Our Ball Player

I know I've already posted pictures of Carson playing ball, but he is just so darn cute I can't resist posting some more!   Once he broke his arm we weren't sure if he was going to be able to still play, but it hasn't slowed him down.  It has been raining a lot, so some of their practices and games have been canceled, but he has had a great time and has made some good friends.

THE WHOLE GANG!

Carson with his sissy.

Tori's Dance Recital

This was Tori's second year to take dance lessons; she takes tap, ballet, and gymnastics.  I love the dance studio that she goes to because the owner is a Christian and not only is she a great dancer, but she is an awesome person and great role model for the girls.  She is so sweet and patient with the girls, it is really unbelieveable.  There is no doubt in my mind that God has given her the talent of not only dancing, but of being a dance teacher.  I feel so blessed that Tori is getting a positive experience with dance. 

Her dance recital was last Friday night.  She did a great job!  I was so proud of her.

This is Tori with her friend, Emma, at the dress rehearsal.

Here's Tori in the dressing room right before showtime!
Last year I danced in the adult group and I was more nervous this year, then I was then.  I guess I had more time on my hands this year to be nervous for her.  She did great!!!!

This girl knew how to shake a maraca!  :)  I was so glad her dance this year was tap, because they just make for a more exciting performance.  Last year her class did a ballet routine and it was sweet, but not near as much fun.





Mini Vacation in the Middle of the Week

Last week Robert had to go out of town for a meeting and so the kids and I went along.  We had the best time being lazy, watching TV, sleeping in and then playing in the pool and hot tub while he was at his meeting.  The elevator in the hotel was glass, so you could watch the people standing on the elevator as they went up.  Our kids thought that was the coolest thing ever and we may or may not have ridden the elevator all the way to the top floor and down again several times in order to enjoy the view of the lobby from up high!  :)  Our kids had so much fun you would have thought they were at Disney World!!  Guess it doesn't take much to impress them!

They loved their bed with all the big fluffy pillows.  They also enjoyed being able to watch TV in bed, because they do not have TVs in their bedrooms at home.

This is us enjoying our very nice complimentary all-you-can eat buffet and made to order breakfast!

There was a pretty waterfall in the middle of the lobby that the kids loved!

We also took pictures of us swimming, but my camera deleted them or something.  Carson looked hilarious, because we covered his cast with a trash bag and he walked around in the water with his arm raised up above his head.  It takes more than a broken arm to slow him down and ruin his fun!

Carson is 5!!!

Carson turned 5 years old last Wednesday!!  I can't believe my little man is so big!  Since our kids' actually birthdays usually fall on a weekday, we have started doing something special that day just as a family.  Then the following weekend they get to have a birthday party where we live to celebrate with their friends and then we go to our hometown the last part of the weekend and have a family birthday party with Robert's family and mine.  This has worked well the past few birthdays, so I think we're going to stick to this plan.  :)

This is Carson and Tori Wednesday morning before we took Tori to school.

He got to open one small present at breakfast time.

I made him his favorite type of muffins.  Tori and I sang "Happy Birthday."

Carson got to pick somewhere to eat out for his birthday lunch, so he picked McDonalds.  His daddy met us to eat, which made it extra special!

( This next picture is out of order, but I can't figure out how to delete it without erasing over half of my post, so just ignore it.)
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Ice cream.......yum!!!

He got to open his big present from us on Wednesday night after church!

Carson is all about some Batman right now!!

 
We have a tradition that on their birthday they get to measure themselves to see how much they have grown.  When our kids were very young Robert was in the process of taking several promotions, so we knew that where we were living was not a permanent home for us.  Because of this, I didn't want to chart their growth on a wall or closet door, because I knew that when we moved it would be lost.  I got the idea of taking a roll of art paper and measuring off about six feet worth and laminating it.  This way no matter where we went, I could always have their growth history with us.  We also chart their weight, their hand size, and how well they can write their name.  They stay rolled up in the top of their closets, so they hardly take up any room to store.

Here is Carson getting measured on his.

This is Carson's without him on it.  :)  It's hard to read because of the glare.

Here's Tori getting measured.



You can't really read this, but I have matched up their charts so that we could tell who was taller when they turned five years old.

Then on Friday night, Carson had a Spiderman party in our backyard!



Here's Carson and Tori right before the party got started!

Carson and one of his sweet friends.  This was the first year that Carson had a real opinion about who he wanted to invite.  It's neat to see the friendships that he is creating through church and preschool.

