Trinity’s Gonna Flip and Dance

Trinity’s gymnastics class started back up last week. And let me tell you she has come sooooo far since last August! Last August she didn’t even know how to attempt a cartwheel and now her cartwheel is almost there. She is still working on keeping her legs straight, but once she has that she will have one heck of a cartwheel! I don’t foresee her becoming a world class gymnast or anything but she enjoys the classes and loves going.

This year we decided to try out dance as well. She loved it!!! My Mom and Dad bought her the tap and ballet shoes she needed as an early birthday present and my mother-in-law made her the adorable bag to carry her shoes and skirt in.

Ballet Shoes      

Tap Shoes

                                                                   

The Dragonfly and Butterfly Bag

Her favorite part of Dance class was Tap! If she decides to stay in the dance class she will have a recital in May. We will see what the next few months bring!!

The Tea Room – Happy Birthday Erika

I had the most enjoyable lunch Saturday with Erika and some of her other friends for her birthday (No, I haven’t lost my mind and I’m not talking about myself while misspelling my own name ;). I meet a wonderful friend soon after we moved here named…..you guessed it Erika). We met for lunch at this quaint little place called The Depot. The Depot is only 2 minutes from my house but I had never been. It was adorable inside and out and the food…… OH the food was WONDERFUL! It was so good I just had to have a picture of my lunch, Phoebe you might be rubbing off on me :)! (My sister-in-law, Phoebe, takes lots of pictures of the food she eats.)

That beautiful three tiered masterpiece is my lunch!!! The bottom plate was a delicious salad, the middle plate was a wonderful summery chicken salad with strawberries and blueberries on a croissant and the top was white chocolate raspberry cheesecake! Dessert was a hard decision, you can see Erika’s triple chocolate moose cake on the right. Don’t worry I plan on trying that dessert the next time I go :D! Since it is called the “Tea Room” I guess I should mention that the tea was also wonderful, I had raspberry iced tea. Mmmm Mmmm Mmmmm!

So if anyone wants to make up a special occasion to visit The Depot I am in!!! Or if anyone from “home” wants to come visit I will make us reservations the second you let me know when you are coming!

There is also a boutique shop that has seasonal decorating items, a floral shop and a huge selection of Vera Bradley. I purchased this CUTE basket!

That goes from this ………………..…………to this!

 

 

 

 

 

I also found my birthday present :)! Hey, when you see something that you want it’s better just to get straight to the point than to beat around the bush. Gabe is going back up there sometime this week with the kids to pick it out. I’ll share it with you after my birthday. Don’t worry it will still be a surprise to me…..you’ll see why later :)!

It was a great way to spend an afternoon! Thanks for inviting me Erika and I hope you had a wonderful birthday!!

His dreams have come true……My nightmares are just beginning!

Gabe has always wanted a motorcycle. He started looking at them and dropping hints that he wanted to buy one for, oh…………….5 or 6 YEARS. I don’t have anything against motorcycles, for other people, but not MY Gabe. They scare me and seem dangerous, especially when it is MY hubby on the thing!

Well anyways, he found the one that he has always wanted and since his “Five Star Award” from work came with a pretty hefty bonus, he had the money. So we went to the bank Saturday morning and this was delivered to our house that afternoon. I will say it is a nice looking bike, but I will be hold my breath every time he rides the darn thing until he is safely back home with it parked in the garage!! I will just add it to the list of things that I can’t seem to not worry about.

I’ll add this picture ‘cause it’s just so cute! She knows that you have to ride with a helmet and since her bicycle helmet is the only one she has that is the one she went with :)! Disclaimer: She will NOT be riding this thing for quite some time!!! Her mommy can’t handle the stress of that!!!!!!!

I guess I need to figure out what I would like to purchase in 5 years and start working on Gabe to let me buy it ;)!

