We did it!!!!

One of our new projects this summer has been our tomato and pepper plants. I have always wanted to do a vegetable garden, but lacked the confidence to go ahead and plant one. I have a hard time keeping any type of flower or plant alive, so the task of a whole garden seemed very daunting! Well, after alot of pushing from Jackson, I decided that we would give it a try! I thought that we should try it out on a smaller scale first. So, we went and bought one tomato plant, four pepper plants, two big pots and some dirt. The kids planted them and we put them out on the deck to grow. I was very uncertain if we could actually accomplish it and I said alot of prayers that the tomatoes and peppers would grow so that the kids wouldn't be dissapointed!

Well, look what we have here! We did it! Thank you lord for sending us tomatoes and peppers! The kids are so excited! Of course they had no idea it could fail, so they expected tomatoes and peppers all along- and patiently waited! Our tomato plant has about 12 tomatoes on it already!

Here Jackson is proudly showing off our pepper plants!

And here is our first pepper! It may be tiny, but it brought huge smiles to the kids faces!!

So, lesson learned-I must not be afraid to take on certain tasks just because they seem overwhelming! The joy it brings to the kids is worth way more than any stress I may encounter along the way!

A very successful 2 weeks!

Our adventure of swimming lessons is finally done and I can truthfully say that the kids really enjoyed it! The beginning was a bit rough on the girls, but they quickly snapped out of it and did awesome! Jaideyn learned to swim without her butt up in the air and doing the bicycle kick. She puts her legs straight and points her toes to kick- and much to her suprise she can actually get somewhere while swimming!

Jackson is a great swimmer. He did not do lessons this year, but Ms. Rita was kind enough to let him swim on his own during lessons! As you can see he had a great time!

And then there is Avery! She did amazing. The first week we weren't sure if she was actually going to get the whole kicking hard and using your arms thing! The second week her true colors came shining through and she was an animal! She kicked and swam like we never expected!

Before swimming lessons started I was talking to a friend and they asked how Avery would do. I remember saying it could go either way. Either Avery would decide she didn't like it and go into her stubborn mode and not do it at all. Or she would do it and realize the freedom that it gave her and she would take off! Needless to say Avery realized the freedom and she hasn't stopped wanting to "practice" swimming since!

Avery jumping in the deep end and swimming to the ladder. By the end of the week Avery was asking Ms. Rita to let her go and jump off the diving board. Apparently she has outgrown the shallow end!

Swimming to Ms. Rita with her "eyes down!"

Our brave little fish!

So I would highly recommend swimming lessons with Ms. Rita to all of you who have young kids. It has made the world of difference in the kids! It was a great family experience of encouraging each other and celebrating each others accomplishments! And we had a ton of fun!!!!!

Our latest adventure!

Swimming lessons have begun! Jaideyn and Avery are taking them this year. Here they are sitting nicely at the edge of the pool waiting for their first lesson to begin. Notice the nice big smiles!

Rita is explaining things to them now and as you can see the smiles have faded!

And in they go! Here is Avery getting her first taste of the water (literally!) She came up spitting and sputtering!! Avery did very well. It was hilarious the first time she went in to swim. She just froze- she didn't kick or even move her arms. She didn't cry though! After a few tries she figured out the kicking thing and actually started using her arms! She did awesome. The true fun didn't really begin until she had to get in the water the 2nd time. She knew what was coming, so she started crying right away! At one point while she was swimming with Rita- she looked at Rita and said in a very stern voice "I AM ALL DONE!!"

Avery did so well that Rita took her down to the deep end and threw her in. Here she is explaining to Avery to keep her head down.

And she jumps! She did a good job finding the ladder and climbing up!

Jaideyn did a great job also. There were no tears from her and she swam awesome. It has been 2 days now and things are going well...I'll let you know how the next 2 weeks go!

Jaideyn's dance recital

This past Saturday Jaideyn had her much anticipated dance recital (or "recycle" as Jaidey calls it!) She has been practicing for the last year for this recital. She was very excited about it. I must admit I was not as excited about it as she was. It was quite an expensive and time consuming venture. The classes, the costume, the tickets, the rehersal, hair, makeup...... and so on. This was our first year doing dance, so we really were not familiear with all the business that goes into the recital. We are learning though! Oh and I must add that the recital was at 3:00PM on Saturday afternoon (Tim loved that!!) Anyways, we set out getting Jaideyn ready at about 1:00PM on Saturday. We started with the hair and then the makeup and then finally her costume. We were finally ready and out the door at 2:10PM.

Of course we had a little time in there for pictures of our beautiful ballerina! As you can see she was loving this "photo shoot" and had no trouble posing for the pics!

Look at that face. Although it is very strange to see a 4 year old girl all done up with makeup- I think that she looks beautiful (Mom's are allowed to brag about their kid's occasionally- right?) Needless to say Jaidey absolutely loved getting her makeup put on! She knew right away what everything was for and she knew exactly how she should turn her head so that I could put it on properly. She said she learned from watching me! It just goes to show how much they are watching us when we don't even realize it! So here is our little Jaideyn looking a bit too grown up!

Another fabulous pose!

Jaideyn at the end of her recital. Tim and I bought flowers and gave them to her at the end of the show. Jaideyn did awesome in her recital. She did all the dance moves and kept up pretty well! As I said before I was not that excited about the recital, but after seeing it I certainly had a change of heart. It was awesome. All of these girls were dancing their hearts out to Christian music and loving it! Also, it gives the girls so much confidence to get up there and dance with their class! Words really can't explain it, but it was awesome and I am definately looking forward to next year!

Our little graduate!

A few weeks ago Jackson had his big graduation program. It was in the school gym with just his class. It was the neatest program ever (I know I'm a bit bias!!) It was very cute. The kids sang a few songs together and each kid had a little solo part. How adorable watching little 6 year olds sing a solo!

Also, each child was assigned an animal to make from a paper plate for the program. Jackson was assigned a donkey. How does one really make a donkey? I had no idea, so I let Tim and Jackson work on it! I took the girls and left for a few hours so that they could work on the donkey. I must say I was very impressed with the finished product! It really does look like a donkey! The kids had a little poem to go with each animal and they each took a turn reciting their animals part!

Jackson receiving his "diploma" from Mr. Hendricks.

Jackson with his wonderful teacher Mrs. Kloostra. What a fun and exciting year. I am still amazed at how much he has learned this year. He is reading and writing like I never imagined!

I laugh because in the last week or so I have been finding little sticky notes stuck around the house that Jackson has written on. He writes things down that he doesn't want to forget!! Today I found one stuck to the computer with a website of games written on it! So, cute. He is really growing up!!!!