Proud to be TEXANS!

We had Go Texan Day down here, celebrating the start of the Rodeo in Houston...a 3 week long huge production.  The kids enjoyed getting dressed up, although having Jacob tuck in his shirt almost killed him...then when I showed up to his square dancing he had it untucked!  Here he is with his square dance partner (who we LOVE)...Anna Lee:

Me and my cowboy...you can tell he is really into getting his picture taken with his mom in front of all his friends:

 Jacob and one of his best buddies:

 I just love that face!

 Jacob and another one of his little buddies:

Here is Jacob square dancing with his class:

I know the blog has been very "Jacob" heavy, as he seems to be doing so much with basketball, which is over, cub scouts, and now the start of baseball...two scrimmages this weekend and we've already had 2 practices this week!  Don't worry...the girls are having fun and getting involved in some things as well.  Gwyn and Annie both start swim lessons next week...looking forward to Annie being able to swim at the beginning of summer!

 Sweet Gwyn is still very into her American Girl doll, and wears these pajamas about 3-4 times a week or as often as they are clean...which considering I do laundry about 6 out of 7 days...she gets to wear them quite a bit!  I took her to American Girl to spend a gift card she had gotten from a friend, she was super excited to get matching clothes like her doll.  She dresses her up in a different outfit everyday, it is so sweet:

 I took this on the day that Oklahoma was getting snow...shorts, skirts and short sleeves for us in Houston...yes, we do LOVE being Texans!

 Annie at Gwyn's gymnastics in an outfit she picked herself, and had to wear her duck hat she made at school upside down...nice!

Gwyn has still got the moves when it comes to Hula Hoopin'...and she has the high score by about 40 spins on the Wii Hula Hoop game that Jason got her for her birthday.  I think I'm second highest at 40 spins and she has 85!!

Jacob had his Tiger Cub banquet...poor guy had not earned a badge all year and he got two at the banquet...the kids had fun, they had a band of cub scouts open up with some rock and roll music, the kids loved it.

 Jacob and Brian drove down to Corpus Christie to stay over night on the battleship USS Lexington.  It was amazing, Jacob had so much fun...they were 3 or 4 bunks high with about 2 ft between each bunk, not air conditioned where they were sleeping and had to share the bathroom with about 70 people.  Jacob LOVED it!  Brian, not so much!

Jacob received his first love note:

 When I asked him who he thought it was from, he quickly said Isabelle because she had told him she liked his singing and even wrote about it in her journal in class...then he said, "or it could be Daylan."  Ha!

 Gwyn and Annie brought home some very TEXAN artwork this week:

Funny things the kids said this week:
Jacob:  Sam Houston is the father of Texas.  His last words were "Texas, Texas, Margaret."  He liked Texas and his wife."
Gwyn:  My belly is soft.
Gwyn:  I get sad when Annie gets hurt.
Jacob (after coming home from watching a movie about Michael Jordan):  This kid wears these shoes that Michael Jordan wore, and Michael Jordan was I guess good at basketball, and then this kid gets to play in the NBA even though he is a kid, as long as he wears those shoes.  (I love it that he is telling us about Michael Jordan while wearing some Air Jordans himself, clueless!)
Annie (to Gwyn):  You hurt my feelings.
Gwyn:  How did I do that?
Annie:  I don't know.  But you did.

Valentine's Day for My Loves

What a fun week we have had!  The weather has been absolutely gorgeous, and yes, we wear shorts, flip flops and sleeveless shirts in Houston in February!  I was able to go to all 3 Valentine's Day parties at school.  Here is Gwyn with her chicken nugget (I call her my chicken nugget:):

 I just love her writing:

 It was "jammie" day at her school since they are covering "J" this week, on the same day as her Valentine's party...so she picked out her skull and cross bone pajamas to wear:

 My mom went to Annie's party first, and I came about 20 minutes late, but this was the face that my Mom got from Annie...apparently she was devastated that Nana showed up and not me, ha!

 Mommy to the rescue, she started to be happier:

 Then they broke out the cupcakes and she could have cared less about me, ha!

 I was doing the craft table at Jacob's party and totally forgot to take any pictures, but I did think his valentine's bag with this mustache was quite cute:

The kids and I made some chocolate covered strawberries...the kids loved them, except maybe Annie who doesn't like her food to mix and ate ever drop of chocolate off and then ate the strawberry...she is definitely Brian's kid:)

 I thought we did pretty good!

