We survived the first week of school!

We did it!  We did it!  We all survived Ava's first week of school!!  Getting her up early each morning, making her a lunch, doing her hair, and out the door a little after 8:00 a.m., and then loading up all the daycare kids at 3:00 p.m. to go and get her.  She is into cheerleading now, and has that practice on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday, then home for supper, shower, read for 20 minutes, and in bed by 8:30 p.m.  It was an understatement to say that this week FLEW by, and I have absolutely no idea how people with three or four school aged kids do this!  You are all my heroes!!!

Here is my little first grader on her first day of 1st grade:

Showing off her new shoes.  :-)

And her new lunch box and backpack.

Buckled in and ready to go!!

 

She had a great first day, and a great week.  She is making new friends and still really likes her teacher.  Next week they are bussing the first graders to the public pool for swimming lessons!  I LOVE that the schools do that, as she had swimming lessons at the end of the school year for kindergarten, and now right away at the beginning of first grade.  She has made such huge improvements of the summer, so I am excited to see how well she does with her lessons this time.

 

The other big project we have been working on is our backyard, and I am so happy to say that it is finally COMPLETE!!!  We had new sod put down on Thursday, and it looks so pretty back there compared to the weedy, muddy mess it was when the bought the place.  Here are the before and after pictures:

 

BEFORE:

 

AFTER: 

BEFORE:

 

 

AFTER:

 

 

 

BEFORE: 

 

AFTER:

 

BEFORE:

AFTER:

 

 

 

 

BEFORE:

 

 

AFTER:

 

 

It looks so much better, doesn't it??  I am keeping the kids off of it for about a week or so to let it take root, and then I plan on shoving them out into the backyard for hours on end and take advantage of finally having a fenced in backyard!  :-)

 

Last night (Friday), we took Silas and Ava to the Portrait Studio at Target to get his 2 year pictures taken (I know....I am a few months late, but better late than never, right??) and I wanted an updated sibling picture of the two of them, as the last one I have he was just six months old.  He actually did a fantastic job, and the photographer told us that he acted more like a four year old than a two year old, and that he was the best two year she had ever had, and she wished they were all just like him.  How hilarious is that???  Silas, the best two year old??  Hahaha!!!  He has such a personality though, and he was just hamming it up for her, so it was fun to watch.  We got a couple of good sibling ones too, so when we get them back I will put them on the blog for all to see.  When we got home from that, we just goofed around and had some nice family time.....which usually equates to "wrestle with Daddy" time.  :-)

Silas is completely naked in this picture....except for his sister's shoes, her backpack, and her lunch box.  When he got them all on, he waved and said, "Bye!" to all of us, and walked to the door.  Apparently he is ready to go to school too......a nudist school.

Ava practicing her cheers.

My little naked boy.  :-)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



Last Day of Summer Vacation! :-(

Well, it is Sunday again.  And Ava starts 1st grade tomorrow.  This summer went by fast as they all do, and I am definitely going to miss my little helper when she leaves tomorrow morning!  Silas is really to going to miss his "Sissy" as she plays with him every day.  We will all be excited tomorrow when we go to pick her up after school. 

Last Sunday afternoon, Ava and I had a "girls' afternoon" where we went shopping for the last of her school supplies, new uniform shirts, and other stuff that she was going to need.  We went out to eat, just the two of us, which she thought was pretty darn special!

This was a pretty typical week for us.  Daycare kiddos and hanging out at home.  Silas enjoyed his first ever experience of finger painting.  Took him a little bit to know what to do, but then he had fun!

 

I took this picture after taking the kiddos for an early morning walk one day:

 

That is 99 degrees, which isn't really that bad in the summer, but that is the time at the top.  It was only 9:32 a.m. and it was already that hot!  Supposedly, we are having what is even considered a little heat wave for Florida, as the "real feel" has been about 115 every day for the last few weeks.  Ridiculous!!  On Wednesday, Ava had two of her friends over to go swimming in our pool.  I was more than a little jealous watching them cool off in the pool!

 

Here are a few cute, random, pictures that I took of Mr. Silas this week.  The first one was when he climbed up onto his chair when I wasn't looking, and ate his sister's yogurt before I even realized it.  The second one is a picture of the hard manual work that he has to do around here.  :-)  Just kidding!  This boy loves to vacuum, and always runs to take it away from me as soon as I turn it on.  Let's just hope that continues when he is older!

 

Ava is really enjoying her cheerleading that she started this fall, and has fun learning all the new cheers.

 

 

Here is a short video of Ava and her cheerleading friends practicing a cheer:

 

 

 

On Friday night, her school had their "meet your teacher" night from 3-6 p.m.  As soon as the last daycare kiddo was picked up, I took Ava and Silas up to her school.  She was nervous and excited, but really liked her new teacher once she met her.

 



Ready to go and meet her new teacher!

Ava and her 1st grade teacher, Ms. Johnson.  Ava said she was "super nice!"

Ava sitting at her new desk.

