Memorial Day Parade

This year our neighborhood hosted a Memorial Day Parade and pool party.  The night before we decorated Ryder's bike for the event during Family Home Evening.  Nicole was our chief designer.  I think they did a great job!

Here's Ryder at the parade start waiting for go time.

And more little kiddos joining in.

And they're off!!! Yes, we had a police escort - sirens and lights going and all!!!

And there they go - it was over waaaaaay to fast.  But it was fun and a great memory for the kids :)

Happy Memorial Day!!

Another School Year Comes To A Close

Mother's Day Party with Ryder
Don't you love the hat he made me?!?!



It's hard to believe that the 2010-2011 school year is already over.  It flew by so quickly!!!! The kids are excited for some time off to swim and travel.  I'm excited to have them home more, and to be done having 4 kids in 4 different schools!  Next year we will be down to 3 schools, because Melanie will be in HIGH SCHOOL next year which means both she and Nicole will be at PHS!

Here is a hodgepodge of pictures from the end of the school year.

Darren's Freshman seminary class that he taught enjoying
their last early morning together for the year

Nicole's Seminary class on their last day

Ryder getting his picture taken with his 2nd grade teacher,
Mrs. Eggelston, after the awards assembly

Here is a sweet card that Ryder and I made for his teacher.  He really enjoyed being in her class!

He also gave her a "Nothing Bundt Cake"  white chocolate raspberry mmmmm. . .

Every year we go to dinner after the last day of school to celebrate.  This year we went to the Blue Goose to enjoy mesquite grilled tex mex yumminess!!  Here's Harrison enjoying the evening:

I notice the chips are already gone and dinner hadn't arrived yet :)  They make some really good salsa!

And I'll sign off with a picture of Melanie and her friend Thi modeling the masks they made as part of their last English project. 

Looking good girls.  Enjoy your summer!!!



Campout

Just wanted to publish this adorable picture of Harrison and Ryder from the campout they went on with their dad this past weekend.  The last 2 Stake Father & Sons Campout have been rained out.  Last year they all drove home in the middle of the night when a huge thunderstorm hit them.  I'm told that Ryder slept through it all.  This year though the weather was FANTASTIC!!!  Sunny, clear and 80 degrees.  The night didn't get too chilly either.  They had lots of fun playing football and participating in a service project to clear the campground of its overgrown brushy areas.

They cooked on the camp stove (campfires were prohibited due to high fire danger - if you haven't seen in the news lately there are huge fires burning thousands of acres near Fort Worth).  Dinner was Dinty More Beef Stew with S'mores for dessert.

All in all it was a great trip for them - if you don't mind the creepy crawlies that were there in abundance.

A mass of daddy long legs hanging out in the restrooms.

There were also milledpedes everywhere - this one was resting. 
I suppose it is quite tiring making 1000 legs move all day long!

Another Year Another Derby

My cute cub scouts with their Derby Cars

We had another fun year at the Pinewood Derby.  Lots of participants with lots of cool cars.  Here is the pre race lineup:

Harrison and Ryder built their cars themselves with just a teeny tiny bit of help from their dad.  I am so glad that this is a dad project and not a mom project :)  They used lots of high tech and dangerous equipment, but the only injury was Ryder's thumb on the belt sander.  Let's just say it's a good thing he had a long fingernail, or more than just the corner of his thumb would have been sanded off.

Every car raced in 8 computer generated heats.  Both Harrison Ryder had plenty of 1st and 2nd place finishes.

Harrison's car - far right

Ryder's car - middle

When the racing was over, the boys anxiously awaited the awards ceremony.

Ryder's car won the award for "Best Police Car Design."

And Harrison's car won the award for (drum roll please). . .

Fastest Looking Car :)  I just love that.

Great job guys!

Shoppin' With My Boyyyyyyzzzzz

Well, actually we were shopping with Nicole.  What that means is that there is A LOT of standing around and waiting for everyone who is with her as she tries on tons of clothes.  It's hard to keep younger brothers from whining and getting bored while standing around in The Limited.  Fortunately, they found a way to entertain themselves. . .

They're striking some serious poses here.

I'm sure all the top modeling agencies will be calling soon :)

6 Day Weekend

Well the kids went to school exactly 1 day this week - 1 day out of 5!!!  Now I know what you're thinking, "Those Texans just don't know how to handle snow."  Unh uh.  We handle snow just fine.  It's sleet and ice that really slow us down.  Monday night ice started falling from the sky.  Trust me it was really loud on the windows. By Tuesday morning there was a nice thick layer of ice on everything, and no one wants to drive in that.

