Mother's Day Weekend

My Mother's Day celebration began on Friday at school with the kids.  They had a Mother's day lunch for all the Mom's and so I got to enjoy a delicious(*cough) cafeteria lunch with Chase and Sadi.  The school also gave all the kids a flower for their Mom.  It was fun to sit with them and hear about their day. 

Mother's day was a nice relaxing day.  I got woken up to all the smoke detectors going off....my breakfast was being prepared.  I did enjoy my breakfast in bed once the smoke cleared the room.  Waffles, bacon (hence the smoke alarm), and chocolate covered strawberries.  The kids showered me with gifts of flowers, chocolates, and lots of handmade treasures.

Chase admitted his teacher forgot about Mother's day and so they only had 30 minutes to create a gift.  He wrote me a letter and made me this picture frame.

Sadi had made me a bookmark, a hand woven art piece, and a book all about me.  Some of my favorite excerpts from the book:  My mom is as pretty as a "very cute and awsome angle"(gotta sound it out...I'm an angel).

And My mom is super smart!  She knows "divition and mutlyplycation".

We spent the day just relaxing outside and barbecued in the evening.  Kelsey was at school, she had finals on Monday and so we decided it would be best if she focused on school and studying rather than come home.  It was weird to not have her here, it is the first Mother's day I have had without her.  Luckily these two made sure there was plenty of noise so that I wasn't sad.  Without all of them, I don't know where I'd be, I am the lucky one.

Bikes

A couple of weekends ago we FINALLY bought our kids bikes.  Believe it or not our kids didn't know how to ride bikes...I know we are terrible parents.  It was something we talked about all the time and just never did.  Don't get me wrong they are not completely sheltered.  They ride scooters all the time and do spend time outside.  Chase did have a bike when he was 3 but the tires were ALWAYS getting flat and I hated it....so our love of the bikes(or rather mine) died.  Our weather has been so nice and we have been going on nightly walks and so we decided it was time(or rather past time).  We took the kids out one Friday night and let them pick out new bikes and gear.  They were pretty excited.

It took Chase only a few minutes to get it down, and was off and riding...lifting the guilt of our terrible parenting.

We weren't too sure about Sadi riding and were questioning ourselves that first day whether or not we should have gotten her training wheels.  But she practiced from sun up to sun down and by Sunday afternoon was riding on her own....probably better than Chase if we're honest.

We have been spending as much time outside on our bikes as possible and really been enjoying our evening bike rides...well for 2 days until we had flat tires (so many thorns out here).  But we ordered new tubes and a pack of 54 bike patches to keep our wheels running all summer long!

Teacher Appreciation

This week as many of you know is Teacher Appreciation week.  This year we definitely got some gems, and wanted to make sure they felt loved.  So Monday we were off to deliver some treats to some of the best!

We gave each of our teacher's a bucket filled with all kinds of goodies for a movie night at home.  I found a cute little tag to go with it and added a red box code.

I also had each of the kids write their teacher a letter that told them all the things they love about them and about being in their class.  They were pretty cute. 

I let the kids decide on a few other staff they see often that they wanted to thank, and so we delivered to a few more of our favorite's, including my friend who is a weekly "sub".

I love decorating the teacher's door's, although I have decided this may be a dying tradition as I am the only one in the whole school to do it this year...guess that only makes our teacher's feel even more special :)  Fortunately I have Kelsey who was able to draw my vision, freehand no less!  For Sadi's teacher I chose Horton the elephant.  I added all the kids names to the peanuts on his trunk.  I didn't know this at the time but her teacher told me her favorite book was Horton Hatches the egg.  How perfect is that?!

For Chase's teacher I chose the Lorax.  I saw these truffula trees online and I HAD to make them.  They turned out soooo cute!  She loved them, and has already told me how she is planning to use them in her classroom next year.  Love that.

Good teacher's are hard to come by, but great teacher's teach behind these two doors!

Switching Fields

This spring for the first season since Chase was 4 I believe he decided he did NOT want to play Baseball.  To be honest I was shocked and a bit crushed.  I love watching him play baseball and he has gotten to be pretty good over the years. He was pretty adamant he wanted to play soccer.  I think he was really hoping to get on his friends team(a girl)...unfortunately for him they made up an all boy team.  So we have been hitting a new field this season.

 His team is the Dayton Dustdevils.  He has a great coach, and I love that he makes them RUN!

They decided after we got started up that this would be a traveling team....boo!  And to make it even more fun we found out mid-season that the teams we were playing against were the area all-stars (playing against some of our first time ever players...yeah seems fair!).  Good thing his coach knows how to give good pep talks.

So far Chase seems to really be enjoying it.  He likes to play goalie, but has been learning all the positions which has been really good.

Our team has yet to win a game, but man they have been great sports!

What was maybe even more surprising to me about Chase wanting to play soccer was that Sadi wanted to play too!  So we have been doubling our time on the soccer field.

I wasn't really sure if she was going to like soccer, but so far I have been surprised.  She is a great defender, and I am pretty sure she is going to kick someone in the face one of these games with her long legs and high kicks. 

