Special Times with Family

Matt and the girls for Father's Day.

Evie and Ellie

Karina and her lovely hat.  =)

Karina,Ellie, Sophie, Caleb and front: Evie and Abbie.  To the right: Karina's friend, Evie (I think).

Sophie and Sierra after her H.S. graduation.

Summer and Jonathan

Sophie, Summer, Sierra and Abbie

We had a lot going on at the beginning of the summer between a visit to Holiday World, Sierra's graduation, visits from family, etc.  Sierra graduated from high school on Memorial Day weekend  (I think that's right).  It was great to see a whole bunch of family like Aunt Patti, Uncle John, Keri's family, Uncle Robert and Aunt Joyce, "Baby sister"-Jackie and her husband, Martha's family, Nana and Paw-paw and a bunch of Aunt Shannon's family.   Summer and her boyfriend, Jonathan, (pictured above), just engaged a couple of weeks ago.  We are all really excited about it!

At the beginning of June, Abbie attended a half day volleyball camp that she enjoyed.  Paula's cousin, Craig, and his family came in for a visit from northern VA.  They wanted to help his parents to settle into their new home and Karina and her friend camp to attend a ballet camp in Nashville.  Sophie and Abbie always love playing with cousins.  Sophie often organizes everyone so that they can perform little skits and songs.  She has a lot of fun with that.  

Holiday World

Carley, Abbie and Sophie in front of our cottage.

Santa with all of the kids.  We went to story time with Santa.  =)

Abbie, Jessie and Carley are up early enjoying time on the swing!

Most of our group in the cabana that the Moss' rented for us to use.

the girls with the Santa Claus, Indiana sign.

The kids on the little bridge by the pond where we stayed.

Abbie, Weston, Sophie, Carley, Jessie and Houston.

all of the kids

Abbie and I on the carousel.

Jill, Jessie and Mrs. Moss are ready to go way up in the air.

Holiday World!

our family

This picture is a random one from a bike ride that Matt and the girls took at Ravenwood Farms.

Right after Memorial Day, our family headed to Santa Claus, Indiana with friends from church.  We stayed in Santa's Lakeside Cottages which were just a couple of miles from Holiday World/Splashin' Safari.  We spent two nights in the cottages.  We shared ours with the Gray's-Jill, Carley and Jessie.  Scott had to stay home and work.  They had a little pond by the cottages where some people were fishing.  They also had a swimming pool.  We arrived in Indiana on a Tuesday evening.  We had dinner at a local pizza place and then went for a swim.  We also roasted S'mores.   We met up with Anna Hicks and her boys, Houston and Weston and her parents, David and Kathleen Moss.  Wednesday morning, we got up and headed to the parks.  During the middle of the first day, there was a thunderstorm and some showers for about 30 minutes to an hour.  A lot of people left the park.  It was a little bit cool that day.  We were thankful that the Moss' had rented a cabana for all of us to use because we stayed there and had lunch until the storm passed.  Our family rode most of the water rides.  We had a lot of fun!  Matt rode two- three of the roller coasters including the new one, The Thunderbird.  Neither of our girls wanted to ride any of the roller coasters.  They did not have a good experience with the wooden roller coaster, The Voyage, when we went last year.   The second night, we had a wonderful dinner with BBQ, hot dogs, and other fixings.  Some people had S'mores again.   The second night, poor Sophie did not see the sliding glass door when she was coming in with her toasted s'more and she smacked right into it.  Poor thing.  I think it hurt her head some but it mostly embarrassed her!  We really enjoyed being able to hang out with Christian friends.

We went back to the park for a second day.  We left the park around 4 or 4:30 and headed home.  The girls enjoyed riding lots of rides that I remember riding at Opryland as a kid like the swings, the old Tin Lizzies, the big raft ride, etc.  We returned home Thursday night.  We had so much fun!

Fun times in May

Sophie and I had a special mom/daughter night out.

Abbie, Monroe, Morgan, Aunt Martha and Sophie

me and my girls

Hello there, elephant!

Look right there, Monroe!

Morgan and Sophie

Sophie was quite excited about all of her loot at the end of the school year.

Sophie was most thrilled about this new art set!

A whole summer has gone by since I've posted.  Now my girls are back in school again.  We had a wonderful summer overall.  As soon as school was out, we made a trip to the zoo with Nana, Aunt Martha and her boys.  It was actually somewhat cool at the beginning of the summer.  We took jackets with us to the zoo.  We were able to get a great view of the elephants, kangaroos, flamingoes, tortoises and several other animals.  We took a picnic lunch that day.  

At the beginning of the summer, Sophie and I went to a special concert (her first)-the K-love fan awards show, which is all Christian music awards.  Sophie and I love Christian music and this was a birthday surprise for her.  It happened to be a very rainy night.  The concert was out at the Opry House.  We went and had dinner beforehand at the Aquarium restaurant and then we went over and picked up our tickets and attended the show.  Our seats were way up in the nosebleed section but there were a lot of great performances including Toby Mac, Francesca Batestelli, Danny Gokey, Plumb, Matthew West and many others.  Sophie and I had a great time!  We did not stay for the entire show because it was getting kind of late but we had a lot of fun.