I didn't really take any pictures of the ice, because well, it was just roads with ice.  I do have a video of Ryder doing some skating on it though.



The temperatures stayed around 0 degrees (wind chill factored in here) so the ice wasn't able to melt.  So the kids got to stay home on Wednesday and Thursday as well.  We were able to enjoy lots of family time together - board games, puzzles, TV, Wii, baking and some crafts.  Harrison, Melanie, and Ryder put together these little wooden craft kits that I had picked up for $1 each the week before.  My thought at the time was that I'd just stash them away for a rainy day or next summer when the kids are bored.  As fortune would have it, we got to use them much earlier than that.

These little kits were awesome.  As I mentioned before only $1 each, and they included all the wood, paint, glue, paintbrush, sandpaper and rubberbands needed to complete the project!  I think the boys can get some scouting achievements signed off for this too :)

Then Thursday night and Friday we got SNOW.  Probably a good 4-6 inches.  And it stuck.  In fact it's still here.  Unheard of!

Here is a picture from early Friday morning.

And snow or not, poor little Blossom still had to go outside to, well, you know. . . She got icy in the process.

Blossom's mad because her paws are cold!

The fun part is that snow is waaaaaaay more fun than ice! You can go sledding.

Or eat the snow (only pure white fresh snow please).

Or if you're me, you can slip and fall.  I know, cool huh.

The neighbor kids had been begging me to sled the ditch with them.  We all know how that would've turned out.  I kindly declined, and so today I can still say I have never broken a bone!

It's also quite beautiful to see our lake almost completely frozen over.

So as we enter our 5th day of isolation in our home, we are grateful for this little window of time where we could just relax and spend time together.  We are also grateful for food storage, and that I had just purchased milk, eggs, and fresh produce on Monday night!

Thanks for a wonderful break Mother Nature!



UPDATE:  Of course all good things must come to an end. . .

Guys and Gals

Here are a couple more photos from our recent family photo shoot.  It was almost November and still an absolutely gorgeous day.  I LOVE Texas :)

Thanks For Not Raining On Our Parade!

Melanie and her volleyball friends

Homecoming Day is always a wonderful time in Prosper.  And yesterday was no exception.  We had a blast with all of the festivities.  Not to mention the kids are always happy to get out of school early!! Gotta love small town Texas where the whole community comes home to participate in the celebration.

First here are the kids' mums and garters.  A Texas tradition that I think is totally cool and fun to get into. By the way, the ones my kids are wearing are very modest in size (well Nicole's is pretty dang big - but there are definitely bigger mums out there - worn mostly by the senior high school girls).

Nicole started off the day with a 6:00 am pep rally at the high school.  Our Homecoming football game was the high school game of the week here in Texas, so the news teams were there to cover the excitement.  Then the kiddos all headed off to school for a half day of "learning" before they were released for the parade.  This years theme was "Wild About Our Eagles" thus all the zebra print and safari themed floats. The 3 younger kids were on floats:

Melanie on one of the 8th grade volleyball jeeps

The tail end of Harrison's float.  It went by too fast :)

Ryder on his pirate float pre-parade

Pirate float cool parrot

Full view of pirate float

Now this meant that Darren and I watched the parade by ourselves (Nicole had to stay at the school so she didn't get all worn out before her 4:30 volleyball match).  Thunderstorms were predicted for the day, and it had been sprinkling off and on, so we decided to take an umbrella just in case.  Well, it didn't rain, but Darren had the great idea of opening up the umbrella and turning it upside down to catch all the candy that was being thrown at us from the floats.  The kids on the float thought it was super fun to try and make a basket, so we ended up with quite a bit of candy!!

After the parade we headed back over to the high school for the pep rally followed by Nicole's first district volleyball match against Farmersville (which they won).  Then home for pizza dinner and a break. Nicole headed back over to the high school in the evening for the football game (DON'T ASK about details of the actual football game - this year we will have to revel more in the festivities of the day - and who selected that we play ARGYLE of all teams for Homecoming?)

What a super fun day.  And the whole time Kenny Chesney was visiting our neighboring town of Celina which he featured in one of his recent music videos.  He really should have used his time more wisely and spent the day in Prosper!