little ballerina

Today was Madeline's first ballet recital. She was absolutely adorable. She loved being on stage and was half dancing and half searching the audience for us the entire time. When the song ended and the other girls walked off of the stage, she stayed onstage under the spotlight looking all over the auditorium for us until she was "escorted" off. That won her another round of applause :) There really is not much cuter than a group of two year olds wearing big giant tutus and dancing!! Afterwards, we took her to The Cheesecake Factory to celebrate....yum! Emma was a little bummed out that today was Madeline's special day (as you can tell by her face in the picture!), but on Friday night she "graduates" from preschool, so it will be her turn to shine :)

have fun to the north and south?!

Being in the car has become somewhat of a headache for me. It seems to be the perfect time for the girls to be stuck next to each other in close quarters with nothing to do but tease and torment each other. Their latest routine goes something like this:

Madeline sings: "Zippety Do Da Zippety Yay...Have fun to the north and south after all."

Emma: "Mad, that doesn't even make sense!"

Madeline: "Ha Ha Ha! Zippety Do Da.............................. " (much louder, of course)

Repeat the entire routine about 50 times or until we reach our destination!!!!!!!!! Earplugs, anyone?

rainy days

Emma and Madeline live for rainy days!! They love nothing more than putting on their boots and grabbing their umbrellas and running around in the rain. Fortunately, summer afternoons in Florida are perfect for that:)

back to life, back to reality

Our cruise was awesome!! It was so much fun to get away with each other and with great friends without the kids. It seems like a lifetime ago that I was able to live life according to my own schedule, eating and sleeping whenever I want....and it was great to have a few days of living selfishly :) By the time we got back, we were definately ready to see the girls...it seemed like forever that we were gone. When I saw Claire, I was shocked-she didn't even look like the same baby to me. It's amazing how much they change so quickly. I think I stared at her for a half hour straight saying to Ryan "I swear I've never seen this baby before. I don't even recognize her." Her hair was longer, she was fatter, she was clapping her hands and talking up a storm. She even trys to dance and sing along to Hannah Montana in the car. It's hysterical. I feel like she went from an infant to a toddler in just a few days.

The downfall to going away is that everyone is always a little out of whack while we are trying to get life back to normal. Madeline and Claire who have both always been champion sleepers have been wreaking havoc around here all week. They have both been flipping out at bedtime (Mad just lays in her bed crying and screaming "I want mommy to hug me") and then they wake up inconsolable throughout the night. Ugh!!!! Naptime has pretty much been going the same way. Thankfully, Emma is old enough to not be phased by any of this. She just keeps complaining that Madeline keeps waking her up and ruining her sleep. Ha! At least one out of the three is not giving us a hard time :) We have several trips planned this summer and I have a feeling that we are gonna be in a continuous cycle of getting adjusted and readjusted to our schedules between trips. I'm sure by the fall I'll be ready for school to start and a new routine to keep us grounded!

Just a few pictures from our visit with Gramma and Grampa who were visiting from California!!

it's been a while...

Life has been crazy, busy here as usual. The girls are getting so big and changing so quickly. Claire has been talking up a storm in the last week. She's started waving and saying hi and bye and she loves to drop something and then say "uh oh". Whenever she does something new, her face lights up and she gets this coy little smile on her face like she's saying "I bet you didn't even know I could do that!". She also loves to point and everything and say "this" and sometimes "that". A week ago, all she could say was mama and dada...it seems like she just started talking overnight.

Madeline is slowly learning to be compliant. Her new thing is to throw a fit over whatever she wants and then after about 30 seconds, she just looks at me and says, "OK" in response to whatever sense I've been trying to talk into her. And just like that, the tears and the screaming stop and she moves on with her day. She cracks me up. I've started laughing now when I get the OK, because I know from the start that it is coming at any time :)

Last week we went to Emma's Kindergarten Open House (already!). We got to meet the teachers and tour the classrooms and watch a video all about what she'll be doing in school next year. She was really excited to be there and Ryan and I were surprisingly impressed with the school and are feeling much more confident in our decision to send her there. On Thursday she takes her placement test, so we have been cramming the last few days to teach her some sight words. Teaching kids to read is not easy...I'm so thankful right now that I never ended up using that teaching degree. Ugh!

We went up to Orlando for Mother's Day weekend. The car ride up there was TERRIBLE!! I think that when the kids were younger, the ride was actually easier because they would sleep most of the time. Not so much, anymore. This time, the big girls slept for a little while in the beginning of the trip and then it was three or four hours of fighting, screaming, giggling and "Are we there yet?". Claire slept and cried on and off. By the time we got to my parents house I had the worst migrane of my life. I wonder how that happened?! I've come to the conclusion that having three little kids is exhausting. Go figure.

thursday

One of my favorite memories from my childhood is all of the time I spent with my mom. I think that my mom always valued spending time together and because of this, she was always laid back about letting me take days off from school. Let's face it-it's because I was her favorite and she always wanted me around :) I can remeber taking off of school for day trips and shopping outings and mornings at Columbus Market.....I think that every school year, I pushed the attendance policy to the limit! I felt so bad for those students at graduation who received the perfect attendance award-I mean, seriously, get a life!! No offense. I love these memories. Now that I am grown, those are the days that I look back on with longing. A handful of special days playing hookey and embracing life means more to me than a hundred mundane ones.

That said, I kept Emma home from school on Thursday. We didn't do anything all that significant-we went to church for bible study and then went to Chick fil A with friends. After naptime, the girls rode their bikes for a little while around the neighborhood and then we went to the gym. But to Emma, these little things meant everything. It was a day of the week where she didn't need to leave her mommy and her sisters behind. A day where she could just BE. On the way home from the gym that night, she was writing in her journal and asked me how to spell "Thursday. It's a good day. I'm happy.". This response would seem typical for most kids. Coming from Emma, this spoke volumes and brought tears to my eyes. Two days later, during breakfast she got her journal out and asked how to spell "Today is a bad day. A terrible, horrible, bad, bad day." That's Emma for you :)