 

We ended the week with a trip to Animal Kingdom on Saturday.  Ava wanted to go on the roller coaster, "Expedition Everest," which she did two times.  It was too hot for us to stay long, so we just spent the morning there, but still had lots of fun, met some characters, and took in some shows.  We LOVE Disney!!

Meeting Minnie and Mickey.  Silas is always shy right at first, but then he warms up.  :-)

Love this picture!  One of the Disney cast members took this for us with our camera.  Love that about Disney!!

Minnie was tickling him and giving him kisses.

I was able to get a picture of Ava and Eric as they came out of the mountain on Expedition Everest.  It is kind of hard to see, but Eric is wearing the yellow shirt, and Ava is the little girl in pink beside him.  She looks so tiny on this big roller coaster!

Eric and Silas riding the Tri-Cer-A-Tops ride in Dinoland.

Ava and Mommy

Meeting Winnie the Pooh

And Tigger too!  :-)

Kiddos goofing off while we waited for "It's Tough to be a Bug" show to start.

My Ava Bava.  :-)

Last show of the day was "Festival of the Lion King."  Kids were pretty wiped by then!

 

Well, that sums up our week!  Hope everyone has a great upcoming week!!






First trip to Busch Gardens.....

Last Saturday we took a trip down to Tampa and went to Busch Gardens.  It was the one major theme park that we had not visited yet, and we had paid admission through our passes to Sea World, so we thought it would be fun to check it out.  It turned out to only be an hour and a half drive, which wasn't too bad at all.  It was so hot that it can be difficult to really have fun because you just want to either get in water or inside something with air conditioning, but we made the most of it! 

One of the first things we did was ride the train, of course!  This is Silas's favorite, and the drive down to Tampa he kept saying, "I ride choo-choo!"  Once we entered the park, he could hear it, so we decided we had better do that right away.  It is always a big hit.

Happy boy riding his beloved "choo-choo"

 

 

If you have never been to Busch Gardens, a good way to describe it is a mix between a zoo and an amusement park.  There are animals everywhere in the park, along with lots of rides and roller coasters.  Definitely different than the other theme parks, and the kids had fun looking at all the animals.

A Sloth!

 

There was a roller coaster there (Eric went on it), called the SheiKra that went straight down in a 90 degree job at 70 mph, and goes through some water that drenches people who are watching.  You don't get wet on the actual ride, but the observers serve got soaked if you weren't careful.  Ava figured out just where to stand so that she got a mist from the water, without getting too wet, which felt great on this super hot day!

The white behind them is all the water spraying up in the air, and is about to come down on that poor person pushing the stroller. :-)

 

 

One of the highlights of our trip was visiting the Sesame Street section that is in Busch Gardens.  We paid a little extra to make reservations to eat lunch with Elmo and Friends.  It was so much fun seeing the excitement through Silas's eyes, as he is at the age where he is really into Elmo and all of Sesame Street.

 

Silas meeting Big Bird

Silas's face when he saw all the characters coming.  :-)

 

Bert was the first one to visit our table.

Even though she said she is too big for Sesame Street, Ava still had fun seeing all the characters.

Bert was trying to feed Silas.

It worked!  Silas has the food in his mouth.  :-)

The characters took their time with each kid, which was really nice!

Next was Cookie Monster!

I didn't get a picture, but Silas put food in Cookie Monster's mouth, and then dug it back out. Haha!

Giving Cookie Monster a hug good-bye.

Silas finally meets ELMO!!!!

 

Silas wasn't so sure about sitting on Elmo's lap, though......

Ernie and Ava

Bert walked up, so I got a picture with both Bert and Ernie!

Time for some yummy cupcakes after meeting all the characters.

I think Silas had lots of fun!

 

 

After lunch, there was a splash pad area right outside, so I put on Silas's suit and let him have fun in that.  I was pretty jealous, because it was so hot, and I really want to get wet with him. :-)  Ava and Eric went on a few rides while Silas cooled off.

He loves to try to "step" on the water coming out of the ground.

Sticking his whole head in the water.  This kid cracks me up!!

He had a lot of fun!!

 

 

When Silas was finished, I took the kiddos on a few rides in the Sesame Street area while Eric went on that SheiKra roller coaster.

Here are a few pictures of Ava and her Daddy being silly while Silas was sleeping in the stroller:

 

 

When Silas woke up, we went to a show (inside a air conditioned theatre!!!!) called: "Madagascar Live!  Operation:  Vacation."  It was a cute show that gave a break from the sun and heat, and afterwards, we got to meet the penguins of Madagascar!

 

Near the end of the day, Ava and I went on the newest roller coaster, called the Cheetah Hunt, which was super fun!!  If you have time, check out this video:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=skez9_TTJb4#action=share

 

 

Silas tried his hand at hula-hooping while he and Daddy were waiting for us.  :-)

The last ride of the day was for Mom and Dad.  We usually don't get to do too many "adult" roller coasters, but this one only had a five minute wait time, so Eric and I took turns going on the Montu.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mirdke7DDoU

 The kids waited very patiently!

 

We all had lots of fun at Busch Gardens and ended up staying there all day.  We are hoping to make it back there again sometime soon!