My Little Soccer Stars

Alicia started her soccer season about a week and a half ago. She played last year so she had an idea of what to look forward too, and was super excited to start her 2nd soccer season.This year seems to be a lot more instructional, so it's been good for her to actually "learn" more about the game. Alicia is a natural athlete and very competitive, which makes for some good "offensive" action. She knows her coach from church and she already has quite a few friends from school on her team which also makes it a lot of fun.

Emily on the other hand, is totally new at this soccer thing. In fact, to be honest, I had visions of Emily standing in the middle of the field picking flowers. But, she wanted to play with her best friend, Madelyn. Madelyn's dad, Heath, (God bless him) is the coach, and Emily loves him. So of course I had to sign her up as well.

I have to say though that Emily really did surprise me. She got very in to playing this new game of soccer. Heath is an awsome coach, and Emily seemed to have a ton of fun.

Off To School We Go!

Alicia had her first day of 1st Grade today. I have been dreading this day since the last day of kindergarten. My little girl, gone all day, the thought (still) makes me cringe. I really had a hard time dealing with all day school. Somehow, kindergarten was not a big deal for me, maybe because she was only gone for a few hours a day. So, after debating homeschooling her, I decided to come to terms with having her gone all day. Believe me, it has not been easy, but she was looking forward to school, so I was determined to not let me fear and panic show.

Alicia is NOT a morning person. Even today, it was not easy to get her moving. 180 more days of this? But, by the time it was to go to the bus stop she was ready to go.

I can't believe my little girl has grown up so fast. Has it been six years already?

Alicia posing for her first day of school picture

Alicia and Emily waiting patiently for the bus. (Ethan did NOT want to be in the picture)

Getting on the bus

Cape May with My Sister and Her Family

My sister and her family are up for a week long visit. It has been so nice to spend time with them all. We decided (rather spontaneously) to take a trip to Cape May. We had a wonderful time. The kids had so much fun playing together. I wish that she lived closer, but the time we do get to spend together is so precious.

Pictures of Dorney Park

Our Outdoor Adventure

Until I was twelve years old I lived in the middle of the woods up in N.H. It was a great place to live. There was a pond nearby where my sister and I spent hours searching for tadpoles and frogs as well as avoiding very large snapping turtles. We also had a lake that we could walk to and swim in. My dad would take us hiking regularly, and I have great memories of just taking drives through the mountains with the family.

Even though I do enjoy the outdoors, it has been a while since I have just took a walk through the woods. Sad, I know. We are not a camping family. It would be nice to say that we do, but I don't really see that happening any time soon. Kudos to all you out there braving camping with your small kids. I am not that courageous. I have visions of bear attacks and children getting lost in the woods.

So anyway, I decided to take the kids for a nature walk yesterday so they could experience walking through the woods and looking at, well, nature. I took them up to Nolde Forest which is literally five minutes away. They were so funny. Emily wouldn't get out of the van into the "jungle" until I assured her that there were no tigers in the woods. Alicia was more worried about bears. No bears, I told her. In fact at this point I figured all the animals were heading for the hills with all the excited noise my little ones were making.

The kids had a great time looking in the creek for fish, crawfish, and of course snakes. Much to Alicia's chagrin and my relief we didn't see any snakes. We did see a fish and a lot of water bugs. Emily swears she saw a frog. Both the girls were delighted to see a chipmunk. Ethan seemed satisfied just to throw rocks and sticks into the water. It was a nice little adventure though, and the kids got to experience, even for a little bit, life in the woods.

Alicia, Emily and Ethan very excited to be hiking through the woods!

Looking for bugs

The Dog Days of Summer

To celebrate the Dog Days of Summer I took the kids and their cousin Breydan to see the movie Underdog. The girls had wanted to see it for awhile, and I remember watching the original cartoon when I was a kid. It was a cute movie. As usual the main kid character was disrespectful to his Dad, I get so sick of that, but otherwise it wasn't to bad. The girls and Breydan really seemed to enjoy it. Ethan got a little bored, but he did pretty well. Best of all, thanks to Dave, we got in for free. -When Dave did a Spiderman event for the theatre they gave us a ton of free tickets. Not a bad way to spend a summer afternoon.

Reading Fair

Yesterday Jamie and I took the kids to the Reading Fair. To say it was an Extremely Hot Day would not be an exageration at all. Even though it was hot we still had a good time. Thanks Pop Pop for the tickets! It was especially nice because the kids rode all the rides they wanted to for free! Yeah! So, even though we thought we would melt we still had a good time.

the Reading Fair

Nesting?.....Not Quite.

Dave's car has been acting up and because of all his traveling he decided to take the van to work today. (We have an appointment for Monday for his car to be checked) So, I was left without the van. Technically, I could have still driven the car today, but I did not want to chance getting stuck to far from home...especially in this heat. Because of being housebound and because a friend needs to borrow my vacuum cleaner this week, I decided to give the house a good cleaning. I figured it shouldn't take me to long since I had washed the floors upstairs yesterday. Unfortunately, its almost 6 o'clock and I haven't even finished.

The problem, I think, is my lack of motivation. The morning started of promising, but I kept taking little breaks in between jobs and it kept taking longer and longer.... What's a unmotivated pregnant woman to do? Hmmmm.... Well, I surfed the net, took a break to sit down with a cup of ice water, went back to work, talked to my sister on the phone (for almost an hour), realized I was starving, made lunch, made some cookies, went back to work, took a break for some more ice water, went back to work...... Well, that 's mostly how my day went. Any of you out there with kids (especially three under six) will understand how distracting they can be (in a good way) too.

So here I sit.... ( I was starting dinner, but got sidetracked again...:)) Typing away..... I guess I should get back to work... or at least back to making dinner.

I thought as I got closer to the end of this pregnancy I would start nesting a little bit at least... Not yet, I guess....

Painting Wilbur

We started reading Charlotte's Web again recently. We had started reading it last Nov/Dec when the new movie came out, but we got sidetracked this winter from finishing it. So, rather than trying to figure out what the kids remember, I decided to start over again at the beginning. Of course, now, having seen the movie they seem to have a much better appreciation for our hero, Wilbur.

Today we read the chapter in which Wilbur was so sad because it was raining outside and he had no friends with which to play with. Wilbur was very bored, and my little ones really seemed to feel for poor Wilbur. Even little Ethan seemed to feel Wilbur's pain. (at least I think so)

After reading we decided to paint some pictures of poor sad Wilbur. Alicia, Emily and Ethan all enjoy painting, but this was the first time that I specifically had them paint something we had just read about. The results were great! They really had a good time mixing red and white paint together to get the color pink. (We had never made that color before) They all did their best to recreate Wilbur on their papers. Ethan gave up halfway through with the pig and declared his creation a Choo Choo. Nevertheless, my children were occupied for a good hour.

Emily and Ethan showing me their masterpieces.

Alicia working hard to make her picture just perfect!