Cousins Camp

Here are some cousin camp highlights:

Davenport cousin Olympics. This is the hug a balloon race.
Feeding the sheep by Grandma's house
Going to Mobius kids museum. We weren't playing on doing inside activities, but had to improvise when it was cold and rainy one of the days. Then we fed the ducks and rode the carousel.
Horse back riding at Ryder Ranch.
Kissing Cousins: Grace and Sam!

We also went to Silverwood, had a backyard campout, and did a talent show...but that can be in another blog entry. We had a great time at cousins camp. Thanks camp director Grandma for the great week!

As they sleep

After a LONG DAY of chasing, cleaning, feeding, errands, playing, I regret to say this, but yelling too, it seems that I can't wait for bedtime and a break from the chaos. Then once both kids are in bed and the house is quiet I love to walk into their rooms and watch them sleep. It is a good reminder to me that they are still so little, innocent, pure, and so lovable.
Grace is anti-binkie nowadays. She basically uses the binkie as a teething toy. She has now found her thumb and realizes that unlike a binkie, her thumb is pretty easy to find. The only time she sucks her thumb is when she is trying to sleep. If she wakes up in the night, she will pop in her thumb and soothe herself back to sleep. I tried to pull her thumb out once while she was sleeping and she woke right up. I have not done that since. Sleep is just too precious!
Gavin loves his little Cheetah, named Bob. It is his sleeping buddy. Every morning, Gavin brings his blanket and Bob up to my room to wake me up. I often wake up with Bob in my face and Gavin saying, "Mom, did I wake up to early?"

America's next top baby model

Way to go Grace on winning your first contest!

(the picture was scanned and obviously, I am not an expert with the scanner)Last week I went to Kiddie Kandids to get Gavin's 4 year pictures taken and the photographer said that they were slow and asked if I would like a free 8 x 10 of Grace. SURE... who wouldn't want a free picture of your kid. Since I didn't think her outfit was picture worthy, I stripped her down for this photo shoot. Thank heaven's I had a bow in the diaper bag!

So then this week I decided to go back to Kiddie Kandids to get pictures of Gavin and Grace together and I noticed that Grace's picture was on the wall. She made portrait of the month! The manager picked her picture as the cutest one taken for the month of June. She thought that Grace's picture was so cute that she even made the portrait into mousepads for the store. The photo shoot went so well the second time that the photographer entered another picture of Grace for the July contest. What can I say, my baby girl is a smiley one!

My strawberry sweetheart

I have SOOOOOO much fun dressing Grace up. She is such a pretty baby and she even keeps her bows in (pretty good). Thanks to cousin Gina for the ADORABLE outfit. Grace recieved many compliments at church yesterday. I just love the little strawberries on it. Grace is transitioning to the next size of clothes, 6-9 months and I pulled that section of clothes out of the closest I was totally overwhelmed at the amount of dresses she has for this summer. Grace will have to wear a dress every other day to be able to wear them all. I don't mind this though, I think little dresses are so cute.
In this picture you can totally see Grace and her one sided dimple. Her little friend Max has a uni-dimple too. They must be made for eachother.
The Bumbo.... I love it! I didn't think that I would like it and was totally not going to buy one then my friend let me borrow hers. I truly love the Bumbo. It is worth the $40. It's great to have something that little ones (Grace started in hers at 3 months) can do and not have to be lying down. I feel that the Bumbo single-handedly saved Grace from a complete back of the head bald spot. Thanks Bumbo!
Gavin and his baseball shooter that he got for his birthday. He really likes it. Brent seems to enjoy playing with it too. Gavin doesn't quite have the hand-eye-coordination for the balls to shoot out, her prefers to turn it into a T-ball stand and can hit pretty good like that. And yes.... that is a canoe hanging from the back of my deck. We ran out of ceilng space in the garage for another small boat.

Grace- my baby girl is growing up!

This is the exact position that I found Grace in after she rolled over. She was just playing in the office and wham, she rolled right over. Then, she rolled back. This was last week and now she is a lean mean rolling machine! We have noticed the hazards of her uncontrolled rolling. Just today she rolled under the office chair, rolled into the door jab, hit her head on the coffee table. Geez... I put her in the middle of the floor and I turn around she has rolled into the wall. She is no longer my tiny little immobile baby girl.
Gavin is showing Grace how to roll over.
We tried to give her cereal about a month ago and Grace wasn't into it at all. So I waited a while and now she totally digs eating. She sees me making her cereal in the morning and she cries in her chair until her meal in served. Oh, she is such a little princess.

Gavin's graduation

This is Gavin's preshcool class. It was a nice managable bunch. They played well together. Gavin would ask EVERY DAY, "Mom, is it preschool day today?"
It's the last day of preschool. Can you tell they were a little wound up?

Well.... taking pictures of five 4 year olds isn't the easiest thing to do. Gavin wouldn't keep on his hat or smile for that matter. Derek's hat kept falling off and then he wanted it back on. Kaelynn would leave her mom's side. Oh, preschool drama!

Happy Birthday Pirate Gavin!

Our little pirate just turned 4! It was an exciting day around our house trying to get everything ready for the big pirate party. Gavin was in his full pirate costume and I as able to round up enough pirate vests and eye patches for all the kids. The girls even got to wear little skirts so that they could be pirate princess's (Thanks Denise for the great pirate CD, skirts, and party favors!) I'd also like to give a shout out to Mom, Dad, and Brent for your help. I could not have hosted a party for six kids without you. Gavin now has his own personal sized pirate ship. Thanks Gram and Pal. My lungs got a good workout from blowing the thing up with nothing but my own hot air! To keep me going Gavin would stand by me and say "Good job Mom, you're doing great!" The ship has a flag, a cannon that shoots balls and has music. What more could a pirate ask for but to captain his own ship?
The party kids: Lizzy, Camden, Morgann, Gavin, Lacey, and Derek. Lizzy just wanted to wear the skirt, she didn't want to don a vest. But in the spirit of pirates, she still wore her hat that we made as a craft.
Gavin loved being the center to attention during opening presents. He got a wide range of gifts, from markers to rockets, games and even stupid underwear (private joke between Gavin and Pal). Surprisingly, Gavin even loved the clothes he got... did I mention that they all happened to be Handy Manny, Gavin's second favorite thing besides pirates.

The decorations and the cake. Yes... I made the cake myself. I am not a domestic diva or anything. Please don't enlarge the picture, the cake looks better from far away. I saw this pirate hat cat in a magazine and thought that it looked easy. It only had a few instructions and I thought to myself, "Hey, you could even do that." Well.... baking the cake is the only easy part. How could it take me almost 2 hours to frost and decorate a pirate hat cake? I don't know why I have to keep relearning that cake/cookie decorating will never be a talent of mine. All in all, it turned out fine and Gavin was very impressed with the cake, the decorations, the treasure hunt and all the presents. It was a very successful birthday.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY GAVIN, I LOVE YOU!