At the end of the school year, Sophie and her classmates had the opportunity to use play money that they had earned to buy different gift cards and other items that parents had sent in.  They had an auction.  Sophie won a Target gift card, a Carmike movies gift card, body lotion, an art set, stuffed animal, etc.  She was most excited about the art set!!

Sophie's 10th birthday celebrations

Sophie and her new raincoat.

1st cousins!

Morgan, Abbie, Monroe, Sophie and Carter (who does not look happy about having his picture made).

Our family before the party.

Sophie and her friends at the fiesta.

Abbie, Ellery Grace, Sophie, Carley, Ellie, Allie and Abby C.

same girls but I think Ellery Grace put the hat over Sophie's head.  =)

Allie and Sophie

Sophie and Abbie

Sophie and Nana almost share a birthday.  Nana's is on April 30 and Sophie's is on May 1.  We got together to celebrate birthdays on Nana's birthday.  Aunt Martha, Uncle Matt and their boys, Uncle Phil (who was just in town for a few weeks between mission trips), Aunt Patti, Keri, Carter, as well as Nana, Paw-paw and our family were able to be there.  We had a cookout.  I made a Heath cake for dessert.  Everyone had a great time being together!  Sophie loved her new monogrammed raincoat, set of beads, recipe box and money that she received for her birthday.

On Friday, May 1, Sophie had her first day of the TCAP test so she was not excited about that.  Visitors are not allowed to come to school on testing days plus I worked on the day of her birthday so I was able to eat lunch with the girls the day before Sophie's birthday.  Sophie was so excited about getting a gift card to Claire's for her birthday (so she can get her ears pierced), some new comfy flip flops and a big surprise which was tickets to the K Love fan awards show at the end of May.  I made up a simple scavenger hunt so that Sophie could find the tickets.  She enjoyed doing that!  I bought these tickets through a school auction.   Sophie loves Christian music so she and I will be going!   The next day, I made preparations for Sophie's birthday party and Abbie had her last soccer game.

We celebrated Sophie's birthday on Saturday night.  We celebrated her birthday with a Mexican theme for Cinco de Mayo.  We had tacos with fixings, chips and salsa, fruit, etc.  For dessert, I made a chocolate chip cookie cake that was really good.   This year we had a smaller birthday party where Sophie invited 5 friends.  Everyone that we invited was able to come so that was great!   Nana came to Sophie's party to celebrate with us.  We made these glass tile pendant necklaces at Sophie's party.  The girls also enjoyed playing a game called Telestrations.  All of the girls took a turn outside trying to break open the pinata.  

Violin Recital and Sophie's Pre-Birthday Celebration

Sophie earned a medal at the recital for mastering the first book of violin pieces!!  Woo hoo!!

Sophie's ready to eat ice cream cake and open some gifts!

Mimi gave Sophie a new charm for her bracelet.

Mimi and the girls.

Teresa (AKA Mimi or Matt's mom) was able to fly in for a visit about a week and a half before Sophie's birthday.  She was able to stay with us for about a week or so.  She came in on a Tuesday.  Over the weekend, she was able to go to Sophie's violin recital, watch Abbie play soccer and we celebrated Sophie's birthday a little early.  Sophie picked Chuy's for her birthday lunch.  We bought an ice cream cake from Baskin Robbins and it was really good!  Mimi gave Sophie a new charm with her birthstone for her Pandora bracelet (she received it from Aunt Leia when she was in her wedding).  Aunt Leia and Uncle Rahul gave her a new Lego Friends set and a cute notebook and pens.  Sophie's birthday is off to a great start!

All Things Easter

Isn't my assistant chef adorable?

All of the kids on our block are ready to hunt eggs!  (Sophie and Abbie are on the far right hand side).

Abbie was excited about something that the Easter bunny brought!

Paula and the girls after church on Easter Sunday.

our family after church

Nana and Sophie

Matt and the girls

We had a very nice Easter!  The day before, we had an Easter egg hunt in our neighborhood, Abbie had a soccer game and we dyed Easter eggs.  It was very cold on Saturday morning when the kids had their egg hunt and for most of that day.  On Sunday morning, we went to church and then came home and enjoyed ham rolls, macaroni and cheese, deviled eggs and some other yummy things for lunch.  It was chilly on Sunday morning too but it warmed up.  Nana and Paw-paw joined us for lunch.  We had thought that Matt's mom, Teresa, might be coming down for Easter but she decided to wait and come a few weeks later.  It was a little bit unusual that we didn't get together with more extended family but that's just how it worked out this year.  

On Good Friday, we were able to meet up with the Wells at the Resurrection Trail that a local church holds every year.  They tell the story of Jesus life, death and resurrection as you go through different little stations.  Sophie enjoyed doing this with her friend, Allie.  Abbie enjoyed it too.  They had thought that it might rain on Friday so they did all of the stations indoors.  Kids can try things first hand like seeing what vinegar is like that Jesus would have tasted, seeing what it's like to hammer a nail in a cross, etc.  People dress up in period outfits and act out parts of the story.  I think this made a big impact on the girls.