Mother's Day

Griff's class mother's day celebration


(will dig up his art project and update post later)

Noah's class mother's day celebration


{they sang his hilarious song called "peel the banana"}


Such super cuties!!


Mike came home from a business meeting with new pirate hats for the boys.  Here they are early mother's day morning.














Mike bought me an awesome new watch that turned out to be enormous (the face was wider than my wrist).  I returned it and shopped at the new athletic store in our mall, lulemon.  Given that I spend 90% of my time in workout clothes, it was the perfect mother's day gift!  Had an awesome day with my guys and am so thankful for all 4 of them!

Weekend in Apex

Our sweet god-daughter, Sydney




Some family pictures after church



Shannon & Mason






this and that














as always, LOVED our visit! would be much better if we were next-door neighbors.

Noah's Soccer Party

Noah LOVED soccer.  He's not a super competitive kid, so it will be interesting to see how sports play out with him.  He did enjoy playing and has already asked to play again in the fall.  I don't have many pictures of games, as it poured during several of them (and was blaring bright sun during others).  His team was hard core -- they'd plan every minute of their game, regardless of how soaked we all were.

Noah's coach giving Noah his trophy.

{notice noah's non-uniform shirt.  he insisted we go home so he could change his wet shirt before the party.  was happy to oblige so we could all change!}


Miles and one of Noah's teammates were so silly during lunch.  Pretty sure Miles loved being thought of as a huge comedian.


The kids loved the pinball machine.  The entire time I thought it was free -- and later learned the coach's son kept asking him for quarters.  Woops.

Looking forward to more soccer in the fall -- at this point, all 3 boys hope to play!

New Shirts

How cute are these shirts from Aunt Dana and Uncle Brad??  When you raise the arms, you make the face. The boys LOVE them!  Thank you Aunt D and Uncle B!!

K Beginner's Day for Noah

Noah's soon-to-be elementary school held a beginner's day to introduce the kids to what's in store for them.  Noah and Griffin both dressed in the school's shirts (selected on their own, which I thought was super cute).


Noah was petrified when it came time to follow a teacher to a kindergarten class.  He would not budge on his own.  Pretty sure I was the only parent that I noticed accompanying a child to the classroom (though the teachers insist that's not true).  One of Noah's TK buds was in this same group (sitting next to him on the rug).  I think that helped Noah's comfort level -- and when the kids changed classrooms to see another K room, Griffin and I slipped away.



They took pictures of all the kids.  I'm sure these will show up on the 1st day of school.



Afterwards the kids were allowed to climb onto a school bus and check it out (no parents, so no photo).


On the way back to the car, Noah told me that he was nervous about K because he didn't know how to read yet.  Poor guy thought that in order to go to school you had to know how to read already.  I asked him if he'd like me to teach him to read and he said, 'yes'.

A few days later Noah brought home a stuffed animal and the book 'go dog go'.  The TK class passes the set around and gets to keep it overnight.  Go Dog Go is a Dr Seuss book (lots of repeating and rhyming words).  We sat down after school so that I could read the book to Noah and instead of reading it myself I asked Noah to try and read it to me.  He proceeded to read the ENTIRE BOOK to me all by himself.  Perfect example that when kids are ready for something, they are ready.


I immediately broke out the BOB books that Miles learned to read with.  Noah starting reading those too.  Miles would help him when he got to a tricky spot.  It was so, so sweet.  Miles would say things like, "you can do it Noah....just try it....good job Noah!  that was a hard one!"