My babies

ready for a tumbling pass?

Julianna's gymnastics exhibition was last Saturday night.  It was much different from her dance recital last year.  It wasn't as formal, loud, or as long.  Julianna did great!

I think she has enjoyed gymnastics a lot more than she did dance last year as well.  Here are some pictures from the event.  I apologize for the crappy picture quality.  It is *really* hard to take pictures of flipping gymnasts. 

They had the older gymnasts do special routines and choreographed performances, but for the preschoolers they basically just moved them in groups along three different circuits.  It was really funny to watch Jules do the seat drop on the trampoline and I was laughing so hard at one point that I couldn't even take a picture.  It didn't help that I had my mom beside of me continually telling me that she has about as much coordination as I did as a child.

When we've discussed whether she wants to take dance again, gymnastics again, or try something new for next year she always considers the fact that the dance place gave her a HUGE trophy on the day of the recital.  My girl likes her trophy.  Anyway, she is still on the fence about what she wants to do next year and since she got a medal Saturday night I'm really not sure what she thinks now.

 Whatever she chooses to do though, I know she'll be great at it.

preschool graduation

On Tuesday, Julianna graduated from preschool.  I could not be more proud of her.  Before everything started we got some pictures in the church parlor with the other kids.

Then I headed to the sanctuary to wait for the ceremony to begin.   The kids came in and sang three songs together and then they sang one song with solos.  My daughter sang the loudest I'm sure, and her strong southern accent rang out throughout the church.  I'll just go ahead and state for the record that I cried pretty hard when they sang this song. 

The director of the preschool said a few words and the pastor of the church spoke for just a minute.  They handed out the diplomas and got to hug their teacher.  It was a nice ceremony and Jules looked absolutely adorable with her hat falling off the back of her head the whole time. 

There was a reception afterward in the fellowship hall and we ate chips and cake and watched a slide show of pictures from the school year. 

Question of the day:

How did my baby get to be this big?!

Working on a nature notebook

a camping we will go

We went camping one night over Memorial Day weekend.  It was our first trip camping with Josh and as a matter of fact, it was our first trip camping with Julianna other than in the backyard.  Needless to say, both Jonathan and I were a little nervous going into the trip but also excited.

It really turned out to be a lot of fun.  We went with one of Jonathan's sisters and her family and I think everyone enjoyed it.  I will definitely do it again sometime (although it will probably be at least a year or so). :)

When we got to the camp site we first unloaded and set up the tents.  It was no less than 90 degrees out and it took some effort to keep the kids out of trouble while we set everything up. So we resorted to cheese balls.

After we got everything set up we put the kids to work gathering sticks for the fire.  Once the fire was ready we cooked hot dogs and decorated our faces with ketchup.

When our bellies were full we decided to do a little fishing in the pond.  Jonathan and Julianna had gathered up some earthworms in our yard before we left home. They brought them in a container so they would have something to use as bait and Jules was able to catch five fish which she really enjoyed.

Of course, no camping trip is complete without s'mores so as the sun went down we enjoyed the cooler temperature and roasted marshmallows. Mmmmmm... I'm not ashamed to admit that was my most favorite part of the trip.

Unfortunately, none of my pictures after dark turned out.

We told a few ghost stories and headed to bed.  I had no idea how we were going to tackle putting Josh to bed in a tent with three other people inside it.  It wasn't too bad actually.  He staggered around in the tent like a drunk person for a while.  He was climbing on everyone and talking while we were all trying to be quiet.  He would trip on something and fall down and we would stifle our laughter.

We could hear my sister-in-law and the others in their tent and we could hear lots and lots of different animal noises.  We even heard a funky sounding peacock.  Eventually everyone drifted off to sleep. 

The next morning we took a short little walk and passed over the log-bridge to go out to the island in the middle of the pond.  Then we packed it all up and headed back home.

I'm so glad we went.  I now appreciate my shower a lot more and my kids got great sleep the next night.  Also, I'm glad to know we could do it again easily if we wanted to.  Mostly I'm just glad we had such a good time with family.

Questions of the day:

- How was your Memorial Day weekend?
- Have you ever taken young children camping?
- What's your favorite thing to put in the middle of a s'more?  I want to try a peanut butter cup.

Free KK Friday night