Around AR

With summer finally here, we packed up the car and headed to visit some of our family! It's been awhile since we've been in Little Rock to see my parents. With Matt teaching Bible class each Sunday we actually haven't been there since Thanksgiving! Yikes! It's amazing how time flies. :)

Matt's been doing some workshops this summer and was able to cut out early after one of them & we headed off to see Mimi & Grandad! To say the kids were excited would be quite an understatement! We'd hoped Charlotte would nap in the car, but no such luck with that; thankfully, she was happy until about the last 30 minutes though. Most of our time in Little Rock was spend hanging around Mimi & Grandad's house with the kids happily playing. Charlotte quickly discovered they have stairs -- her new most favorite thing -- and spend most of her time plotting how to get around the gate and climb them!

One day while we were there, Matt was able to play golf with a friend and my mom & I took the kids to The Tubes to play. This is always a must-do when in LR for us! This time even Charlotte got in on the action in the toddler area. She was determined to get up the little stairs to the slide and slide down by herself.

This time Madeleine surprised me with her confidence and before I knew it she was all the way up to the top and all over the place! Here she is in the top tube before heading down the 2-story slide!

Seriously, this is TALL! Once Madeleine had made it up to the top, Harrison wasn't far behind in trying it! She took him and showed him the way up there and they went up and down up and down forever. By the time we left, both of them were sweating and ready for some lunch. :)

One of the other things we've been dying to do is go and visit Ryan and Jamie in Newport. We wanted to go see their new house and, most importantly, meet our new nephew Baby Garner! We had such a fun time catching up with them -- and I'm still thinking about what may be my new favorite kind of pizza!!

Madeleine, Harrison & Emery played together so so well -- they didn't want to leave to come home. I didn't get too many pictures of them since they were busy having fun and making a mess. :) Harrison & Emery weren't really into having pictures made that day, too. They actually told me NOT to take their pictures! But, this girl was happy to let me snap one.

One of the *best* parts was getting to meet and love on Garner! He is the sweetest baby! I could have held him for hours he's so cuddly. :) Uncle Matt got in some lovin' time too.

We've had a great time using some of our down time this summer visiting our families! I'm always reminded of how blessed we are with such great families and how much we need to try and get on the road to see them more often.

Splash Park

I'm way behind in posting these pictures from a couple of weeks ago, but I wanted to be sure and remember all the fun we had with our Tuesday Playgroup at the Splash Park. We tried out the newest one in Bentonville this time and it was a blast! We'll definitely try and make it back there this summer.

I stole this picture off of AJ's blog....it's so cute I had to repost it! To read the adorable story behind it click here.
While Madeleine and Harrison both looooved the splash park, Charlotte was not a fan. But, it was fun to dress her in her cute little swimsuit and take pictures of all those rolls....and rolls....and rolls!

I think one of the kinks they're working out is the drainage system. The water pooled in one spot and make the most glorious mud-dy water which just called out to little boys, mine included. Notice that big ol' piece of sod by Harrison? Lots and lots of mud!

Days like this one make me so very very thankful for wonderful friends that help out! This particular splash park was not gated and it was actually pretty busy this day so watching 3 little kids (especially Charlotte) is quite a challenge -- having good friends that help me out is such a blessing! I think Miss Charlotte found herself a friend in my friend, Rachel and she's pretty picky about who she likes. :)