Here's the whole crew!  We felt very safe, with there being so many superheros close by!! Ha!

Before they ate, we played some games.  This is during the scavenger hunt.  There were three spidermen all dressed exactly the same!  It was hard to tell them apart! ha!  They also got to spray villains with silly string and went through an obstacle course.

PIZZA for dinner!  In one of the Spiderman movies, Peter Parker is a pizza delivery boy, so we called it:
PETER PARKER PIZZA!

The birthday boy loved having all of his friends at his house all at the same time to play! 

Spiderman Cupcakes!  I was trying to not spend tons of money, so I made the cupcakes myself.  They were very easy and I thought they turned out cute enough.

The party ended with a pinata! 

Then on Sunday, amongst all the Mother's Day festivities, we had a family birthday party for Carson.  This is Carson with all of his first cousins except one (Wyatt had to leave for baseball practice).

After presents, we had more Spiderman cupcakes and ice cream! :)

Played outside in Nana's backyard

And yes, another pinata!  :)

I know this was a super long post, but I want my kids to be able to look back and remember these special times in their life.  I'm beginning to sense the urgency of documenting their childhood, because I realize in a blink it will be gone.  Little man, I love you so much.  I'm so glad that God entrusted you to me and your dad.

Weekend Excitement

This weekend my mom and my brother's family all came up to spend some time with us.  Robert and I have several projects around the house that we would like to get done before summertime and one of those is to build and organize a shed in our backyard.  Right now 1/2 of our garage serves as our shed, but we really need that room to move our gym equipment out of the house.  We are working towards creating more room inside our home for when we adopt.  My brother is very good at carpentry stuff and he volunteered to come up and help with the shed.  They got the base constructed which is the hardest part and now (if it will ever stop raining) Robert can do the rest (we bought a building kit that you just have to put it together).

The shed is going in the back corner of our yard....can't tell you how excited I am to finally be getting a shed!
I have wanted one for quite some time.

Luckily, the rain held off and the guys were able to finish the floor.  By dark on Saturday night they were ready to begin assembling the actual building.  They had said that they wanted to keep working until they finished it.  So, around 8:00 pm  they had just gotten flood lights set up, so they could see what they were doing when the unplanned happened.......

You see, inside the house, the ladies were watching the Royal Wedding on DVR while the kiddos were playing around in the playroom.  Everything was happy and bliss until we heard a loud shriek and cry coming from Carson.  So, I ran in there and picked him up off the floor.............he kept crying and crying and once we sat him down on the couch we realized that he could not move his arm and he was in a lot of pain.  Once he calmed down he told us that he had jumped off the computer desk chair onto the carpeted floor head (and arm) first.  Not exactly sure what he was trying to accomplish by that, but his arm did not like it.

I ran outside and got the guys.  My brother used to work at a vet clinic and Robert's friend who was helping is a pharmacist.  So, we immediately gave him Tylenol and my brother splinted it.  Then Robert and I rushed him to the emergency room.  It is horrible to see your child in pain and there is no way that you can help them.  Sure enough, his arm was broken!!

He got a temporary cast at the ER and then they scheduled us an appointment for today to get the real cast.

This was our first experience with broken bones in either of our children.  It was amazing that once they secured his arm, he didn't hurt anymore and was even joking around with the doctor and nurse.  He was excited to be getting a sling and immediately said that he wanted a green cast!!  On Sunday at church he showed it off very proudly!! :) 

My mom, brother, and his family went to church with us on Sunday morning.

Sunday night the kids were in a musical at church.  Carson looked so pitiful in his sling.  :(
They did a great job singing, though.

Today he got the real cast.  He will have to wear it for 4 weeks probably.  He turns five years old on Wednesday, so I keep telling people that he almost made it to five with no broken bones.  That would have been quite an accomplishment, because he is always climbing on things and jumping off things.  So it would have been a miracle if he had made it all the way to five; he missed it by only four days!  Ha,ha!

One last picture with the temporary cast before getting the permanent one.

This is the nurse putting the cast on him.

Yeah!  A green cast!  The doctor said that he would heal up just fine; it would just take a few weeks.

Needless to say, the shed project got put on hold with the other excitement of the night.  And it rained all day on Sunday, so they didn't get to work on the shed then.  Hopefully Robert can work on it this week once it dries up a little.  I will try to remember to post a picture of the finished project.  :)