Bikes, Ducks, and the Playground

Last week, Camden invited Lily to ride bikes and play at a park near his house.
The three year-olds graciously let their mommies come too. =)
The bike riding didn't last too long (for Lily anyway).
She quickly realized that Camden was a lot faster than she is and decided to run to keep up with him. =)
She doesn't like to be left behind.....
Camden showed us the blue bridge where he gets to feed the ducks and geese:

Lily wasn't too crazy about these giant ducks.

These baby ducks were too cute!

After all of the crackers were gone, they hung out on the bridge.

Then we all headed back to the playground to have some more fun!

Thanks Camden (and Dianna) for a fun afternoon!!!!

Spring Concert

Last Thursday evening, Zach & Riley had their Spring Concert for school.
Riley's class sang Zipidie Doo Dah.
It is so fun to watch Kindergartners sing songs.
They get SO excited!!

They had actions and everything!! =)
Riley did a great job!!

The second graders sang Little April Showers and a song about Noah's Ark.

Zach had a short solo during the Noah's Ark song (along with several other kids, including my niece Taby!)

He looked down the entire time.

I think he was really nervous.

He did really good though.

We are proud of both boys for doing such a good job!!

Our New Neighbor

I have a lot of flowers on our deck in the backyard.
One of the baskets of flowers is on a hook hanging by the sliding glass door.
A few weeks ago, while I was watering this plant, I noticed this:

A little bird had decided to make this plant a home for her nest.
The kids were really excited to see it there.
I left the flowers alone for awhile to see if the bird would come back and lay eggs in it.
After a week, I saw this:

One cute little blue egg!

Then a few days ago, I checked on it again.

The kids were really excited to see 4 eggs now!

(I don't know why one of them is brown, maybe they turn brown the older they get??)

The other day I finally got to take a picture of the mam bird.

I had to do it from the inside, because whenever we open the door, this happens:

I had stopped watering this plant because I didn't want to disturb the nest too much and make the mama bird leave, but yesterday I noticed the flowers were so wilted, that they didn't provide much protection for the nest. So I watered it & the flowers popped back up within an hour. I also noticed that there were 5 eggs in the nest (two are brown now).

The kids are anxiously awaiting the eggs to hatch so they can see the baby birds!

Sprinkler Time!

While the kids were riding their bikes/scooters Friday evening, I turned the sprinkler on to water the lawn.
The boys took that as,
"Mom really wants us to take our shirts off and run through the sprinkler!"

Well, it was pretty toasty out there, can you blame them??

Lily's not too fond of the sprinkler.

She walked in the puddles in the street and occasionally got a few drops on her.

Zach thought it would be funny to get water from the sprinkler & then spit it out.....

The boys had a lot of fun!!

Lily, saw how much fun the boys were having & decided to try to be brave.

That didn't last too long.....

She thought it was fun though!

On Sunday, we decided to get out the fun sprinkler (and their swimsuits).

Riley got this for his Birthday, so he was excited to finally get to use it!

Lily decided to just go down the wet slide.

After awhile this started to happen:

Which led to this:

Which lasted awhile.

Crazy boys! :0)

I have a feeling they will be wanting to do this again soon!

Lily's New Ride

Lily had graduated from the little "baby" bike (as she was calling it) and had moved up to the bigger bike with training wheels.
The only problem (to her) was that the next bike was distinctly a boy bike.
Lily is a girly-girl, and she was not fond of riding the boy bike.
She had to prove to us that she could pedal the bigger bike, though before she could have a new girl bike.
Well, she had gotten pretty good on Riley's old bike, so we went to the store to pick out a new bike.
We let her pick it out herself.
She went full on girly-girl.
I don't think there was a girlier bike there!

Pink: check. Princesses: check. Streamers: check. Princess purse on the front: check. Cute little bell: check. Hearts on the wheels: check. Flower pedals: check

Yep, it doesn't get more frou-frou than that! :0)

But can she ride it???

It was a bit bigger than the bike she had been riding, but we decided that she could fit on it and it would last her longer than the smaller size would.

She was a little afraid at first because she was higher off of the ground, but then she got the hang of it!

Here is a short video of her riding her new Big-Girl bike!

Cinco de Mayo

On Thursday, the kids had their annual Cinco de Mayo dance.
Every class has Spanish class at least once a week with Senora Nicholas.
Every May 5th, she has a program where the kids can show off what they have learned.
They sing songs in Spanish and dance to them!
This year, the kindergartners sang three songs.
Peter Rabbit, The Moon, and The Chicken Dance.
Riley got to be Peter Rabbit!

Then he got down doing The Chicken Dance!

It was so cute!

They walked around in circles singing, then they would stop and do the chicken dance.

Riley would make sure he stopped right in front of me so I could take his picture.

It didn't matter how much he should have moved over to stop. :0)
He's such a ham!

They also did a great song singing a sweet song about the moon.

After the 1st graders sang, it was time for Zach's class!
His class did a dance to the song Rocky Top.

Zach is also a ham.

I had to stop taking pictures, because he would move up from his line to make sure I could see him. :)

Both boys did a great job!

Here are some videos of the boys dancing!

Zach's First Communion

Zach received his First Communion on Sunday.
He and his class have been working hard all year to learn about God, the mass, and communion.

He got to get all dressed up in a suit and everything!

Doesn't he look handsome??

(At first, Zach did not want a suit, but when he saw himself in it at the store, he said, "I look good!") :0)

Zach and his BFF Cody:

Zach and his teacher, Mrs. Rudisill.

We LOVE her!! =)

Zach and his Godmother {my BFF :0) }, Stephanie:

Zach's second grade class at All Saints:

We did not get to take pictures during the mass, but they had photographers there so we will get a picture of him receiving his first communion. It was less distracting to have one person there the whole time than having parents run up and down the aisles the entire time.

After the mass (and after pictures, which took forever....), we had a party at our house for Zach, and his cousins Tabitha and Carson who also had their first communion on Sunday.

Here is Carson looking handsome in his suit:

And Taby looking adorable in her dress:

My sister Mary (Taby's mom) made this beautiful (and yummy) cake:

Thank you to everyone who came to make this day even more special for all three kids!!!