More lovely beach time!!!

Julia and Sawyer spent a lot of time building a water slide. 

Julia was the construction manager, so she had Sawyer going back and forth getting water from the ocean while she did the design and buliding.

Here is Sawyer testing out the water slide they made. It did not work as well as they thought that it was going to work, but they had a lot of fun

Dennis and Ryan spent a lot of time playing in the waves.  The wave do not get very big, so the boogey boards do not work all that great, but they are good floating devices out in the deeper area.

When Ryan is not in the ocean with Dad, he is looking for creatures and treasures.

We found sting rays again this time.  We had a net and so everyone wanted to be our friends and play with our net.  We did not care, and Ryan enjoyed having older kids to play with. 

Just a few awesome pictures of the kids.  I love beach pictures!!!!

date night

This particular week, it was Julia and My date night.  We decided to get a pedicure.  This was Julia's first time and she was way excited.  She picked out some crazy colors and had it all mapped out what she wanted the lady to do.  Her concoction= purple toe nail polish with orange flowers, with red centers.  The lady looked at her like she was crazy and told her it would look better if she swapped the orange flowers for white ones.  She was ok with that when she saw the "sparkly" red centers she was going to get.  She did think that it took a little to long.  Next time, I will just get her nails painted, since that is really all she wanted. 

Our pretty toes!!!!!

Last visit to Children's Museum

We took one last trip to the children's museum before we made the grand voyage to Ok.  Ryan brought along a friend with him.  Sawyer spent a ton of time at this exhibit.  It was a magnetic board with pipes and balls.  He wanted to use all the pieces and with my help we finally got it done. 

Julia had a lot of fun at the dance and groove place.  She was a little embarrassed and would stop dancing whenever some one would walk by.  She is a good little dancer though, she is precise and has rythym.  I think she look absolutely adorable in this little hat, with her cute attitude.

Ryan spent most of his time in the pretend grocery store being the "boss".  His favorite thing to "pretend".  He and Julia and his friend had many minutes of fun together.  I think they might all grow up to work in a supermarket. 

Last day of 1st/3rd grade

The very last day of school for Ryan in third grade and Julia in first grade.  It was very hot and humid, which is why the pictures look all cloudy, too much humidity.  Both kids did great this year in school.  We really liked their elementary school, their teachers and the kids that they became friends with.

Sawyer and I filled ALOT of water balloons and put them in a wagon and took them to the bus stop.   All the kids at the bus stop had a water balloon fight when they got off the bus.  An end of the year balloon blast.  It was tons of fun and I think that we will make a tradition. 

What a fun group of kids!!!

Spring Recital

For his spring recital, Ryan played two pieces.  Funny thing-he took about 30 seconds to carefully place each page of one of his pieces and then never looked at them one time during his five minutes of playing.  Too cute.  He did a great job, I am so proud of how well he did this first year in piano.  He loves it and I hope he sticks with it.

Ryan and his piano teacher. 

Galaxy Girl

Julia was invited to a birthday, costume party in the summer.  There were no costumes that were jumping out at her, so we decided to make something up.  Our creation, Galaxy Girl, or glitter girl, she really could not decide.  She was super cute and we had fun being creative together. 

Lulu's class picnic

Just like Ryan, Julia's class had a picnic the second to last day of school.  The did a lot of water activities.  This sponge one was really cute and Julia loved it. 

This is Julia most best friend from 1st grade.  The best part, she lived around the corner from us, so they got to play a lot together.  We sure miss her and her family!!!

Not a very good pictue, but the only one that I have.  This is Julia and her first grade teacher, Mrs. Castille.  She was a great teacher for Julia, super nice and pushed her just enough. 

Back to Normal Life

School has started...
After a fun summer,
* moving from Houston to Tulsa, Ok
* trying new thing to do in tulsa
* a month long trip to the west to visit family and friends
* resting and recovering from said trip
* trying a few more fun things in Tulsa and new shots for school,only required in tulsa YUCK!!!
................................we are back in school and ready to bring our lives back to normal.  I should have more time to clean, rest and blog!!  All of which I am very grateful for.  I have a lot of catching up to do and I will try hard to get it all done before I get sick of blogging!!  Enjoy that last five posts and check back often to review our fun summer!!