Sadi also has a great coach who does a great job of keeping these kiddos focused, which at this age is a job in itself.

 2, 4, 6, 8...SCORPIONS!

Although I miss the baseball field I am really enjoying watching a new game, on a new field, with some of my favorite little people.



License to...

Someone has not been very excited about getting their drivers license (Kelsey).  It's not uncommon for kids to not get their license until much later than 16 out here, I'm still not sure why.  After driving her all summer last year I told her it was time.  Friday she took her driving test.  A quick check in at the DMV and she was off  with the driving instructor (yes, I was taking pictures from the parking lot)

I wasn't sure if walking back in this face was pure relief or the feeling of success...

 This is proof they will give anyone a license....

just kidding, they said she earned it.   BUT, watch your car with this one if she's parallel parking...just saying.

Day at the Museum

Friday was our last official day of spring break.  Matt went back to work and I decided to take the kids to the Nevada State Museum.  I figured a little education might be fun, and the kids surprised me by how excited they were to go.  It is a beautiful building in down town Carson City. 

We started out in the basement touring the underground mine.  It was pretty realistic, and a little too scary for someone.

The Mammoth exhibit was pretty cool, especially since we had just watched Night at the Museum the night before.

My favorite room I think was the Natural History room...we found some stinky fellas in there.  Sadi thought our state animal was the big horned goat...good thing we were able to educate her a bit while we were there although she was adamant sheep DON'T have horns.

She thought the Nevada History wing had some inappropriate things for kids to see.  Gambling and drinking is ok but she was drawing the line at the naked golden lady.

There were some big guns in the firearms room..."You'll shoot your eye out!"

Chase was scared of the ghost town so he made sure he was "looking" at something conveniently close to the EXIT the whole time.  

This baby doll would give anyone nightmares I think but some of you know that Sadi hates babies so this was especially disturbing to her.  A doll that you can change her mood by twisting her head.  She had 3 faces!

 She was much more in her element in the war room.

Chase liked the wheels on this hot rod....

It was surprisingly big and very educational and as much as I am not a Museum person, it was really enjoyable for all of us.  I think I need to make more of an effort to take the kids to some of these gems so close to home...especially since they thought the replica of the state capital was the White house.  Time for some more education!

Spring Break Vacay

We got a pretty early start on the road Easter morning.  Our first stop was in Hawthorne for breakfast.  The kids thought it was pretty cool that the McDonald's had missiles in their parking lot.  We had to stop for an "explosive" picture.

We made it to Vegas before our Condo was quite ready so we walked around and checked things out and just enjoyed the warm weather.

Once our room was ready we checked in and went and picked up a "gourmet" meal...Panda express. We were within walking distance of about 20 different restaurants which was very convenient.  Although our condo had a kitchen the kids preferred to eat in the living area.

They were too excited to sleep so we decided to take them for a late dip in the pool.  This pool was perfect for them, no deeper than 4 ft. in any area of the pool, and lots of play areas.

The next day we got up early and hit the pool which was really fun but we then took them to the other side of the condo to the lazy river....soo fun!  It was fun and relaxing to just float away.

It was a winding loop with all kinds of waterfalls.  I think Chase liked this better than the pool.

We enjoyed every minute of that sunshine!

One area of the pool was a sandy beach that went into the pool which had all kinds of sand toys.

Surprisingly they didn't spend as much time playing here as I thought they would.  I think Sadi would have spent more time here if Chase would have cooperated (done what she said). 

Apparently our sandcastle building skills need some work....

We spent all 3 days from sun up to sun down at the pools, and then walked the 30 feet to our condo and spent the night relaxing and eating more "gourmet' meals that the kids loved!  Matt and I had our own room, and the kids actually fought us over this pull out bed(we teased them we wanted it).  I think this might have been one of their favorite parts of the room, maybe even the vacation.

They liked having their own t.v. to watch movies and cartoons on.  They had plenty of Easter treats within an arms reach of them with the kitchen so close.  Ever seen anyone eat an entire package of peeps in less than 30 seconds?  Pretty sure this kid set the record.  She asked if she could open them, next thing I knew they were gone!

 The last day we spent at the pool Chase made some new friends and had fun playing with the boys.

Sadi was a little lost and not sure what to do with herself.  She did make a friend of her own for a little bit but then she had to leave.  She made the comment that "Chase must have forgot about us".  Poor girl drowned her sorrows with Cheetos.

Our room was in such a great location that we could see the pool/and restaurant area from our room.  Matt and I took advantage of that the last night and went to dinner without the kids (although they could see us from the window) it actually felt like a dinner date alone.

We were sad to leave the last day, and took our time getting up.  The drive home was just as boring as going.  We passed through many old towns, and also by many  "Area 51" and speculated where the REAL one is.

 But the top of the creepy towns was this place in Tonopah....

Fully decked out in clowns...seriously who would sleep here?!  What makes this place even more creepy is it is right next to an old cemetery!  That clown is literally pointing to the graves...aaah!

BUT...on the upside I think I may have found the perfect place to stay next April fools day...yup, that would totally be worth the drive.