Trinity’s Slumber Party

Trinity goes to bed at 9:00 but she rarely falls asleep before 10:00. Yes, I know that is late but she takes a decent nap and gets up around 7:00 so she gets the amount of sleep that she needs. Anyways, she often looks at books, plays her Leap Frog or plays with her dolls and stuffed animals during this time. It is always interesting to see what sort of shape her room is in when I check on her before I go to bed. The other night she decided to host a slumber party during this time and this is what I found when I went in to check on her:

Some of her friends had pillows,  

or cozy blankets to share. This friend even got it’s own special shoe! This little fellow got his own sleeping sock bag!  

I can only pray that her first slumber party with breathing friends is as quiet and peaceful :).

We made it!

Week one of school was a success! What I mean to say is that we survived, Trinity learned some new things and Keenan enjoyed playing along side us and he learned some new songs:). We are all adjusting  wonderfully to the schedule, although I am trying to figure out how to still get other things accomplished (like housework, errands, etc.). I am working on a daily schedule on a two week rotation for keeping the house clean, or at least kinda clean (I hope to share it in a future post).

I am still excited about watching my own children learn new things!!! This week we reviewed shapes (describing, comparing,  drawing) started our word wall (including family names, a few sight words and color words) read books that contained our new sight words, played beginning sound games, created artwork with our shapes and read books (lots of them) to learn about story elements and journal about our favorite part.

We chased a frog around the yard, played outside, made banana bread, played board games, colored, found caterpillars and cicadas in the yard, went to the farm park and the grocery store. And the beauty of homeschooling is that we learned while doing all of these activities, traditional school activities as well as living our lives!

Gabe’s Awards

Part 4 of our July trip back home

This one is a little late in coming but I had to wait to get good pictures before I posted it :).

While we were back home in July for a visit Gabe was in Cincinnati for part of the week for the annual kick- off and awards ceremony for work. While he was there he enjoyed a baseball game as well as meetings (those probably weren’t quite so enjoyable) and an awards banquet.

The best parts of the trip for Gabe were…………… and…………….

Yep, that’s right he received two awards!! The first one is  “Senior Manager of the Year for the Midwest Region” it is given out to the top Senior Manager from each size facility. The second award is the “Five Star Award”, the most prestigious award they give out. This is what it says:

“In acknowledgment of your superior performance, you now join a select group of employees…recipients of the FedEx Ground FIVE STAR AWARD. As a member of this prestigious team, you can be truly proud of your contributions to FedEx. We sincerely appreciate your continuing dedication, and trust by your example you will inspire others to this same level of excellence.”

I think that sums it up! We are so proud of him! We have always known that he works very hard and is (obviously) very good at what he does. But it is always nice to be recognized for your hard work and dedication and know that what you do is appreciated.

Gabe with his awards

  And here is one from us:

The Best Daddy and Hubby in the World Award Presented to: Gabe Nalley For your extraordinary hard work and commitment to your work and your family! Because of you we are able to live, laugh, play, love, learn and enjoy all the wonderful things we have been blessed with!We love you and appreciate you! Love, Erica, Trinity and Keenan

The Start of School

We started school this morning, after much begging from Trinity to do so!! She has been asking me for several weeks if we could start because she knew I was planning for it.  Well today was the day!! It went great and now I can work out some of the kinks that I knew I would run into. Some things you just can’t plan for until you actually start and know how things are going to go :). And then again there are some things that you just can’t plan for…..period!

Trinity’s First Day of School

Keenan insisting that he do the same thing as Trinity :)!

I am looking very forward to seeing where this journey leads us and I am very excited to see my own children “get it” (whatever subject or discovery “it” might be )! I hope to share some of what we do here, once we get into the groove.

When you have a sister………….

......

When you have a sister and girl cousins these things sometimes happen..........

You end up with barrettes in your hair!

Your tool box is full so you use the nearest empty bag

which happens to be a pink baby basket! 

You play in pink and purple play houses!

  But no amount of girly things can take the boy out of this little boy!

