The Many Faces of Alaric & Amara

Since my kids share room, we have mostly non-gender decorations.  The walls have black and white pictures.  Since Alaric was an infant, we've had body parts of the babies on the walls.  When Mara was born, we switches out Alaric's to toddler parts. Assuming we'd take new ones every couple years to show their growth and development.  Sadly, 4 years later, Alaric still has pictures of when he was 2 and Mara...

 ...her's are all pictures from when she was a baby.  And while I desperately LOVE these pictures and will save them forever, they needed to be changed.  I asked the kids to help me.  They asked if they could dress up and take pictures.  And the idea was born.  I told them they could dress up as whatever they wanted.  The only rule was one picture had to be a sweet picture with no costume.  We had SO much fun this morning.  We destroyed the house trying to find all the perfect accessories and made a morning of the costume changes and imaginations.  What resulting were 4 perfect pictures of each of my children truly showing their personalities and their spirits....

 My sweet boy

 Karate man

 Ninja warrior

 Pirate

 Beach girl

 Movie star

 Princess

 My sweet Mara

LOVE, LOVE,LOVE these and can't wait for them to be on the walls!

Veronica's Stage Debut

Today we went to my neice, Veronica's stage debut at the Parkland College Theatre.  She was in a junior preformers class where the kids decided what parts they wanted to play, the wrote the scripts, they blocked the scenes, etc.  They did it all.  Veronica was the youngest star at FIVE YEARS OLD!  We all came out to support her!

 V'd first scene- look at those skills- totally playing the part!  LOVE the expression

 Another scene

 Alaric asking for V's autograph on his program

 First autograph EVER for my sweet little cowgirl!!

 We were all so proud of her!

 Especially her mommy and daddy ( check out all the flowers she got!)

Great job, Veronica!  You were amazing!

Amara on the slide and swimming

Today Amara learned to swim.  yes, TODAY!  Her private swim lesson began and by 6, she was throwing herself down the slide by herself and swimming to the edge.  So impressed.  So excited.  So proud of our little girl.  She can't get enough.  Its so great to see your kids try so hard to do something and succeed!!!

Visit to Great Gram's

We went to Great Grams yesterday to spend the night and just be together for a nice visit.

We really enjoyed just doing simple things with Gram like coloring.

As always, Uncle Tommy gave the kids coins!

Both kids are smitten with Tommy.  Especially Mara.  She asked him to color....and color he did.

And he read Princess books too!

When Aunt mary and Uncle George arrived, we were in the middle of a puzzle.  Aunt Mary got right down with us and began working ( not bad for 87)

We celebrated Mary's birthday too

Everyone loves a birthday party!

Especially when you are 81 years younger than them but almost as tall!

Oh, and the alltime favorite pastime is Gram's chair that lifts you up!

Swimming Lessons!

The kids did swim lessons for the past two weeks and had SO much fun in class with new friends!

And they both learned so much.  

Amara fell in googly love with one of her teachers, Mr. Ryan.  And Ryan was kinda sweet on her too.  She didn't really like anyone else but Ryan to work with her. 

On the last day, the little ones got to go down the slide and be caught.  Guess who caught Mara?  Ryan!

And then she melted into his arms ( this was not a floating exercise)...its really disgusting really.  She's only 4! God help us!

Bubba needs no catching- he's amazing on the slide!

Amara's class

Alaric's class

Mara passed- she's a Turtle!

Alaric passed- he's a DUCK!

Singing In The Rain

It rained 12 drops today and the kids were so excited, they went running to the yard in their suits and umbrellas.  Wishful thinking----cute kids, though!

Alaric can READ!

Alaric's been reading for awhile but this summer, he has discovered READING!  Chapter books.  becoming one with the book.  Loving every second of it.  We are on our 3rd Magic TreeHouse Book and we are all hooked. 

Alaric made this awesome bookmark too!

Happy 8th Anniversary

I love this man more than anything in the world.  Tonight we celebrated 8 years together with a progressive dinner in Downtown Champaign....one place for a drink, another for apps, then another, then another for entree, then another for dessert- it was awesome!

Pinkalicious

After headaches and naps and some vitamin B, we joined the Goods again today for Lauren's birthday party- PINKALICIOUS party at I Power Gymnastics!!!

There was lots of running and jumping and flying off of things

And snuggling of cuties in pink, like Elle!

Another fun day with our great friends...Happy Birthday, Lauren!

Backyard Campout!!!!

Last night we went to Good's house for a backyard campout!  It was amazing.  We did it with their neighbors and our friends, the Kappes'

We went in the Kappes' pool

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Launches rockets

Hugs

Beer Bongs ( for the adults only-Amara is just an observer)

Fireworks

More beer bongs ( about 5 sessions in all)

Lots of talking by the fire with great friends!

and just celebrating!

The kids crashed around midnight, adults after 1.....

here was the scene at 6 Am the next morning.....running, screaming, and trampolining!!!

here's what the adults had to survive!

What a wonderful night with friends!