Three Cheers for Summer

This year summer could not get here soon enough. It's been a long year for us and I'm so ready for some good ol' family time!
We are going to have 5 whole weeks of nothing to do!! This semester has busy: Matt's been teaching, been the co-department chair, full time Ph.D student, teaching our Bible class at church, and working on FPS math task force. And, I've been busy wrapping up my term as PTO president, working with Matt on Bible class stuff, and, oh yeah, raising 3 kids! :) This is the first year ever that Matt's not going to be doing some kind of summer school for a good part of the summer; partly because his program got cancelled due to budget cuts, and party because when that happened we just decided that maybe we need some catch-up time and this is it. I realize that most dad's will never get to have 5 weeks of vacation with their kids in the middle of the summer. I realize that we're spoiled by this. But, most dad's don't spend as much time away as Matt does either. There are times this past year when he went for days without seeing Charlotte or Harrison awake -- or maybe just seeing them for 10 minutes in the morning. So we need this.
With Matt gone so much at night, The Three & I have spent a lot of time together & I'll be honest and say that I'm looking quite forward to some "mommy time" this summer as well. We need to catch up on family time & just the though of being uncommitted for 5 weeks makes me smile! We have a few things we'd like to get done around the house & some fun things we want to do with the kids, but those are all flexible.
Mostly I'm looking forward to hanging out and playing with the kids and having some dates with my sweetie. And, it all begins this afternoon! Matt's been doing some conferences the past couple of weeks, but today is the end of the last one and after a final meeting at 4pm -- Vacation Begins! I'm just hoping that meeting is a short one, cause I'm not too sure how much longer this mamma can wait!

Farewell School....Hello Summer!

Well, I'm finally getting around to documenting the last week of school, which was mostly just fun stuff for the kids.
Tuesday was Field Day at Madeleine's school. They have all these fun different activities for the kids to do outside during the morning. Last year, I volunteered. But, with Charlotte walking now -- and having NO FEAR of running away from me -- I decided that this year we'd just go and hang out and have fun. :) We got there about an hour before lunch and caught up to Madeleine just as she was finishing getting her face painted.

Harrison is not a big fan of the heat and was more than happy when it was time to go inside and eat lunch. This day they got to eat in their room which was a special treat!

After lunch, they got to go outside and have sno-cones! Yum! I was only able to take this one picture of Madeleine with some of her friends because Charlotte found the stairs that lead down to the parking lot and spent our entire time out there running toward them.....with me chasing after her!

Even though Friday was the "official" last day, we decided not to send Madeleine. Instead, Thursday was her last day. Mostly this was because her teacher said they were going to just play/watch movies on the last day because the teachers had to have their room ready for the summer by the time school was out on Friday. They also had their awards ceremony on Thursday afternoon & it just seemed like a good time to say goodbye.

I wanted to post first/last day pictures too. It's incredible to me how much she has changed this year. Yes, she certainly looks bigger. But the thing that strikes me the most is how much confidence she has gained this year. Gone is the little shy girl we once knew, and in her place is a little girl full of self confidence and not afraid to try anything.

August 2010

June 2011

Since Matt only had finals in the morning, he was able to get away for an hour to join us at the awards ceremony. It fell right in the middle of Charlotte's naptime, but she did great!

This little guy wasn't too excited by the idea of going to the awards ceremony (can you tell?).

And my sweet girl. They called her class last & I could hardly wait to see what award she would get this year, although I had a pretty good guess from all the writing she does and knowing that her teacher always is telling me that Madeleine is the one that writes the most on any assignment. :)

Getting her awards from Mrs. Currington (not her teacher, but one of the other 1st grade teachers). She got both the Reading & the Writing Awards! We are so proud of her!

This is her with Mrs. Austin on the 1st day of school.

And on the last day.

And this is my poor attempt at a picture as we left on her last day of 1st grade. sniff, sniff. Again, can't you tell just how excited Harrison was to be there!?!?

And now she's a big 2nd grader! I remember thinking on her first day of Kindergarten when we dropped her off that before we knew it she'd be going to 2nd grade and all this would be routine to us. Now we are there and I just can't seem to figure out where the time has gone.

Planet Harrison

One of the last art projects that Harrison & I did before school was out for the summer was the creation of our planet page. But, first we pulled out the crayons while I got the paints all set up and Charlotte got her first taste of coloring -- which turned into a real taste when she decided to eat the crayon. :)

The funniest part is that she would make a face like it tasted aweful each time, but she continued to put it in her mouth!

Harrison was so excited to paint some planets! He actually knew quite a few of them thanks to big sis.

After we painted the real planets we got silly and started creating our own. I think this was his favorite part; it certainly was mine! We made Planets Harrison, Charlotte & Madeleine, Planet Lotso, Planet Grass, and, of course, Planet Poop. :) Can you guess what color that one was?!

And, while we finished up with our painting, Charlotte discovered the crayon box and had herself some fun!