Birthday Party

This was the pic on the invite.

The birthday party was a little early, but it worked out since Grandma and Grandpa were in town!  Aunt Jenny, who just started a cookie and cupcake business with grandma, sent the most adorable My Little Pony cookies.

While in town, grandma made yummy raspberry and vanilla cupcakes.  Elia helped.

This is the first year we did not have a party at home.  After calling bounce house places etc, I found this awesome indoor play ground in Carrollton that is open to the public on weekends, and you can reserve tables for parties for FREE!  It was a huge success, and we ended up spending about the same amount as we have in the past, because really all we had to pay for was the food.  No pinata this time around.  We saw some old friends and G invited all of her new friends too.

MLP shirt!

rock climbing.  this place had it all!

I was running around like crazy so I didn't take many pictures.  

A Week without the Girls

After our fun filled camping trip in Colorado, Grandma took Gianna and Elia back to California with them for a week so that I could get work done to prepare for this upcoming school year.  Chris and I drove 17 hours back to Dallas from Grand Junction, CO on Sunday.  Then, while I went to boring trainings and made my classroom look awesome here in Dallas...
 

Leveling and categorizing my library took me all day Saturday!

The girls had a blast hanging out with the Rowles!  I got an iphone (finally!) and so we were able to share pics and of course facetime every day!

Aunties and cousins

Gianna is channeling her inner Gabby Douglas

Crafty stuff

I wasn't at school every waking minute while they were gone, so I managed to surprise them with some crate chairs for the playroom.  Of course I found it on pinterest, and it was surprisingly easy.  Chris and I managed to get out for a few dates too!

Bedtime story.  Elia conked out while I was reading a Care Bears book.  So happy to have them back!

Camping in CO Photo Dump 2

The day before we left, we went on a hike near our campsite.  There was a trailhead just a 2 minute walk away.

Dead trees from that beetle

Elia being the trail leader.  That is definitely an action shot of me looking for
Poison Oak, which thank the good Lord we did not touch any!

Chis switched out little girls in the 1 backpack so they could go longer.

Near a beautiful waterfall.

My pretty pretty little girl.

I found a recipe on pinterest on how to make just 2 cupcakes and Grandma found a tutorial
online on how to bake cake in hollowed out oranges.  Happy Birthday to Chirs!

Chris ate one bite and the girls devoured the rest!

Leaving our camp, this is the view.  Gorgeous!

Camping in CO Photo Dump 1

This car was packed!

Hot chocolate, the only and best way to start the day!

Hanging with cousins

Watching for bears

Cousin Love

Probably my 2 fave action pics

Fishing

Telling scary stories!

Family Picture by the fire

Bug hunt in our jammies.

More to come...

A quick Visit from Grandma

Why am I so bad at taking pictures when it is important?  Grandma Rowles came in town for the HomeSchool Conference so we were able to spend some QT on Sunday.  Saturday night we met her out at Bass Pro Shop in Grapevine so we could stock up for the big camping trip next week.

This was as good as the zoo for them!



 Then we headed over to Rain Forest Cafe.  The line was long, so we sat at the bar and got seated right away.  Pretty cool chairs, eh?

We are so lucky this summer!  We have seen Grandma twice in a month and will see her again while we camp, plus the girls will be out in CA for a week while I train and prepare my classroom the week after we camp.

Grandma Rowles Visit

Watching Avatar

Grandma came to visit for Uncle Matt's wedding.  It was really fun for the girls to have their grandma all to themselves.  A rare, fun occurence!
 We went and saw Brave together and she cooked awesome food for us too!  She will be back at the end of July for work, yay!

California: Bunnies and Ping Pong

Thursday started off just hanging out at Grandma's house.  Becky had the day off.  We decided to bring the bunnies into the house to play.  First, we put up the gate so the bunnies couldn't run away

THese 3 got along so well this visit!

Then the bunnies hopped around and we fed them.

Our future vet!

Gianna helped grandma make a dirt cake truffle for dessert.  It was yummo!

Then we had a gigantic ping pong tournament.  Chris even made up a tournament bracket board.  I lost right away to Becky, but Chris did ok.  Matt ended up winning the whole thing.  The winning prize was an it's-it.  I think you can only buy these in Cali.

There is always something fun happening at the Rowles house!

Another Visit with Grandma

Ahhh grandma! She gives the BEST presents. Elia's newest sentence is "I go 'side pay sand peez?"

We finally got her to ourselves on Memorial Day. We spent the day hanging out at IKEA and reading books. See you in July!

I'm So Lucky

Grandma Rowles was here until Tuesday afternoon. I went to work on Monday and came home to her folding my laundry. Awesome, right? Well it gets better! I went into the kitchen to find this:

She made 5 meals for me! 5! And they are all yummy, classic Mary dishes. I started crying as soon as I realized what she had done for me. This was a pretty stressful week with it being my last week and trying to wrap everything up etc that it was just perfect that I didn't have to worry about dinner.

Thursday, my parents gave me a goodbye party. They had all my students sign a Fancy Nancy book and put that and an $85 american express gift card in this really cute tote bag that is monogrammed with Rowles on it. They served M&M cookies and lemonade, because they know it was my favorite. I was close to tears again!

I could go on and on about how wonderful my experience was at this school. It seriously put my faith back into public education, and teaching for that matter. I was officially asked by one of the second grade teachers to do her maternity leave (she is due in November) so I will be back!