids are supposed to be reading before they start kindergarten now).  I had been promised by several of my teacher things that everything was just fine.  Ben would start reading at his own time.  There would just be one day when the light bulb went off and he would read.  I believed them (sort of).  

Well of course they were right!!  About a month ago the light bulb went off.  He started reading like crazy.  He was reading everything he could get his hands on.  He is reading 2-3 books a night and lots more at school.  His reading level has improved drastically.  He is now reading on a second and third grade level.  He is doing awesome.  

It has been so neat to see the world open up to him as he has learned to read.  He reads signs as we drive down the road and menus at restaurants.  It is so cool!!  We are so proud of him and how hard he has worked.  Now it is almost time for Parade of Readers!!