Sunday, June 30, 2013

Wednesday, June 26, 2013

Beach Babies

We took the kids on our first family beach vacation last week. They had so much fun! So did Mike and I but I also learned a valuable lesson. Going to the beach with your young children is way different than going to the beach with your friends. I felt like I was on "lifeguard duty" the entire time. I really could not relax with them in the water. Still, I'm glad we went and we are already planning our next trip next summer!

Before I show you pictures though I need to tell you about the pre-vacation stress my precious children gave to me. As we were leaving I stopped to feed my hamster. I noticed that everything in his cage was moved to one side. It was very peculiar. So I called out to Mike and he came and looked and began digging around in the cage. Which turned out to be very, very empty. No hamster anywhere. The children were already buckled up in the car. We were that close to being out the door. So I looked at Mike and said "bring them in here for questioning." Our son told us that what had happened was the cage had somehow, mysteriously fallen off of the table we keep it on. He repeatedly stated that he didn't know how it happened. But the lid fell off and so he picked it back up and put it on the table. Evidently, he did not see dear Striper crawl out of the cage when it paranormally took a nose dive. Emma claimed no knowledge of the event whatsoever. She said she was asleep. She is a known liar so I'm not sure I believe her. Anyway, we spent the next 15 minutes looking for Striper but did not find him. So we left. I was very worried about him because the front door had been open for some time while Mike packed up so I knew if Striper had made his way outside that he was toast. I mean we have hawks, snakes, mean old mockingbirds and all sorts of dangerous stuff out front. And Striper is not an outdoorsman. He has no survival skills that I'm aware of. Also, I was afraid that if he was hiding inside our house he would accidentally get caught on the sticky mouse traps we have everywhere just like our cat did a few weeks ago. Not pretty.

So we spent the next two days on the beach living it up but always in the back of my mind I was worried about my hamster. When we got back in town the first thing I did was look for him. Still no Striper. The next morning after I fed the cat I happened to walk by her food bowl only to see a cute little ball of fur sitting in there eating cat food like there was no tomorrow. I have never been so happy to see a little rodent.

Now, on with the photo documentation!






The kids loved the Texas State Aquarium. And Mike got to participate in the dolphin show. He won a free Whataburger for his help!


We took a ten minute ferry ride. It was the first time for our children to be on a boat. We even saw bottlenose dolphins! Yeah! Behold, the brown waters of the Texas Gulf Coast. Thank you Mississippi River.


The view from our condo. It was beautiful but my camera lens kept fogging up.







We didn't even have to teach Emma Mae how to hold her boogie board. She just did it naturally. It's in her DNA. Mike was so proud. Both kids did great on the boogie boards and spent an entire day playing in the surf. Love!

Saturday, June 8, 2013

Kinder graduate

This little guy graduated from Kindergarten on Wednesday. Where has the time gone? We are so proud of him! He can read and write now! He can play well with others. In fact, the one area that he received an "excellent" in was cooperating with others. I think that's almost as important as writing in your night journal!
 

 
 
Jake and Abigail


Most of his Kindergarten class.


Our sweet Mrs. Ware. I've already begged her to take Emma Mae when she gets to Kinder!


Jake and Kason. BFF's.


Our dear little Sydney. I'm not sure yet if Jake will marry her or her little sister someday. I'm ok with either one.


Little Miss gets to go to all of the Kinder parties with us. She's like an honorary Kinder mascot. Love them! Congratulations to my big man!