Ryan's field day/class picnic

The third graders had their field day the second to last day of school.  It was miserable hot outside.  I vounteered to help and Sawyer came with me.  Sawyer and I helped with the cup stacking station.  This is a picture of Ryan with his partners.  It was good that Ryan was in a group of three, cuz Sawyer got to have a turn with Ryan.

After the hot, humid field day, they had their class picnic, in the shade.  This is Ryan and his third grade teacher, Ms. Laurence. 

horse races

One Saturday, while Ryan was at a birthday party, the rest of us went to the horse races.  It was fun to pick a color and cheer that horse on.  Sawyer really liked it.  It was dollar day, so all the goodies were a dollar, which was nice.  This is the only picture that I got.  A fun outing with the fam!!

No more long, beautiful hair

For about 4 months, Julia kept asking to get her hair cut.  I was very against it.  It took 7 years to get her hair that long, and it was so pretty!  After using every excuse I could think of, we finally let her do it.  She was so excited and I was in tears.  But,........

it turned out pretty cute.  It makes her look so much older, but it is a lot easier to do! 

Dinosaurs

We were so excited for the much anticipated dinosaur event at the Houston zoo.  There was months of advertising for it.  Ryan was so excited and then we found out that it was not going to open until we moved from Houston, he was so dissapointed.  Then, almost miraculously, there was a member only free preview, that would take place before we moved.  So...we went.  It was very hot outside, but Ryan was so excited, so we went. 

I will say this event was the most disappointing thing I think we have done in a long time.  All that was there, were giant statues of dinosaurs.  And there were only about 5 of them.  I am so glad we did not pay the $5 a person to see it!  Makes for a cute picture though!!

Taylor Swift concert

As part of Dennis's Christmas present,(one event a month), we went to the Taylor Swift concert in May.  It was amazing.  An added bonus, Kellie Pickler was one of the warm up preformers, she was great as well.  I love going to concerts, the show that the artist puts on is as good as the music.   I did notcie that Dennis was 1 of about 100 guys in the whole place.  We were also the oldest people there that did not have little girls with us!!  The night that we were there, they were recording the concert for her CD, so that was cool.  It was a great concert!!

Ry's field trip

The third graders took a field trip down to the children's museum.  They learned alot about balancing money, having jobs and playing adult this year.  So they took a field trip to kidtropolis, which is a mini town that lets the kids pretend to be adults, well the fun parts of being an adult. 

They started with a picnic in the park and all the boys played games while the girls sat on blankets and chit-chatted.  This whole year I have noticed that the girls and boys really seperated themselves.  Whenever I would go to lunch with Ryan, his whole class voluntarily seperated themselved into boys and girls.  The boys all sat at one one end of the table, then there was a huge empty area and the girls were clear down on the other end. 

After the picnic and games we went to the museum.  Ryan really likes the newsroom.  He likes to preform in front of people.  The one thing he likes most at the children's museum is to gather money on his "debit card"

He runs from one job to the next collecting as many paychecks as possible.

I found Ryan often in the bank being the manager, that way he had access to all the money.  He likes to get money.

This is Ryan with his friend Matthew.  Matthew was a great friend for Ryan. The funny thing about this picture is that I had my camera and asked Ryan is he would like me to take any pictures of him with any of his friends.  He said no, in a mom quit embarrassing tone.  So I asked if he would like to use the camera to take any pictures himself.  He gets all excited takes the camera, walks over to Matthew's mom and asked if she will take a picture of him and Matthew.  Wow, what a blow to me, the un-cool mom!!!  JK, I thought it was very silly!!!

Day Trip to Brennam, TX

We took one Saturday and drove up to Brenam, TX.  It was a very quinte little town.  We started the day browsing through the old town town shops and eating at a cafe.  The food was very southern, and good. 

Then we went to the Blue Bell factory.  It was Saturday, so no tours, but we did see a shot film of a tour and then ate some yummy ice cream.  It was only $1 a scoop and they were huge scoops.  We all tried a different kind and this is the day I tasted my most favorite ice cream.  BLue Bell banana pudding.  It was a flavor the Sawyer tried and I loved it!!!!

