'Twas the night before Christmas...

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night... 

THREE!

 Happy Birthday to my...
super sassy,

oh-so-expressive, 

very demanding, 
born to keep her momma on her toes, 
hand on hip posing,

lollipop eating, 
"long" hair wearing, 
boppy and blankie obsessing, 
pat her back and fast kisses requesting, 
roller coaster hating, 
ballet dancing, 

yellow loving, 
color everywhere but on her paper, 
cuddle bug.

To my best Christmas present ever...

Happy Birthday Anna Jo, we love you! 

Santa!

TWO smiles on Santa's lap - definitely a Christmas miracle!!

Amigos!

I have been meaning to do a post on our sweet neighbors who moved away this summer for years (let’s be honest, I’ve been meaning to do LOTS of posts lately!).  A little history…

My girls (and our whole family) just latched on to this family – they moved to The Woods 2 ½ years ago from Trinidad and Tobago.  Lucila (Lucy), Juan & Juliet became fast friends with our crew. Juan would even knock to see if Mr. Ryan could “come out and play”.  Avery and Juliet were close to the same age, but it was Anna and Juan that formed a special little bond.  There aren’t too many little 9 year old boys that would stop playing with his friends in the street to come say hi to a 2 year old little girl. 

He loved to make her laugh, and she gave him a nickname that spread throughout the neighborhood.  Before Anna turned 2, Juan tried so hard to get her to say his name.  We were working on English at the time, so learning a Spanish name was just not in the cards. ;) One night while playing outside, Juan was determined to get her to say his name:

Juan – “Anna, can you say Juan?”

Anna – “Two!”

Juan – “No, JUAN…”

Anna – “TWO!!”

(Read it aloud if you didn’t get that. ;))

So precious – so from that moment forward, Juan was always “Two” – both in our house, and on our street!  We were so very sad to see them go, but so very happy they recently came back from Spain to visit (or Speeen if you ask Avery).  Even though it has been 6 months since we saw them last, everyone seemed to pick up right where they left off!

(Not pictured - Lucy.  She made a special trip just to see Ave.  Someone happened to be throwing a fit at the time, so we did not get a picture!)

Kindergarten!

So much for the lazy days of summer... it flew by!!  I can't believe that school is already here, and I can't believe that I have a Kindergartner!  

First day of school pic!  New school for Ave, new class for Anna!

Avery was VERY excited to ride the bus today - she's been waiting for the day when she was "big enough" to ride!  Seriously, how grown up does she look with that backpack??

A few of the neighborhood kids ready to get on the bus!  There are seven kiddos starting Kinder this year from our neighborhood!  

Red-eyed mommy with her girls. :)

Off she goes.  I thought she'd be a little shy when it came time, but she surprised us all - she was the first one on!

She was smiling and waving from the window - so precious!

And sweet little Anna... she was waving and enthusiastically shouting, "BYE, AVERY!!!" over and over.  As soon as she got on the bus, she asked, "Avery's gonna come back?" in a very concerned little voice.  On the way to school, she could not quite figure out where Avery and "all our friends" were.

Here's to a great year!  Go Greyhounds!

Goooooaaaaaal!

Now that summer is here and our activities are over, I finally feel like I have time to blog about them! 

This was the first season we signed Avery up for soccer, and we joined a league called “Upward” through our church.  It was a great, Christian-based program that was very positive and was a great first experience for my shy little girl.  She played for the "Stingers" and had an awesome coach!  She even managed to score 2 goals this season - the first was totally accidental (but we still counted it!) and the second was legit... 

Here you are coming out of the tunnel:

Starting lineup!

Big kick!!

Making your move…

I would describe your style of play as “polite”.  This picture made it look like you were far more aggressive than you were, considering that you probably skipped more than you actually ran…

Your sister enjoyed “watching” you while playing on Daddy’s iPad.

And while you assured me that loved soccer and want to play again next season, I’m pretty sure that you were in it for the skipping and the snacks. :)

Cinco de Avery!

This year’s theme was easy – birthday on Wednesday, May 2^nd – the following Saturday was Cinco de Mayo, and the little senorita turned cinco. Cinco on Cinco de Mayo - done and done!

Always excited when we can get a somewhat decent family pic!

