Summer Time!

Goodbye house, we will miss you!

Happy 5th to Elia!

Happy 7th to Gianna!

Uncle Bobby and Aunt Colleen came to visit!

Baptism Weekend

Baptism with Godparents and kiddos

Lots of peeps were in town!

Danny's Wedding in CA- Elia was super proud of being the flower girl.

More to come...

Summer Time, and the Living's Easy...

Could there be any better job than getting paid to do whatever you want during the summer?  It seriously makes up for all the stress of the school year.  We have been having a great, laid back summer so far.

Reading, reading, reading!

Splash Park

Hanging with cousins Madison and Taylor

Pretty much swimming everyday!

Bike Riding Fiend!

Slurpees and Swinging

Shopping at our fave store

Dressing up

I love the last picture because it shows some more freedom in our house.  We put all the girl's cups, plates, and bowls in a bottom drawer in the kitchen.  So whenever I get the "mommy, I'm thirsty" comment, they can now help themselves.  With a footstool I brought home from my classroom, they can drink water all day long!  This also helps with setting the table, and emptying the dishwasher.  They can do all of their own dishes!
Stay tuned for our big summer adventure, our road trip out to AZ.  I'm sure I will have lots of pictures and stories to blog about!

Swimmy

I signed the girls up for swim lessons as soon as school got out.  So we have been to the pool every weekday so far this summer!  They both amaze me.  G's teacher said to move her up a level next summer, as did Elia's teacher.  With lots of practice in between.

Diving Board Day

I like this picture because it shows that G can handle the older kids- they were all in the same class!

This was Elia's first time, so she was a little hesitant at first.

Here is a video of them playing in the "square" pool, as they call it.  This is at our public pool, and this year is the first where both girl's heads are above water in the deep end!  I think it goes up to 3 feet.  Here they are practicing their back floating.

Last Week of School

I write this long after, but I cannot believe the school year we have had!  I grew so much as a teacher, and it was so wonderfully unique to be able to see Gianna everyday.  Next year is going to be even better in that arena, with both girls at the new school!  And though this new school I'm going to is ah-ma-zing, I will miss Spears!  Here are some highlights of the last week:

I had 2 mystery readers- Gianna and Elia! they were the stars of my classroom.
My students wanted their autograph and everything.

Huddles will be missed!  In April, G got to dance on the stage.

Gianna's best buddy, Brandon.  I have never met a more sweet, enthusiastic kindergartner!
They shared a lunch table all year, so I got to know him pretty well.

My end of year gift.  All of my kiddos contributed summer stuff, and put it in this awesome beach bag- gift cards, coozies, beach balls, floaties and goggles for the girls, crafts, towels, flip flops, and more gift cards.  I was SO spoiled.

We did a measurement Olympics, and my class represented Ireland.

If you want to see more, you can see my class blog, Passing the Torch, which is located on the sidebar of this blog.
I am so blessed!

Summer Loving

A few posts ago, when I said we go to the pool often, I meant we pretty much go everyday. We've been everyday this week and plan to go tomorrow. It is seriously the only way to survive this datgum heat. Gianna is looking pretty summery in this pic!

Oh and I usually don't talk about too personal of things, but thought I would give a shout out to all the NFP users out there who are keeping it natural and the way God intended! NFP is a way to use your body's signs as a natural tool to achieve or postpone pregnancy. We have Gianna and Elia because of NFP and I wouldn't ask for our life with them any other way!

Pinterest

*Pinterest is becoming more and more addictive to me! It is worse than facebook, blogging, and email all put together. It gives me really good ideas, but all I was doing was just pinning the ideas and not doing or trying anything. So this week, we remedied that. We made homemade gold fish (so good they were gone before Chris got home from work) and sweet potato cookies. The girls have loved these cooking projects, and G especially like making the gold fish!

I

The best part of baking- licking the batter!!

In the next few days I'm going to try ice cream in a bag, homemade fruit roll ups and rainbow pudding pops! Watch out, Martha Stewart!

*Don't know what pinterest is? Let me know and I will send you an invitation. You will never be the same afterwards!

Slurpee Weekend

This weekend, we introduced the girls to slurpees. I originally wanted to take Gianna to get a sno cone (cuz whats more summery and american than that?) but a small is $2.50 at the sno cone place by our house. So I did the math and realized that at .79 cents, slurpees are going to be the new summery, american treat.

We went back for more the next night too!

What we have been up to...

It is frakkkkkking hot here in Texas. So hot that I haven't had the energy or material really, to blog. Life is back to normal after our StL trip, so we are just hanging here. I try to get the girls to the pool at least 4 days a week- its the only way to stay cool outdoors. They have loved it. Gianna started swim lessons this week so we will be there everyday!

Otherwise, we have been play-dating, bbq-ing, cleaning and reading all summer long. The 4th of July weekend was super fun. Besides the heat, I can't really complain!

The Monday after we got back from StL, Gianna had Vacation Bible School at her preschool. She loved it. She was gone each morning all week, so Elia and I spent 3 days straight in the bathroom trying to train her. Fail. Not an epic fail, but I went and bought 2 Costco boxes of diapers after that, so it will be a while before we try again. Anyways, here are some pics I took from her last day. She looooved dancing to the music.

Even Boom was feeling the love.

Don't Break the Ice on your toes!

We got a Beta fish and it has been alive for almost 2 weeks! G named him Cinderella and insists that he is a girl. Whatevs.

Typical after nap bed head. We have been making home made popsicles! Yum!

More later...