He loves to get sweaty and dirty!

He loves checking things out!! While wearing his favorite hat :)!

He likes to “fix” things with his tools.

He likes critters and creatures! (Look closely there’s a frog right beside the tree)

He found a frog in the backyard! Gabe said he was pointing and "talking" to something in the grass and then started walking around. Gabe finally realized it was a frog and went over to check it out. By the time I got back outside with the camera Keenan had followed it around the yard for almost 10 minutes! The poor frog finally found refuge from the interest of a 22 month old under the rock wall of our swing set!

I Love this little boy with all my heart!! He is so much fun. He is also funny and tries to make us laugh. He loves his big sister and he loves to be on the go! He is a true blessing in our lives!

My lucky fisher-girl

Last weekend Gabe took Trinity on her first fishing trip. When we were back home two weeks ago Grandma and Grandpa gave her a real fishing pole (not the little kiddy kind). They went to the lake that is across the road from our house and had LOTS of luck!

They visited our local hardware store where they bought the worms. Gabe let Trinity tell them what they were there for and she was very proud to say that she was going fishing for the first time!!

There they are, the “big, fat, juicy worms”

Nope, she isn’t afraid to hold them either. Each time she chose a worm for Gabe to put on the hook she said "Alright big juicy worm, you catch us a nice big fish or your gonna go back in your container!"

They fished in a great spot. Gabe said several times that no sooner had the worm hit the water a fish was biting! They caught 6 fish.

Here she is when she caught the first one

Trying to reel it in, it must weigh 50 lbs or something :)!

And there it is!!! Her first fish!!

She did touch it but she didn’t want to hold it without the towel, she has to stay a little girly :).

She can’t wait to go again!!!

It’s been a good day when…..

you look like this, (Dirt and sweat from the park)

like this,

(More dirt from the park, applied like Indian war paint!)

or like this!

(Water colors applied like Army camouflage paint!!!!)

Yes, both of these nights became bath nights!!

Family and Fun

Part 3 of our July trip back home

We stayed at my sister and brother-in-law’s house for our visit. They were gracious enough to let us take over their basement for the week! We had a great time visiting with them and celebrated my sister’s 30th birthday while we were there.

The kids enjoyed a game of “Mouse Trap”. I remember loving that game as a kid!! It is neat to see my kids enjoying the same games I did as a kid :).

We sang “Happy Birthday” to my sister, part of the cake is already gone because we had to keep the little kids occupied while we played the game and the cake worked like a charm :).

We were trying to find a good place to take a picture of all the kids and this was one of the test shots. It turned out better than the real ones as you will see later in this post.

We always go see Carrie when we are back home to get our hair cut and she styled Keenan’s this time. How stinkin’ cute is that!!

Ainsley wanted her picture taken also. Look at those cute, cute cheeks!

Trinity got an early birthday present from MaMa and PaPa. Tap shoes and Ballet shoes for her upcoming dance class.

My Dad and Ainsley enjoying a snack

My Mom trying to get Ainsley to smile :)

We had grand plans to get a picture of all 5 of the kids. We even found matching out fits (plaid shorts and solid color tops). These were the best ones that we got after many, many shots.

   When they are all grown up we wont care that they are not perfect pictures we will just be glad that we “went to all the trouble” to take them :).

We also went to the airport to pick up my in-laws. They were returning from their 3 week tour of Taiwan. My youngest brother-in-law, Derek, got married there and then he and his wife, Phoebe, took them on a tour of the country. They brought back some great stories and insist that Gabe and I must go visit Phoebe and Derek some time. They even offered to keep the kids so that we can go, I think we might have to find a way to take them up on that :)!!!! Even if it takes a few years to save the money to make the trip! They also brought the kids some great souvenirs (even if they are all noisy!) and an adorable outfit for Trinity.  I 

I can’t wait until Labor Day weekend when we get to see everyone again!!!