Ashley makes me laugh

I was helping her get dressed for school this morning and she didn't want to change into new panties.  The ones she was wearing were pink with Hello Kitty on them.  When I asked why she didn't want to change she said "but I want my panties to match my bandaid!"

We noticed going to the bus stop this morning that the streetlights in our neighborhood had Philippine flags on them-will try to get a picture soon.  Ashley pointed them out and I wondered what they were up for????  Ashley immediately tells us all "maybe they are for my birthday!!!!"  Can you tell that she is just a little excited about turning 4.  Most of the talk around our house these days is about birthdays and Grammy's house!

Greg reminded us that Philippine independence day is on June 12!  I think that must be what the flags are actually for.

2 funny things

After a WHOLE YEAR I saw Golden Grahams cereal at one of our grocery stores!!!!!  I bought 5 boxes!  These were Ryan's favorite cereal when we left home and he was VERY happy to see them again.  I don't think he has missed many meals having at least a small handful of Golden Grahams with his meal since I bought them.  Someone else must have been happy to find them too because I was back at the store the next day and they were ALL gone.  However I found some more today.  Greg was excited about them too-a break from his Corn Flakes!  I asked Ryan how excited he was that I had found Golden Grahams on a 1-10 scale and he said "10 Mommy!"  The little things that make children happy!


You know that you are a mom when. . .

you look in your purse on Monday morning and find-

-a string cheese wrapper-empty of course
-a church craft from yesterday
-the kids church nametags
-lipstick, wallet, keys, school id, sunglasses, and other regular purse stuff
-2 Krispy Kreme hats-from my trip with Scott and Ashley after church-we have been doing something fun the last 3 Sundays-since we are about to leave Greg for almost 6 weeks, he has taken each one of the kids to get ice cream and do something fun-their choice at the mall after church.  He has enjoyed the one on one time and I have enjoyed something fun with just 2.  I guess that I should be thankful that the KK balloons aren't in my purse-they are almost 4 feet long-taller than Ashley!

Hope we have provided your laugh for the day!

How much fun can we cram into one Friday?

Last Friday was Water Fun Day for the first Grade.  I have decided that their grade is the best because they do SO many fun things.  There was a pirate theme and it was a GREAT day!  I had volunteered to be in the pool with the kids-which I was looking forward because I had never been in the Brent pool.  Ryan told me the water was always cold but we thought it felt great!  A little cool and refreshing-unlike our nearly 90 degree pool water at our house.  The 3 classes rotated through 2 game stations out on the field in the middle of the track, came to the pool, and then they got to eat pirate snacks!  It was great-see the pictures below!  The only downside to being in the pool was not being able to take pictures, but it was SO HOT that day that all the parents who weren't in the pool envied those of us who were!

 Ashley and her buddy Hannah eating snacks

 This is my friend Melissa in her pirate hat!  She lives up the street from us and has a son in 1st Grade.  She and her husband and son were having dinner in the same restaurant where we were eating back in August and she came over and introduced herself and gave me her card-she was the president of ALIG last year and being the president of our international ladies group and seeing Americans that she didn't know assumed that we were new and she was right!  Her husband is still teasing her about doing this-I told her it was ok, that I was excited to meet her, but my husband would have teased me about doing something like that too.  She and her family are from Texas.

 Ryan's class having their snacks

 Ryan's teacher having some pizza!

 The adorable pirate cupcakes that my friend Sheila (Hannah's mom) made-they were delicious!  and even had a treasure hidden inside-a reese's peanut butter cup!

 Ryan REALLY enjoyed his!

 Ashley got a pirate tatoo!

Couldn't get Ryan to smile for a picture-maybe he was sad because he had eaten all of his cupcake!


Proud of her pirate tatoo!

Then we went home and more fun was planned for when the boys got home!  When I asked Scott what he wanted to do to celebrate his birthday he said trade pokemon cards, play wii, and swim-so here we are doing those things with Scott's friends Jude-immediately below and another friend named Emilio from his class at school.

 The slide was tired by the time these 4 boys and Ashley were finished.

 We had a cannonball contest!

 And for some reason the kids find sliding on our wet tile very fun-I'm still trying NOT to have that happen to me again!

 Yes-Ashley is making a snow angel!

 A lizard joined the party!  not surprising at all!  There were probably 30 more that we just didn't see!

 I took this beautiful picture of the sky out our bedroom door as we were going in from swimming-to the left is a house that is being built-we wake to construction noise every day except Sunday and the house probably won't be finished by the time we move home from Manila!

 Enjoying pizza for dinner

 Here is Scott blowing out his candle on his brownie and ice cream!  I cannot believe that he is almost 9!

 Ryan did a lego show-whose script was highly stolen from Star Wars-good guys and bad guys in speeders in the desert

 The audience!

 Then we did boardgame island and mario cart on the wii!

 Here they are-Jude, Emilio, and Scott-Emilio will also be 9 on May 29th and Jude's birthday is in mid-June so Scott will celebrate birthdays with these friends before we leave also!  Our last days here before home leave are busy!

More on Mother's Day

Above is the picture Ashley made me at school.  It came with a cupcake which Ashley asked me if we could share-do all of your children have to be away at college when you get something to eat where no one asks to have some?

Ryan's class has been writing poetry and he wrote this acrostic poem about himself and It made me laugh-
It says
Reads chapter books a lot
Yearns to be a teacher
Adores school
Nice and kind

I had never hear him say that he wanted to be a teacher before so I asked him why-he said because he wanted to be like Mrs. Avecilla-God blessed us with a wonderful teacher for him this year.  Greg and I are tremendously proud of what a great reader he has taken off and become this year.  I truly believe that he and Scott would be sad to see school end if they weren't SO excited about going to Grammy's house!


Ryan and his classmates also wrote poems about their moms.  I also got a nice Mother's day note-in neat cursive handwriting-from Scott too-just haven't had a chance to get a picture of it yet!

2 Weeks from Today!

We are just a little excited that our home leave is getting so close!  Two weeks from today the kids and I will be in Atlanta.  I have already promised them Chick Fil A for dinner that night! 

All is good here-busy with the end of school and getting ready to go.  Ashley is having a ball at her summer camp reading class.  I read to Ryan's class yesterday and took them m and m brownies.  Tomorrow is 1st grade water fun day.  Ashley and I will be in the school pool with 3 classes of 1st graders rotating through the pool.  There is a pirate theme to the day.  I have made blue jello with gummy ocean creatures inside it and we are having cupcakes and pizza and more I am sure.  Next Friday I will read to Scott's class as part of their party and bring them ice cream and toppings. 

Birthday sharing-apparently the May 29th attracts people to share birthdays.  The two boys from his class that Scott wanted to do something special with for his birthday both have birthdays soon too!  So they are coming to our house for swimming, pizza, and wii tomorrow night, going to Enchanted Kingdom together to celebrate another's birthday, and then the last one is having a party the day before we leave to fly home.  Thankfully he lives close by, so I told Scott he could go for a little while!

Funny things lately-I sent Ashley outside one day recently to put something in the toy basket by the pool.  She was walking around the pool and I realized was screaming "MOOOOOMMMMMMMMYYYYY!!!!"  I expected to see that she had fallen in but that wasn't it.  She was that upset about a frog in the pool.  She wouldn't walk by him to put away what I had asked her to, so I did it for her.  Then she was still upset that the frog was in "our" pool.  It made me laugh.  I had already laughed really hard when I asked if she thought the frog would jump up and get me when I walked by-she said maybe.  So much for the love and appreciation of Mother's Day-just a few days later, she is ready to sacrifice me to a frog in the pool.  I asked her if I should get the frog out and she said yes.  When I asked her "how?" she told me to get the net.  So I did and got the frog out of the pool and put him in the grass.  She wanted to know where he was because she couldn't see him from where she was standing-INSIDE the house!  I told her he was by the rock and the flowerpot and when I started walking toward him, he hopped away under the bushes.  She has also been acting scared of lizards in her room lately-Greg suggested that we take a picture of one and tape it to her wall so that she will get used to "her" lizard and not be bothered when there are additional ones.  There are some Manila things that I will NOT miss while I am AT HOME!

I had asked Ryan recently to go through his desk/bunk bed drawers and clean out some of the things that he likes to hoard.  He brought me a paper and asked "is it ok to throw away a Jesus paper?"  I told him that if I saved every paper all 3 of them brought home from church that even our larger Manila house would be full by now.  So yes, we threw away the "Jesus" paper.

Looking forward to seeing all of you soon!

Mind Museum

 Our trip to the Mind Museum last Saturday was fun-one of the most interesting things that I learned is that whale sharks can be identified by the spots on their backs-like a human's fingerprints.

  Of 343 whale sharks identified by the World Wildlife Federation and ECOCEAN in the Philippines 328 were spotted and tagged in Donsol-a city in the Philippines that we plan to visit and get to snorkel with these really neat animals.

 The boys making a tornado

 Playing with balls!

 Listening to Dad explain what DNA is

 Ryan walking between a model of the 2 hemispheres of the brain

 Ashley and Ryan were inside this cool house building models with elements-they also had a periodic table with examples in each box

 We all had a turn trying to get our hair to stand up

 Ashley pushing a button to make the magnet jump

 I thought this rice exhibit very interesting-

 Ashley pointed to the brown rice on the far left and said "look Mommy chocolate rice!"

 4380 rice bowls feeds a family for 12 months-that stack of rice bowls would be taller than the Petronas Towers-the umbrella that all this information was on was filled with grains of rice.

At first the kids were so excited they just ran around playing with things but it was a very interesting place-there was really a lot to read and learn and older (or more patient) kids could definitely learn a lot!