After the ice cream, we went out to a minature horse farm. There were a lot of new babies.  The kids really liked it.....

especially Ryan.  He loved touching and petting the little horses.  It was hot and humid and I was totally grossed out.  I mean look at how gross those horses look.  Anyway, the kids loved it and did not seem to be bothered by the gross-ness of it!!

This little horse was taking a lick of Julia's foot while she was looking at me for the picture, and she is still not grossed out!!

Even the flies, note the one on Sawyer's forehead, did not keep the kids from spending way too much time touching the horses.  The horses were cute, but the atmosphere was not grand!!!

It was a great day.  I love taking little trips places to see new things.  I love to travel!!!

playing hooky

                                             

I think I like the kids skipping school more then they like it.  I told them that we could skip one day of school in May and have a lot of fun.  So we started off the day at the zoo.  There was a brand new(10 days) baby elephant that we really wanted to see.   SUPER CUTE!!!!!

 

After we were done at the zoo, seeing all of our favorite animals, we went over to Hermann park and rented a paddle boat. The kids loved this.  We saw a lot of turtles and fish and one really cool big blue fish.

After the paddle boat ride, we ate lunch at Hermann park and the took the train over to The  Museum of Natural Science. 

It was fun, but more for big kids, Sawyer was not really enjoying it, that is until we came to the seashell exhibit.  He thought it was so cool and never wanted to leave the area.  WE also paid a lot extra to go to a magic show.  I assumed, since we were paying more to go to it, that it was going to be amazing.  it was not amazing at all.  Seriously, even Julia and Sawyer could see his tricks.  Lame-o Lame-o!!  

We did, however, get to look for fossils and such at this area.  The guy was a little grouchy about how "careless" Sawyer was being with the tools, but Ryan and Julia loved the attention that he was giving to their "skills".

After the museum, we went to the Miller Outdoor Theater to roll down the hills.  I never get the fun in rolling in grass, but the kids sure enjoyed it.  We had a great day, and it is days like this one, that I am reminded how LUCKY I am the Dennis goes to work each day, so I can stay home and be a mom and play with the kids!!!

We are officially OKLAHOMANS

Well we did it AGAIN!!  We have moved to Oklahoma.  We have been here for about a week and it is very nice.  We are renting a house right now until we find a place we want to call home.   This is potentially the last move that we will make, therefore we are forever OKLAHOMANS!!  We look forward to a more rural life, well I might miss the urban life, but I know the kids and Dennis and ready to plant some country roots!!  I am trying to get caught up with my blog, so I plan on putting 2-3 posts a day until I am all caught up.  Hope you enjoy!!!
(2 new post below this one!!)

Talent show

For the talent in our ward Ryan and Julia both decided to show off a talent.  Ryan played the piano.  The piano was turned around and you could not see him, therefore no picture of him.  He did a great job though!!
Julia's talent she chose was jump roping, she would only participate though if a friend joined her.  So her friend Maddie jump roped with her.  Sawyer was so bummed out that he was not doing anything that we decided that he could dance in the back corner while Julia jump roped.  Have you ever seen Sawyer dance?  He is quite the little dancer.  Anyhow he stole the show.  He has such good rythm and I have no idea where he gets his moves, but the little guy can dance.  While Julia was jump roping, which she did an excellent job at, the crowd started to chat Sawyer's name.  I was a little worried that Julia would be upset, but she was fine.  Afterwards everyone was commenting on Sawyer's dancing, even one guy who did a Vanilla Ice reinactment, was wondering where Sawyer got his moves.  It was tooooo funny.  I have a vidoe of it, if I ever can learn how to put it on here, I will!!  (Sorry the picture is sooo bad!!!)

Dancin in the Rain

Texas rain is so warm, making it alot of fun to dance in the rain.  Ryan and Sawyer had a ball playing in the backyard while it was raining.  It was really coming down, making large puddles all over.  They did not get to play very long because it started to thunder and lightning, so to be safe, they came inside. 

I love this picture, it shows how much water was falling from the sky and also how happy Ryan was to be in it!!