I have truly become horrible at blog updates and am really hoping that I can improve on this! I've also done really poorly at capturing what we've been doing lately.....I guess I've just really been living in the moment!
As far as what we are up to, here's a little summary...
Charlie: He just finished up basketball a couple of weekends ago and will start baseball next month. It's his first season of actual baseball and he couldn't be more excited about not being in t-ball anymore! Charlie is really excelling in school and loving every minute of it....even though he tells me every day he doesn't want to go. He is reading really well, even adding and spelling! He impresses us daily with what he brings home! Thanks to his big brother, he has developed a love for Star Wars and he and Johnny are constantly having "fights" and "shooting things" up in the house. He has also really enjoyed his over the door basketball goal and I continuously hear the banging from the ball on the rim, but he's actually getting really good at it!
Johnny: He just finished ninja classes (of which I have zero pictures...and i'm so upset with myself about this!) and while he loves ninja so much and is sad for it to be over, he is also ready for baseball to start! He didn't play baseball last spring, so we are really excited for him to play again and hopefully like it much better than he did then! Johnny is enjoying second grade and has learned a lot not only curriculum wise but about himself too....he's introverted and learning how to navigate that....as well as how to become intrinsically motivated. He is without his bestie this year, and while he has made some new friends, he is more than ready to be reunited in 3rd grade. He has developed a love for all things Star Wars and in addition to the daily "battles" with Charlie, he has worked through several lego sets (and even helped Charlie build his). Lastly, after several years of begging and tears after leaving Rural King, we have decided to let Johnny have chickens. He is already drawing up coop plans with John and thinking of a business name to sell the eggs and put on a business card.
Mellany: She has spent this entire year dancing on her studio dance team and is so looking forward to their competition in a few weeks. 5th grade has been a really fun year for Mellany (though sad for mama) and she has matured so much! She is enjoying art more than ever and has even won several competitions (4H Handbook, Cargill Safety Calendar & the BGE/BGI Yearbook Cover)!! It's so amazing to see her excel this way! She constantly talks about how thrilled she is to start middle school next year....she wants to try out for the dance team (as well as her studio dance team), some sports teams and might be most excited for middle school dances!
Rachele: Now that all 3 kids are in school, you would think I have quite a bit of downtime. I don't! I can't tell you exactly what I'm up to every day, but there have only really been a couple of days where I had nothing to do and it blows my mind! Between volunteering at school, bible study/church activities, running errands, household chores, picking up sick kiddos and doctor appointments, etc. etc. etc.....I've stayed busy. I really do love being able to make my own plans for each day so going back to work at some point might be extremely difficult for me. I'm so excited for baseball season to watch the boys play and I cannot wait to watch Mellany dance her heart out at her competition and recital. I love being able to watch the kids do the things they love! Looking forward to the summer, I'm really pumped for all the trips, concerts, activities we have planned! Our family really lives our best life in the summer!!!
John: Travel has picked up quite a bit for John, but he and I are so excited to surprise the kids with a short spring break trip to tag along with him to one of his facilities. It isn't anything fancy, but will be a stay in a cute little hotel and they love a good hotel! John is still working on our bathroom remodel and is making some great progress. It is going to be so amazing when he finishes! While home remodels are not my favorite, John really enjoys the process....and he's good at it! John is mostly working from home when he's not traveling and I love it so much. Hopefully he likes it as much as I do, but even just having lunches together has been awesome. We have a few adult trips coming up this year and while I truly enjoy our family trips, I really love a trip with my main man!
So, there's a little update about each of us! Now on to a few pictures of what we've been up to!
While cleaning up dinner one night, Charlie said "Mom, I took a picture with your phone of the sunset. It's so beautiful". When he showed me the picture, I was super impressed with his skills. And it really was a beautiful sunset!
Most days the kids have decided to skip riding the bus. But there are a few random days when one or two of the kids wants to ride. On this morning, Johnny wanted to ride the bus and brought along some slime to play with while he waited.....he was a big fan of the "slime smiley"...haha!
I'm not sure who took this picture, but if there is a load of clean laundry on the bed to be folded, you can bet that Winston is laying in it!
John had to travel for a conference that lasted through a weekend. It's really painful when he has to be gone through the weekend so we try to make the best out of it. On this particular weekend we headed to our favorite Mexican restaurant for dinner and Dick's for baseball gear. Then on Saturday after Charlie's basketball game, we used up a gift card from TX Roadhouse and then ventured to Barnes and Noble.
Charlie with his basketball trophy!
Johnny fell into the TX Roadhouse "trap": fill up on rolls and cactus blossom and then you're completely full by the time your food comes! :)
Always finding a kid selfie on my phone!
Got a call from the school one day....Charlie threw up in line in the hallway after recess. I felt so bad for the poor guy.....he had never thrown up before and throwing up at school is the worst! But his teacher said he handled it like a champ! Strep has really been making the rounds in our school building, so I decided I should probably get him swabbed. After checkin gin at urgent care and being told there was a 2 hour wait, I decided to call my doctor and they could see him in 20 minutes! She didn't even swab him and said that what he had was classic strep.....that she doesn't really even trust the swabs! Considering he had just been diagnosed with strep about a month ago, she gave him a stronger medicine and he was doing much better within 12 hours! The next morning, I woke up with a sore throat, so a quick call to my doctor and they called in some meds for me too!
Mellany's science class is currently doing some rat observations. After about a decade of not letting the rats go home with students, her teacher decided to start up again and Mellany begged for us to be able to bring them home. John and I say no to so many things, that we felt like this was one of those things we could say yes to. Did I want a school rat in my house? No, but it made Mellany so happy and John and I didn't have to do anything! She took care of it all weekend long! We were both super impressed!
A great group of friends just hanging out after church service....
Saying goodbye to Spaghetti!
These two just love playing basketball together....our goal has been worth every penny!
After dropping the kids off, I looked back in the car to see that Charlie had buckled his tiger in and snuggled it up with his "fox". I don't imagine there will be too many more years of him doing this.....
Another load of clean laundry.....another pile for Winston to snuggle in...
Finally using our dairy queen from Gammy! Growing up, my family would always go to Pizza Hut for dinner on Friday night, followed by ice cream at dairy queen.....Last night, we did the same (including a quick trip to the mall) and the kids thought John and I were just the best and were really thankful to Gammy for the gift cards!
And now, we finally have a weekend that is completely free of activities.....and we are not sad about it!! It's almost 5:00 in the afternoon and one of the kiddos is even still in pajamas!! It's the best kind of weekend around here!
Happy Saturday!!!