I simply could not have pulled this party off without the Mr., and it helped that he was beyond excited about the party theme.  In case you don’t know the Mr. very well, he takes a costume party very seriously, even if it’s a 5 year old one:

 The details…

The party was great, but the weather was HOT.  You know, we like to keep our parties authentic – right down to the Mexico weather.  Thankfully it didn’t seem to slow the kids down one bit!

The piñatas were a big hit (pun intended)!!  Almost all of the kids took a swing or two, and Daddy busted it open for the grand finale! 

Piñata number dos was this little lady, or should I say big lady… she was almost 4 feet tall!  

On the count of “CINCO”, everyone pulled their string to get more junk prizes!!

One happy little señorita!!

Feliz Cumpleaños Señorita Avery! 

Birthday Girl!

For months, you have been SO excited to turn FIVE – with all of the birthday parties we attend, you always want to know when it is YOUR turn to turn five.  At your request, I finally printed off a calendar for you so you could see why it is “taking a long time” for your birthday to roll around.  We all get daily reports of how many more days until your birthday and how many days until your Cinco de Mayo party! 

You’ve grown so much over the past year that I don’t even know where to begin. You started tap and soccer this year and have really enjoyed both.  You love to go on family bike rides and we have ridden as far as four miles which just amazes me! You are learning to read; you have mastered your right and left, and you finally know how to skip (even in soccer)! 

I can’t believe you start Kindergarten this year!  You are ready in every way though...  I see the school bus in our neighborhood every day, and I think that there is NO way that you are going to ride that big bus all by yourself in just a few short months!

Avery Renee, you have been such a joy and such a blessing to all of us. We all love you so much!!

More Birthday posts to come… 

Picture Day!

I've never purchased school pictures, until these!

So grateful for my precious girls!

Let's Rodeo!

This was the first year that we decided to take the entire family out to cook off!  Usually just the Mr. and I go out for a night, but this year was a great change of pace and hopefully a new annual tradition!

Family pic where everyone is sort of smiling and looking at the same camera – yay!

Just some of the kids' crew (not all smiling and looking at the same camera)!

My little cowgirl did not want to leave the dance floor!  As we were finishing up our awesome bbq dinner, she kept asking me – “Please, Mommy, can we stay for just one more song!!??”

I’m still waiting on some pictures of Avery and Jack dancing (ahem, Carrie!!) – not sure who taught those two to dance, but it was absolutely priceless!  I have a video too that I need to post!

The first time the Mr. has worn a cowboy hat – not his thing, but he was a handsome cowboy that night!  These are the only two girls that can drag him onto a dance floor!

Anna was obsessed with Miss Carrie:

Love this one of my banana…

 The groupies…

  

One of my very best friends and me - yay for an updated Carrie-Traci picture (and Anna gettin' her dance on in the background)!

Thank you Pratis for always inviting us back!  We had SUCH an awesome time!!                  

Thank you, Mr. President!

This year we actually made plans for President’s Day since I always have the day off and so do the girls.  Daddy joined us along with Carrie and her boys, and we headed down to Kemah!  The girls were SO excited to ride the rides…

Avery wanted to ride everything – she may be shy, but the girl has no fear when it comes to big rides.  The 2 story carousel was the first stop, and of course we had to ride on top!

Anna wasn’t quite as sure about the ride just yet, and judging by my face, I wasn’t quite sure that we were being photographed:

The train was the highlight as evidenced by the huge smiles!

We had to wait for The Aquarium to open for lunch, so we decided to have the kids pose for a photo op.  Anna wanted nothing to do with the shark, so she got as far away as possible, and even that was not far enough for her – haha…

Then, all the kids took turns with Avery’s Hello Kitty camera and made us pose this time… 

Anna’s turn!

 Finally, we made it inside for lunch… this was our view from our table!  Thankfully the kids were very entertained!

After lunch, we headed outside for a walk along the water and for a few more rides:

The airplane ride was high on Avery’s list, and since Anna wasn’t tall enough to ride alone, Daddy offered to ride too.

If you notice, all of the other planes are up high, but the Sims’ plane… not so much.  Love the Mr.’s expression here:

If you look closely, you can tell that Avery has now figured out what is happening!  Luckily, they let her ride again – without Daddy to weigh down the plane. ;)

The ferris wheel was the last ride of the day – it was a little chilly way up high (and actually a little terrifying for the Mr. and me), but the girls loved it!

We had such a great time, and the girls crashed 30 seconds after loading up in the car to head home - Thank you, Mr. President for a nice little holiday!