Silver Dollar City

November has been a crazy month. My parents and three sisters all made a trip down to Silver Dollar City for a weekend....My dad gets condo and we show up!! Here we are making a YUMMY dessert! It's all kinds of brownie peanut butter goodness!!

Going into the park...First up...Saloon show. It's always a wait, so we take turns standing in line and roaming the park. Here is Z and Brant standing in line...precious! Then while mom and dad waited, we took the kids on this ride...Avery and Britt above. Zane and Brant below. You pull yourself up then you fall down!

We make it into the show and ended up getting right by the stage with the overflowing root beer float of course...

This girl would wink at Zane or get real close to him and it always made him smile and shyly look away!

Brant with the Saloon girls! He actually got told "nice sweater" and his head rubbed with a feather boa during the show! I knew it would be a good idea for him to wear the sweater...Britt tried to talk him out of it!

We then rode Fire in the Hole. Avery was a little scared...

and Zane was bawling by the time it was over...

The camera got put on the wrong setting, but it still captured Wes's awesome posing skillz...

More rides...

I just realized all these pics are of the bugs lowered. They all go up if you push the button!

Now for dinner. Man I could use some yummy family feud right now. It is a sin to go to SDC and not get family feud and an apple dumpling! The camera just can't do this tree justice. Right before this picture was taken, we were watching the tree's light show to music. Zane was standing on a bench jumping up and down to the music and just fell right off the bench. Poor guy. It was pretty funny to watch and he recovered quickly.

We always have to go through grandpa's house...

This mirror pops up with an ugly witch lady's face when you stand right in front of it. Pretty funny. I missed the witch, but got Avery's reaction!

Grandpa's bed is very hard to get out of...It looks like its level, but the whole house is built on different angles. His bed is actually leaning back pretty far, giving your abs a nice workout...

We can't leave without checking out the glass blowing. So awesome. I want to try this some day...

Playing a little Left, Right, Center. The kids loved it, but Zane was VERY upset he didn't win the pot. I won it though. A big $27!! Cute cousins...

On our way home, we ate at Lamberts. Each plate has enough food to feed a family of 4! Great trip like always!

Just some things I don't want to forget...

Zane

Zane has gotten pretty good at not answering questions when confronted. He will try and beat around the bush or say “I dunno...” Squeezing toothpaste all over the bathroom is not something you forget, so Wes and I will say “Yes or No?” and make him fess up. The other day, Zane asked me if I could get him a pillow pet and followed it by…“Yes or Yes sir?” Ha. Good try buddy. I think Santa will fall for your desperate pleadings though.

Speaking of those desperate pleadings…I told Zane we weren’t buying a pillow pet, but we can ask Santa for it. He responds…“You said that last time and Santa didn’t bring it. He never ever will. Everyone has a pillow pet…Jaxon, Ryan, Austen…everyone in the whole entire world but me.” I almost felt sorry for him…

Zane is very good at catching me when I’m losing patience and when I start saying “Shush” or “get out/go away/leave me alone” etc. He will say “mommy, you shouldn’t say that. Its not nice...” I really want to tell him “It’s not nice to annoy your mom either…” but I look at his innocent, sad, so dang cute little face, that I just have to hug him instead. It helps when his hugs are followed by “You’re the best mommy ever!” or "I love you the most...well not more than God though...!"

He is very good at thinking of other people. He drew pictures the other day and put them in envelopes. He asked me who’s mailboxes we should put them in. He was very excited. I need to provide more opportunities for him to get to follow through on his ideas and actually get to see people’s reactions, hugs, and thank you’s for the things he thinks of.

Dear Zane, You definitely like to push buttons and you never run low on “whine,” but you are so sweet, love learning, love helping, love giving, and love hugging. You are my little buddy and I love you very much!

Avery

Avery is the total opposite of me right now. I loved all sports and have been looking forward to watching her love it as much as I do, but his kid doesn’t want to do anything!

She has never cared about soccer; I’ve just bribed her to play. She is one that needs some confidence, and I thought she’d enjoy it after she understood how to play and got better. I’ve never pushed her to practice, just wanted her to have fun. 4 seasons later, she is still not wanting to do it. I'm done bribing.

She really liked hip hop jazz this summer, but no longer wants to go every week anymore. I told her I wasn’t going to pay if she wasn’t going to go. She said OK, she doesn’t want to do it…We dropped out.

She always loved gymnastics and I thought that was her thing. She was the most confident in it, but she told me last week she only wants to do it if she’s in her friend’s class. I tried to remind her how much she loved learning routines and going to little competitions (because she really did!) but she said “Well, I just like doing it at home and making up my own routines now...” If she wants to go down to a rec. class with a friend, I guess we'll do that. It's better than totally quitting.

After all these convo's I realized sports may not be her thing (Yes. I'm slow!). I ask her, Would you like to learn how to play the piano? “No, I already do that at GG’s.” Well, yes, but this way you can learn how to play actual songs!? “I just like making up my own songs…”

You love art! Would you like to take art lessons and paint? “I would like to paint, but I don’t want someone to tell me how to do it because I already know how…”

Hmm. She likes doing things, just doesn’t like people telling her what to do!? Maybe she’ll gain interest as she grows. I just want to get her (me) out of the house occasionally-get to know other girls, have fun, and gain confidence in herself and her abilities. Maybe she just wants to get better at painting fingernails at home... I think I can handle that...