 Jacob has a little friend who lives around the corner and his birthday is on Valentine's Day, so several of us went over to his house after school for a play date and we somehow ended up with mardi  gras beads and a black eye:

 The eye, from a metal bat, and self inflicted on accident by Jacob himself:

 Basketball season wrapped up with a big win!  We were all smiles as the kids got donuts and trophies, until about 2 minutes after this picture was taken Jacob was using his trophy to dribble his basketball and somehow dropped it on the tile.  The trophy basically exploded into about 11 pieces and you would have thought Jacob's arm had been cut off.  It was a bit embarrassing, but thankfully Jason helped recover all the pieces and super glue and an awesome Daddy fixed it up as good as new...well, not really new, Jacob will be more than happy to point out every where that you can see it has a crack:)

 These boy birthday parties are fun, this one was a combo party for two of Jacob's friends who have birthdays a few days apart.  30 first grade boys, red team and blue team, camo, masks, forts, sling shots with rubber balls, and a park...what is not to love.  They had so much fun, it was called Yard Battle and it may be in the running for Jacob's party...every party we go to he ends up leaving saying, "that is what I want my party to be!"  Unfortunately, with a birthday in July in Houston, I somehow doubt it would be as fun as 70 weather like it was for this one in February:

 Look at this little sassy thing.  She dressed herself, her shirt HAS to be tucked into her skirt, and she added this headband, complete with tag sticking up in the front (she would not let me fix it):

And a video of my crazy girl with crazy legs:


 I'm loving Gwyn's little homework sheets with her writing the words that she knows, so cute!

Funny things the kids said this week:
Annie:  Don't sing Mommy.  Don't sing that song.
Gwyn:  How old do I have to be to use a sharpie?  (Unfortunately, after Jacob wrote on my cabinets with a black sharpie when he was 3 those have been banned from the kids ever since...poor responsible Gwyn has to suffer the consequences)
Jacob (when I asked him if he wanted to go to the middle school vs faculty basketball game with a friend):  Definitely Mommy, you don't even need to ask me.
Annie:  I heard the TV say a bad word.
Me:  What was it.
Annie (she hesitates and whispers):  poop

And Then She Was 5...

How hard it is for me to believe that my sweet little Gwyn is 5 already!  This girl has a heart of gold, loves her sister and brother, shares what she has, let's people win at games, let's people go first, she loves gymnastics, she loves to sing songs and play music, she loves school, loves homework, loves to read her home readers, loves her teachers, loves to run and play outside, loves carrots dipped in ranch, loves spaghetti, loves her family, loves her friends, and now absolutely LOVES her American Girl doll and to change her clothes multiple times / day.  We've had a great few days with visits from both her G and Grandpa and her Nana and Papa.  She woke up on her birthday morning so excited (before everyone at about 5:20 am) and waited patiently to blow out her candles on her donuts:

 She got  dressed and ready to go...it wasn't a school day:

She picked to meet Brian at lunch at Chick Fil A and traded in her kids meal book for some birthday ice cream!

 Next up were getting her nails done with Annie and Izzy:

 Birthday dinner at home (spaghetti and meatballs) with a Periwinkle birthday cake (vanilla)...Periwinkle is Tinkerbell's twin sister:

 Annie was ready for the cake and ice cream:

Here is a closer picture of Brian's masterpiece...Gwyn got to help:

 Next up was a quick trip to the American Doll store where Gwyn for the first time ever got to try on outfits to match her doll...I realized I had never taken her shopping like this before where she got to try things on...she either gets hand me downs from friends, or I just buy things for her and know her size...I feel like we opened a can of worms here, she LOVED modeling the different outfits for Brian:

 Her American Girl Doll...who has since been named Anna, Hannah, Ailey, McKenna, etc...not sure what her name is today:

 And this is what crazy Annie did while we shopped for Gwyn:

 She got dressed and ready to go back to the American Girl store for her birthday party...how lucky did we get that the store is about 3 minutes from the house...wait, maybe not so lucky as it is going to be an expensive habit and already Annie is jealous and wanting a doll too:)

 Tea party for her friends and their dolls, so cute!

 Annie brought her baby from home and was giving her some tea:

 Yummy!

 Group picture with Annie acting like a goofball and purposefully not looking at the camera:

 Group shot minus Annie since she wasn't cooperating:

Picture of Annie licking the bowl from Gwyn's cake, I had to throw that one in here...too funny!

We have had a very busy couple of weeks.  Brian took Jacob to the Houston Rockets basketball game with a group of kids from his basketball team and Jacob thought it was the best thing ever.  I went to Kindergarten round up for Gwyn...still can't believe I'll be enrolling her in the next couple of months!  Brian and I got a hotel night after Jacob's school Auction, we had a lot of fun, it was a great night.  Jacob scored 7 points at his basketball game for Rick/Sue and my Mom and Dad.  We've signed Gwyn up for coed t-ball and Jacob up for 7-8 yr baseball...this is a calm before the storm with just having Jacob in basketball on Saturdays and Gwyn in gymnastics on Wednesdays...Lord help us when we have 3 kids doing things at the same time!! We are loving life and sadly it is flying by!!