Waterballoons

Today we decided to play a little outdoors.

So I blew up some water balloons and let the kids have at them.

I bought the cheap ones from Dollar Tree. 

And out of 100 balloons only 9 were successfully filled with water.

Those 9 were almost unburstable!

We'd toss them to the ground and they would just bounce.

Or they would roll away.

But finally we figured it out.

We gave them to Grace who put her muscles into it.

And they finally went ker-splat!  Next time, I think I'll shell out the $2 for better balloons...

A Riddle

Our flight home was seriously delayed.  Put our pilot tried to keep us all in high spirits by posing a trivia question and offering a bottle of wine to anyone who could figure it out.

Name a famous rock group with all four members dead.  One member was even assassinated.  

The answer?  Mount Rushmore!  Hahahah!  

Guess who got it right and brought home a bottle of wine...David!  Not only does my husband have beauty, he's got brains, too.

A Richmond Wedding

This weekend David and I had the pleasure of attending another wedding.

We flew to Richmond and stayed at the Jefferson Hotel.  It was gorgeous and we found some goodies in our room courtesy of the bride and groom.  Our bag included German candies, Nutella, sugar cookies shaped like Virginia with a heart on Richmond, chocolates from a New Orleans chocolatier, and so much more!  What a thoughtful surprise.

Soon we headed out and enjoyed pizza and friends at the rehearsal dinner.

The next was gorgeous as we to Historic Tredegar for the ceremony. 

Here we are!

And here's another friendly couple.

Here's Ulf with his two high school buddies.  The handsome one on the right is my dear hubby.

The site was gorgeous.

As was the ceremony.

Everything went off perfectly as far as I could tell.

Ring bearer and flower girl were precious.

And so was Dixie!

Kate, the bride, was magnificent.

Ulf's stepmother read a passage from 1 Corinthians in German.

And soon Kate and Ulf were husband and wife.

We wish them a lifetime of love and laughter.

And we were so honored to be guests as they begin their lives together.  Best wishes!

Kindergarten recognition

Today is Kindergarten recognition.

Grace eagerly waited for the school bus.

And then it was time for the program to begin.

The kindergartners sang, "You Raise Me Up" to all us parents.  And my heart melted.

Then it was time to get their diplomas.

They even got to wear caps.

Grace was the first in her class since they went alphabetically.

Then we went back to her classroom to say goodbye to her teacher.

Faith and Benjamin came along to support their big sister.

My heart simply cannot hold all the love I have for this little girl.   My heart overflows with pride from all that she has accomplished this year.  She can read - really read - all by herself.  She's a whiz at math.  She's made friends and matured so much.  She's developing into such a bright, compassionate, and special little lady.  As her kindergarten year comes to a close, I welcome this bittersweet ending as the magic of learning continues to unfold and adventure awaits us this summer.  I am so grateful to be her mother and friend and I know that the best is yet to come.

Tubing with Aunt Hope

Since Aunt Hope was still in town,

We decided to go for a boat ride.

We cruised around the rivers.

And then headed out into the Bay.

And we decided to let Grace and Hope tube together until we reached our beachy island.

They had a lot of fun.

Then we parked and played in the sand.

Before we headed back home.  On our trip back, David tubed with Grace.

All in all, it was a fantastic afternoon.

Grace's recital

After Benjamin's birthday party, we all drove over to Mobile.

To enjoy Grace's dance recital.

Faith was tired and wanted to rest in the stroller.

Benjamin just wanted to crawl in and out while making funny noises and faces.

Meanwhile, I helped Grace get into her costume.

She posed for a bit and then the recital began.

It started with a funny dance by some of the dads.

We had to wait about 20 minutes before Grace came on.  She was awesome!  Then it was intermission.

After intermission and another 20 minutes, Grace was a little bumble bee for her second dance.

She wowed me again.

She looked so beautiful on stage.

And did a fantastic job.

After 4 hours of different dances and intermissions, it was finally time for the finale dance.  Grace totally rocked it!  And as much as I enjoyed watching her again this year, I think this may be her last year of dance class.  We are going to try karate and gymnastics instead.  This was much too long.  It started at 4 and didn't end until after 8.  No one warned us it was going to be that long.  Just imagine two kids under two without dinner or their beds...  Faith begged us to go home because she was hungry.  We bribed her with skittles since food was not allowed in the auditorium.