Lisey's Spring Program

The year is winding up. It hardly seems like it should be summer again, but after the winter we had, I'll take it! Hazel is wrapping up her year in kindergarten; she has an extra week to make up for all the snow-days. But Lisey is done with preschool for the year. Last night was her spring program to celebrate a year of hard work and fun, and we had a blast.

 I was told that since I made dresses for all of Hazel's preschool programs, I had to make a dress for Lisey to wear to her program. She picked out the pattern and the fabric (with a little gentle guidance from me) and I went to work. We were both happy with the finished product.

 Lisey was feeling really good!

 She was proud to show off her portfolio of work, on which she had been working all year!

Showing Daddy the murals that the class made to go along with the stories they read.

There is a super cute video of the performance, but blogger is not cooperating with the upload, so I'll just have to leave it to your imagination.

 

A Trip to Indiana Dunes

For Glenn's birthday this year, the girls decided that we should go to the beach for the day.  So, the family packed up and headed up to the Indiana Dunes today.  It was an absolutely gorgeous day, and everyone had a blast, including Hammy!

 The girls modelling our spread under the sun shade.

 Lisey modelling the view from our spot.  Not too shabby!

 Hammy, not quite sure what the dude behind him is doing.

 Megan, the girls, and Hammy playing in the waves.

 Glenn supervising the construction work.

 Places to go...

 ...things to do.

A stroll through one of the hiking trails, with Hammy leading the way.

Hammy spent quite a bit of time biting the waves.  We are pretty sure he was protecting us.

First Day of School!

I can't believe the summer flew by so fast. We have a lot of posts to catch up on, including a trip to Kansas to visit with our McCain Relatives and a trip to Huntsville to play in the lake with the Marsdens. But before I spend hours sorting through all those photos, I thought I would update with a post about the first day of school. Yes, that's right. Our Hazel is officially in kindergarten and our Lisey is officially in preschool. So, without further preamble, here you have it... The First Day of School!

 Hazel, in our traditional First Day of School photo.

Our neighbor, Lizzy is in fifth grade and has voluntarily taken the role of big sister to help Hazel get on and off the bus in the mornings.

 Walking to the bus stop.

Waiting for the bus.

Getting on the bus.

Once Hazel was on the bus, Lisey and I started the long day of waiting for Hazel to get off the bus. Finally at 4:00, we walked down to the bus stop to meet her and hear about her day.

  

And a big smile getting off the bus; I think she had a great day!

Hazel wasn't the only one starting school this summer, though. Two weeks after Hazel started school, Lisey started pre-school. Although she was a touch nervous, she was very excited and proud.

 Just as on Hazel's first day of preschool, Lisey started preschool on red day, so we picked out a red outfit to wear.

 Lisey thought standing under the tree for pictures was just the best thing ever!

She couldn't be more excited about being in school. She is such a big girl now.

Although you can't really see her giant smile, she had the best time at preschool. She just loves her teacher and is apparently making friends left and right.

We'll have more updates about our summer coming soon, and the girls have a big surprise coming when birthday season starts next month!

Preschool Graduation!

It is official!  Hazel has completed preschool and is ready to start Kindergarten!  A few selections from the evening's program (Hazel is third row, second from the right):

A little post-graduation cake!

The changing of the guards.  Lisey starts here in August!

In Which Stephanie Wears Us All Out With Organized Activities

Two weeks ago, I got a text from Steph asking if we wanted to spend President's Day Weekend with her and Sarah Kate in Hunstville. She explained that Richard was going skiing and Sarah Kate was off school on Monday. Since we didn't have any plans, and since Hazel was off school as well, we decided to make the drive. We left on Friday after Hazel got out of school and arrived late Friday night. Little did we know how much fun stuff Stephanie had planned for us to do!

Saturday morning, we gathered everyone and all tromped to downtown Huntsville, where we painted some pottery at a cute little studio called Doodle Bug.

 Lisey's pottery turned out like most of her paint jobs, every color of the palette, all mixed into one brownish-grayish color. But she was proud of it, so who were we to argue with artistic genius?

Hazel painted a peace sign and Sarah Kate painted a really neat plate. We can't wait to see them once they're fired.

We worked up quite an appetite with all that creative inspiration, so we got some burgers for lunch. While we were at lunch, Steph suggested that since it is my birthday on Wednesday, she would take the girls back to the house for quiet time, while Glenn took me out to a movie. Such a treat! And I got to pick the movie too! We saw Argo and we loved it. After the movie, we headed back to Steph's where there was quite a surprise waiting for us. Literally, the girls had organized a surprise birthday for me! Complete with Twister:

And Just Dance on the XBox Kinect:

 

 And of course, cake and presents:

 

 

 Lisey helped me open my presents.

 And because Steph can't bear to leave anyone out, everyone got presents!

  

Look, Mom, AS SEEN ON TV!

And what is a party without silly hats and mustaches?

 You would think that all that partying Saturday night would have worn us out, and you would be right, but we had big plans on Sunday. We got up early and headed to the US Space and Rocket Center, which we had always wanted to visit, but somehow had never found the time to. Glenn was very excited.

 

 The Saturn V Rocket that you can see from the interstate. It was neat to finally see it up close.

 Sarah Kate and Lisey and I are ready to head into space, but why does Lisey look so shifty?

 I can't remember which number it was, but it is another Saturn class rocket, I think. Glenn wants to know what genius came up with the idea of riding an explosion into space. We found out at the Space and Rocket Center that that genius was named Werner Von Braun.

 I just liked it because I really liked the movie Apollo 13. Alas, we did not see Tom Hanks anywhere.

 Hazel thought the rockets were pretty cool.

 

And Glenn found this Command Module to play in.

 Oh no. He's pushing buttons...

 Gah! What did you do? What is all that beeping? Why does that sound like an alarm going off?

Lisey thinks maybe she would like to walk in an astronaut's footsteps one day. But her feet need to get a bit bigger first.

So, after such a big day, what do you think we did on Monday. We hung out around the house and played with Sarah Kate's toys, of course. Lisey especially liked the drums.

But all that drum-playing can make a person hungry, so we headed out for sushi.

 Aunt Stephanie got Hazel special chopsticks for her sushi, and she's pretty good with them.

 In fact, she is better than Glenn with her chopsticks.

Lisey doesn't believe you need chopsticks, especially when you are not going to eat any of that icky sushi. She'll stick with noodles, thank you very much.

Needless to say, we were completely worn-out by Tuesday morning, when we started the long drive home. We had an awesome time, though!