First Day of School

Since we moved at the beginning of the Summer, yesterday was Payton and Ian's first day at a new school -  Ashley Elementary in Frisco. They both, understandably were anxious and excited.

 Ian is in first grade and has Mrs. Shade as a teacher. He said that she is very nice. He got to play with Play-doh twice! I'm a little skeptical about Play-doh in first grade, but it was just the first day, so we'll see..... Ian was most excited that they had HOTDOGS! in the cafeteria for lunch!

Payton has Mr. Thornburg for homeroom, math and science; and Mrs. Cooksey for reading and writing. I think Payton is excited about having a male teacher. She said she had a good first day. The only real work that they did was 'power write' about a topic Mrs. Cooksey gave them.

We are all learning the ropes. It's a new school and they definitely do things differently than where we were before. I haven't decided if it's good, bad, or just different. Time will tell.

I was very excited to see my kids off to school. Don't get me wrong, we have had a great summer and I love hanging out with the kids, but they were starting to get a little tired of hanging out at home with Mom. Thus, I was getting a little tired of hanging out with the kids at home :)

Disney World - Florida

Our big vacation this year was to Disney World. We went less than a week after school was let out for the summer. We had been briefed/warned by other friends what to expect. I had been to Disney World when I was a kid, but Scott hadn't. And this was our kids first times, as well.

Let me start by saying, in the end, we loved it. We all had a great time. It was a great experience.

BUT, it was also one of the most exhausting vacations I've been on. After the first day, I didn't know how I was going to make it the week. Don't go to Disney, if you want to relax....go to a beach or a mountain top.

The first day, we went to Magic Kingdom. It was hot and crowded! For a Wednesday, I thought the crowds would be less, but I was wrong. We went to Space Mountain first. This might have been a little much for everyone, including Scott. We should have warmed up to it, but by the end of the day, the line would have been impossible. We used our FastPasses wisely, so even though there were huge crowds. The longest wait we had was about 25 minutes.

We made from when the park opened till about 2pm. Then we were just hot and tired, so we went back to the hotel to swim.

In the evening, we went back to Magic Kingdom for one of my favorite things, the light parade. The kids thought it was cool, too. But after that, the kids were ready to go back to the hotel, so we didn't stay for fireworks.

Spring Break III - Bloom Festival

My parents came up and we visiting the Dallas Arboretum where the Bloom Festival was in full swing.

Spring Break II - Medieval Times

Groupon brought us our next Staycation Spring Break adventure. We all went to a Medieval Times Dinner. We actually went to a 2:30pm show, so that Ian could go through Knight Training.

Knight Training involved lining a bunch of kids up in the stadium and teaching them to swing a wooden sword. Ian liked it well enough.

The kids thought the castle was pretty cool. 

As part of the show, they had trained horses prance around for us. While Scott and I thought this was very cool, poor Ian was sneezing up a storm. As soon as the horses were done prancing, the sneezing stopped. Thus, we have concluded that Ian is allergic to horses :( Poor guy, it was so bad, he wanted to leave the show. But I got him to hold on until the horses left and he was fine.

The show's choreography was pretty impressive. It was better than I expected and Scott thought it was amazing!

The food was good.....especially for food that you had to eat with your hands.

All in all....a good time.

Spring Break I - Legoland Discovery Place

We had a staycation during Spring Break this year.  One day we went with some friends to the Legoland Discovery Place and SeaLife Aquarium in Grapevine.

We have been to the Discovery Place before. The kids enjoyed being there with friends though. And I was pleasantly surprised that it wasn't overly crowded. I think Lego limits the number of guests, so that everything is manageable.

There was a new ride that we hadn't seen before..... 

The kids enjoyed driving, except when they had to contend with the littlest girl out there who didn't quite understand what she was suppose to do. Poor thing. She caused quite the traffic jam.

 This was our first time at SeaLife. It was a little shorter than I expected, but was still had some beautiful displays.

For dinner we ate at the Twisted Root (yummy hamburgers!) and visited the fountains at the Shops at Legacy.

Happy Birthday Ian!

My baby is 6! He had Connor and Aidan over after school. He requested a Batman cake....which he insisted he help ice. It turned out pretty good, considering :)

Ian wanted hotdogs for his birthday dinner, and he wanted me to come have lunch with him at school.

Daddy made him a special Lego Batman Cave.....

which Ian thought was pretty cool.

He had a great day and was super excited about all the Legos he received for his birthday.

Ian is such a sweet heart. He is kind, thoughtful and full of love. He loves Legos, soccer and playing with his sister.

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Oh Jonah!

Well, the tale of the whale is a whale of a tale:

it's a story of the deep blue sea;

about a fish and a man named Jonah,

who was a lot like you and me.

Payton and Ian loved being in the musical at church. They were in the chorus. Pastor Marvin spearheaded this adventure with the children's choirs, and it turned out super cute.

The end product was well worth all the time and effort the kids put in :)

My little sailors:

Payton as a Ninevite: