Lauren and Davis here posing with the characters from Six Flags Fiesta Texas. We purchased season passes again since it's a quick 2 hr drive south.

Swimming Fun!

Today, Davis and his best friend Sam had the entire pool to themselves thanks to the this lovely rainy days we have been having. The weather broke and we headed to the slide pool for some fun! She came over and did not bring her suit so she borrowed Davis'. She LOVES wearing his clothing and was equally pleased when the guard told her she'd go faster w/out her shirt! Since it was just us I said "I don't care..just don't tell your dad!"

Crazy Summer Weather!!!

We had a CRAZY afternoon. It was bright and sunny one hour. By 2:30p, it was dark, eerie and suddenly the skies were pounding softball size hail to the grounds! It was absolutely the weirdest thing we have ever seen lately in Austin weather! Our front and backyard is laden with ice!

Last Day of School

On Wednesday, May 23, Davis celebrated the end of kindergarten with a performance in cap/gown. The kinder classes sang about 15 songs ranging from phonics, hymns, to rapping the B-I-B-L-E with Coach Lodovico. It was very fun!





Here is a picture of Davis with the girl who has captured his heart already! She is the sweetest gal in the class and I can see why he is smitten by her! He said "Mom..I need a picture with my girl"..and would not let anyone else come into the photo until I had snapped them together!





Lauren celebrated "Roman Days" that afternoon as well. She dressed up in a toga and was "Livia". We packed a picnic basket lunch of hummus, grapes, cheese, salami, olives, and bread. The 3rd graders ended their year of "Greek/Roman" learning with roman games out on the football field.

David and I enjoyed a nice evening out at Hill Country Christian School Annual Silent Auction.

We went to the Lakeway Inn and Resort and had a wonderful evening!

May

Happy May! We are just about at the end of the bluebonnet splash across our hillsides. It was a rainy season so the flowers were magnificant this year!

This, I think..is the LAST of my posting on "painting". David and I almost finished the upstairs game room. We've got the corner and the wall top trim by the stairwell which is virtually impossible to get to without a 10 ft. ladder.

Overall, I am very pleased with this "Mississippi Mud" color. It is very warm and welcoming.

I have yet to hang curtains, pictures, or any wall decorations. My mission for today! I have bunco tonight at my home and a friend visiting, so I have incentive to get them up and off the floor!

We're making changes!!!

After: -taken at 1opm-so the lighting is horrible!


















Before pictures above--plain khaki walls.




As many of you know, I have the painting bug. Have had it for years. Some of my friends have yet to put one color on their walls in years, while I have changed rooms many a times! David and I FINALLY spent this past weekend painting the downstairs family room and dining room! I am so excited to not have little hand prints on my walls that do not belong to my kids!





We JUST finished at 11pm Sunday night after 18 LONG hours of painting. We make a great team, but I am telling you my back is killing me from stretching for our high ceilings in the dining room! Nothing is on the walls, but here is a sample of before and after...

A Month of Family Fun!!

Right: Mimi/Papa Bob before the Spring Concert at HCCSA.

Right: Dad and Lauren before Father/Daughter "Hawaiin" Dance. David wore attire, but Lauren opted for her favorite brown dress!

Davis is learning to be bat both left/right handed...David is elated! Davis' coach gave him the nickname "hoover" the first practice because he catches everything that gets near him and sucks the ball into his glove! Davis is not too fond of the name because I think he thinks Matt (coach) is teasing him. But it truthfully is funny to hear Matt call him "Hoover" on the field!

We had a very busy month since my last posting. We ended basketball for both kids and started up baseball for Davis and volleyball for Lauren. Lauren went on a "dad/daughter" date to the girl scouts "father/daughter dance". They had a blast! My parents came to watch the kids perform in their first annual spring concert at school. Unfortunately, David's parents were unable to make it due to being under the weather.

We spent Easter weekend in Houston with my parents and Rob, Erin and Dylan and Wyatt. Unfortunately, I do not have any pictures to share digitally because I went directly to CVS and uploaded them to print for scrapbook night and accidently deleted them off my memory card! SORRY! But, ensure..a fun time was had by all despite the gross weather!

March Madness is over

............Although I've survived countless hours of basketball games at home this month , I've still not managed to post anything new since January!

We spent spring break relaxing--riding bikes, seeing Bridge of Terabithia and Charlotte's Web. The highlight of the week was going up to Waco with Andrea and her girls; Casey and her girls along with Casey's friend and her awesome son who wanted to be the "wagon puller and kid watcher" most of the afternoon! We arrived in Waco safely only to get lost at Baylor University due to my lack of writing ALL the directions down! What a gorgeous campus! Finally after Casey directed to the "right side of the highway" we made it to the Dr. Pepper Museum.


We had a blast touring the Dr. Pepper Museum and tasting the "real" soda out of the fountain! What great artifacts they have and who would have thought such a "small town" like Waco would develop such a cultural icon such as Dr. Pepper Soda!

After our fill of Dr. Pepper floats, we headed over to Cameron Park to spend the afternoon with the animals! WOW! What a gem of a small and beautifully landscaped zoo! The kids spent a leisure afternoon running all around, playing on the playscape and sliding down a tube slide that was in the otter habitat -the tube went through the water so the otter's swam over the tube with you inside! It was very cool!

The Texas Bluebonnets have begun to pop to life! Look for pictures coming soon!!!! Plus, David has worked hard on the backyard building the retaining wall, so I'll add updates soon!

We are looking forward to April as our good friend's the Haviland's will be coming on Sunday, April 1st. Lauren and Davis will play "hookey" on Wednesday to spend the day with Courtney and Nathan! I am sure I'll have cute photo's to show of our "Minnesota friends". We head to Houston for Easter! Another great photo weekend with the Prijatelj grandkids!

February

Icicles on the roof-hard to see-but they are there..no laughing my NORTHERN friends!


It's not much--but it MOVES!





That snowball-it's COLD and packs a punch!

Well, I completely MISSED posting Christmas pictures and anything fun that happened in the month of January. The new year escaped me so quickly, I don't believe I can recapture it all.

We did manage to have a wonderful 5 1/2 day week"end" starting on Friday at 11am the 12th. We went into the Martin Luther King holiday weekend with the anticipation of ice and freezing rain. It was a miserable weekend starting immediately when we got out of school for teacher work day on Friday. Saturday AM, the rains pelted our area and the preserve next to us filled almost to the fence line of our property. By Monday PM, the rains formed to an icy cold sleet and paniced most of Austin, thus canceling school for Tuesday and Wednesday. Needless to say, it was wet, cold, and cabin fever had began to settle in for a nice warm stay.

Here are some of the "fun" shots I took of our patio and the preserve where the kids "ice" sledded. I even attempted to ride the boogie board (that's all us Texan's had-other then card board!) and it was a sad, sad sight.

Christmas Season Activities

Lauren and Davis in front of the Trail of Lights entrance.


This is the "Zilker Tree"--it goes almost to the ground and stands VERY tall..you spin underneath it for a crazy time!











Davis, Madelyn, and Lauren on the Yule Log...

























This is our year to do holiday activities with the kids that we have not done in years. Last weekend, we drove over to Burnet, Tx to see their production of "Little Town of Bethlehem". This is an outside area designed to look like Bethlehem the night Jesus was born. They have camels, goats, Roman soldiers, people dressed up and acting just like the townspeople back then. "Shalom's" are heard as well as people talking about the coming of Christ.

The drive up is a little over an hour then we waited 1.5 hr. to tour the "town." It happened to be a chilly night, 50 outside, so that made the wait drag on a bit. Davis had never been and Lauren went when she was 3. So this was a good time to see it again!

Last night, we drove downtown Austin to see the annual "Trail of Lights" the city puts on in Zilker Park. This is over 42 companies that come into the park and decorate the trees and a certain "area" in a theme. We saw everything from Spongebob to Snoopy, to the 3 Wise Men.

Camp Tex-Lake

Camping with Troop #328!!!











(Back L-R) Taylor, Ashley, Cayla, Micaela, Kristin and Kara. Lauren in front

We spent the weekend at Lone Star Girl Scouts 500+ acre camp site. We went there last spring and had a blast and decided to go ahead and go earlier this year for the girls and mom's to really get to know each other earlier since we had a few new members.

It was a chilly weekend, but we made the most of it. We went to bed late, woke up early to an orientation hike. We learned to use compass', maps and how to direct ourselves while hiking. It
was very fun and the walk lasted about 1 hr.





In the afternoon, we went to learn how to shoot a bow/arrow in Archery. That was a blast and I think it was everyone's favorite part of the day!






















Lauren did great-she managed to hit the target all but a couple of times. She had very good aim!

When we finished there, we wenton another hike to look at Lake Travis because we were told we could not canoe due to the water being so low. Low was right.

Below you will see that the dry patch is actually where we canoed into the "cove" last May. Very sad how low our water level is in Austin.

















We rounded a great day out by having a campfire with smore's. Yum!

9th Birthday Girl fun...

Right: Davis, Kristofer, Haleigh, Caroline, and Tatum. Lauren in front. This is a special group of friends whom Lauren has known all of her life. Haleigh and Kristofer, friends from our Machado St., Caroline lived down the next street. Tatum and Lauren met when they were 3 in preschool and we live in their neighborhood!









Lauren went with 5 friends to the Cheesecake Factory for dessert tonight to celebrate her "9th" birthday . Each child got their own cheesecake, sadly 4 of the 6 all got original cheesecake with strawberries! But we all had a good time! Not sure why the "red eye" will have to look at my camera again...

Santa Saturday Fun!

Our 3 Elf's: Annabelle(L), Lauren(M), and Caroline (R)


Davis by the 37 1/2 St. Tree


Lauren by the 37 1/2 St. Tree!












Davis and Joe McDermott-signing his CD.





We had a blast on Saturday Morning with Joe McDermott, local Austin children's artist. Lauren and her friends were elf's this year. After attending this event since Lauren was 2, it was very surreal to see her as an "elf" and not a little girl dancing around on the floor.

Joe asked for the girls (the 3 elfs on the floor by him) to come up on stage---Annabelle, lauren and Caroline all were delighted! They danced 4 songs with Joe and the band and had a giggling time!