Dear Avery, you have so much spunk with natural talent in so many areas. You are a big helper, love babysitting, and obey very well. I can't wait to find out what else you really love to do. I hope I will notice it, if it is something I'm not expecting. I love you my little sweet angel.

Soccer is Over: Avery Edition

Avery had a good season playing soccer. A lot of credit goes to her awesome coach... The kids were told if 1 of the 4 players who haven't scored yet (Avery being one of them) scores a goal, then each player can bring one thing for the coach to wear to the last game. Thus, you get the picture above. He is very lucky we ended up being late...we had some awesome lipstick or blush for him!

Avery was less afraid to get in the middle of things this year. She preferred to play defense- Probably because the ball rarely got to that side of the field...but she did make a few nice saves when it did get down there!I was able to capture some lovely kicks... Avery's team only lost one game this season! Way to go Monkeys! Or Fireballs? The kids change the name every season, making it a little difficult to remember!

Soccer Party at CiCi's!!

Thanks for coaching, Robert!

New School Adventure

Feel free to just read the bold!!

I had no intentions of having the kids switch schools until next Fall.
However, things changed and it all happened really fast. Now that I think about it, I'm not even sure my parents know!?

Driving back and forth was less fun than originally thought.
It was very hard for me to pick up kids from MDO on the East side at 2:30, drive to my house on the West side, and then 30 minutes later go back to the East side to get Avery from school. Now that the weather is getting colder, we can't just kill time at a near by park for that hour. Because of that, we'd just leave her at her friend's house until 4 and many times even 5 (when it was time for soccer or gymnastics). That worked out just fine, but it left no time for homework. If homework doesn't get done before 5, it doesn't get done...it wasn't getting done.

3:30 Tuesday Nov. 2nd, I pondered switching the kids at Christmas time. I called the new school to put Zane on the waiting list for Pre-k in hopes something would open up at the semester. They told me someone had just dropped that day. They don't hold spots and I was told Pre-K openings don't last long.
That night was Zane's teacher conference so I talked to her about it. She was very sad to lose Zane, but she thought he would do great with the change. She said he was always excited about EVERYTHING they did. He was attentive and got a long with everyone. He was ahead academically, so she didn't think the move would harm him at all. I also emailed Avery's teacher and got her opinion. She said it would actually be easier to switch now (since 9 weeks just ended) than at Christmas time when the 9 weeks won't be over until the middle of Jan.

Wednesday morning, I decided to make the switch and went to fill out an insane amount of paperwork, but didn't have a utility bill because we hadn't gotten one yet.

Thursday morning I took them over a letter from electric company
and the lady told me she was so glad I brought this that day because someone had just called about an opening for Pre-k!

This past Monday was their first day!
I walked Avery into the cafeteria where the kids wait until the bell rings.
The one bad thing is Zane is now in PM and he really needs his nap.
It's good that we can see friends in the mornings, but man he is not a happy camper after school. I forgot my camera when dropping Zane off...(Insert cute picture of Zane waving to me as he walks to the Pre-K playground)

Tuesday I totally forgot to pick the kids up from school!
I got there at 4ish! Oops. I'm not used to picking them up at that time and my phone will only hold 3 alarms (7:30- wake up, 10:50- get J and R, 2:15- get P and E)!

Wednesday I remembered to pick them up and was able to capture an amazing picture of it...(Zane's backpack and red shirt are behind Avery!)

I'm second guessing my decision because of the no nap for Zane but then also, more homework!! Even Zane has 5-10 mins of homework everyday (not including the daily reading).
They both seem to be enjoying it and it was a very easy transition!

I win the award for the most boring blog of the day...

I'm bringing crafty back...

It's been FOREVER since I've scrapped. I realized how much I missed it when I put together this little scrapbook last weekend... While I worked on the scrapbook, Zane's created a little masterpiece himself.
The first was spiderman...

and then a less detailed, Green Goblin...

Now that Zane is in PM pre-K (that story coming later), we get to enjoy playdates again!! Nothing crafty about this...but, thought I'd throw it in.

More pot creatures! I can't wait to make my turkey!! Then maybe a Reindeer?!

They also made little baby pine cone turkey's as well...

I just love crafts. I'm glad my kids do too!

Soccer is Over: Zane Edition...

Go Wolves!!
Zane played soccer and actually kicked the ball and got in the middle of action at times... He definitely messed around a lot too...

Focus on the ball and not the girl, dude!

As you can see, keeping track of shin guards was a little difficult in our house this season...

I'm pretty sure these push-ups were a result of the above picture of messing around and not paying attention!

They played up a league, so my little 4 year old played against 6 and 7 year olds! He looked so tiny!

Occasionally, he would actually be aggressive...

One practice, they were shirts vs skins. Zane is my modest one. He did NOT want to take off his shirt. He did though. After practice he worriedly asked me if I laughed at him when he wasn't wearing a shirt...

He did a great job at heading the ball!

He ran more than last year and I'm pretty sure he never played with grass this season!

End of the season soccer party!

Watching an awesome slideshow that Elizabeth put together!

Here's the best action we got...