Go, Go, Goers!

We have a child in the double-digits! Ava celebrated her 10th birthday this past Monday. We invited both sets of grandparents over for cake, ice cream, and the gift opening...and it was fun! When she started putting together a Lego City pizza truck, it was the longest amount of time that Ava and G have sat together, without bickering. I think that means we need more Legos! T-E-N! Notice the little daredevil in the background, standing on the arm of the chair... There's a hidden message in this cake - do you see it? I don't think Ava realized that she had a little help in blowing out the candles... It was so quiet during this time The flowers have really bloomed around the yard, and I adore these portulaca plants that I discovered by accident last year. They are going to be a staple in our flowering plants each year! My lilies have also started to bloom...they bloom for such a short time frame, so I'm trying to enjoy them e

Well, we survived hosting our first slumber party. Ava will be 10 years old tomorrow, and instead of planning a fancy party, we decided to keep it "simple" and have her invite a handful of good friends over for a night of fun, and apparently NO sleep. Guess what? We succeeded on both counts! The girls did have a great time, though...they had a pizza dinner, followed up by 3 bingo games with prizes, decorating their own HUGE pieces of cake, and opening gifts. The rest of the night was a blur, honestly. We tucked them all away in the guest room, with access to the Roku and internet for their devices...we heard them A LOT, but didn't see much of them. There was an attempt to play a 2am game of hide 'n seek,which we squashed. And finally at 4am, we laid down the law and told them it was time to go to bed. We had to quiet them down them again, 45 minutes later, and they finally went to sleep. Crazy! They loved the color changing flames that I put on each of their cake

We officially have a fifth grader! Ava’s last day of school was on Tuesday, and I was so pleased to see that all of her grades improved to the top level for this past trimester. Besides the lesson in procrastination last week, she has really applied herself in recent months. She is focusing very well in school, and getting her work done there, so she has minimal homework. Hooray for good habits! To keep her sharp and focused, she’s partaking in 8 weeks of math and reading lessons (done at home) over the summer. I don’t think she’s too excited about it, but, a few hours of lessons during the week will still leave her plenty of time for fun in the sun! Last day of 4th grade! G had another rough start to the week, but we had some long talks with him, and the last few days were very pleasant at daycare...to the point where he was complimenting his friends instead of getting mad at them. He’s such a sweet boy, when he wants to be...so we’re going to do what we can to keep him surr

This was the last full week of school...Ava has two more days next week, and then she's out for the summer! I cannot believe that she will then be starting her last year of elementary school. Seems like a huge milestone for us... Ava was a little stinker this week, and neglected to tell us that she had TWENTY pages of math homework due by Friday. Scott had been asking her every day if she had homework, and the answer was always no...until we "caught" her trying to catch up on those 20 pages of long division problems. Oh boy...she worked on those for hours and hours, and even lost access to her Kindle for a few days. We had a nice long chat about 1) procrastination, and 2) lying. When I dropped her off at the before school care on Friday morning, I advised the director that Ava was not to play until she finished her homework. And, she succeeded! We have no idea how much of it was correct, but...at least she learned the lesson about procrastination. Since she finished t