Happy Holidays!!!

Sending warmest thoughts and best wishes for a wonderful holiday and a very Happy New Year!!!
-Avery, Cal, & Minnie XO

Callum's Bites his Tongue

So I got a call from Callum's teacher yesterday saying that he had bitten through his tongue while eating lunch and it was bleeding pretty good. So my first response, being the mom I am, ran outta the house and drove (okay raced) about 50 mph up the hill to his school, lol! When I got there Miss Felisa told me he didn't want to eat anymore of his lunch and she noticed his mouth was bleeding. She looked in his mouth and saw a cut across his tongue and a lot of blood. Apparently my little guy had chomped down on his tongue while eating his food and sliced right through the top about a quarter of an inch long. OOOUCHH! The crazy thing about it was, he wasn't even crying and was completely calm about it, and when I got there he was sucking on a popsicle and looked completely fine. I on the other hand was a bit surprised! My poor little guy!We've been monitoring it and have been having him rinse with warm salt water in the mean time. It looks like it should heal just fine. Just something else we can smile about later on, right?! ;)

 Day #2 of tongue injury. You can see where the cut is and part of his tongue pokes out from the side because he sliced it underneath.  :)

Princess Sofia

Thanks to the long Veterans Day holiday, we were able to venture over to our favorite hang out today. We spotted Avery's faaaavorite princess ever, Sofia, as we were leaving the Muppets 3D show. We made our way over as they were closing the line down and made it just in time before Princess Sofia had to leave!

                                               A big princess hug!!!

Avery Looses another Tooth

So I went to pick up Avery after school today and as she was walking towards me and I noticed she had water and some blood down her shirt. As she walks closer to me she tells me that she pulled out her tooth in class today and hands me her tooth in an envelope. Uhhh...okay, definately wasn't expecting that. I guess her friend Bailey had pulled out her tooth in class earlier today and Avery decided she wanted to pull her tooth out also. I knew it was loose, but not that loose. Sheeesh! I guess we're in for another visit from the tooth fairy!

Happy Halloween

Twas a Happy Halloween and both kiddos had a great day with the usual costumes and school parties. Here is my Pinkalicious and my super cool Fire fighter! Trick or treating through the neighborhood was lots of fun and a special thank you to all the grandparents who walked the neighborhood with us, which made for an even more spooktacular evening. :)

            Waiting for the next trick or treater to ring the bell

                                  My cool fire fighter...

                                       and Pinkalicious herself!

1st Grade Award Assembly

Avery had her 1st grade award assembly on Tuesday. I have to say the awards are a tad on the early side this year but it's great to see them getting rewarded for all their hard work. She came home with a certificate for Excellent Attendance and Honor Roll. Way to go Avery!

                       Avery with her teacher Mrs. Sheehan!

Halloween Cupcakes

It's cupcake making time!!! Earlier today I had made some pumpkin cupcakes in my easy-to-use and very convenient "BabyCakes" cupcake maker, I'm not only a spokesperson, but a believer. When Avery got home from school, I let the kids go to town and decorate their own Halloween cupcakes. They decorated all 28 cupcakes (Callum had fun pre-tasting before the frosting went on, leaving us short of a couple, lol) Of course there was lots of licking and tasting in the process, to make sure each and every cupcake was simply delicious. All said and done, we had 28 beautifully scrumptious yummy cupcakes and a very sugar happy Avery and Callum.

                          Our yummy scrumptious cupcakes!!! Yay!!! :)

Wordless Wednesday

Avery's Michael Jackson Dance

Upon our most recent adventure to the Magic Kingdom.  We stumbled across some very interesting areas in the Innovations attraction in Tomorrowland.  The kids had a great time exploring the world of tomorrow, even if daddy did have to stop some potential line cutters to let the kids drive a car in a Siemens virtual reality...he should have known better.  Towards the end of the attraction we found a game that had you dance with the King of Pop.  Avery could not pass up the opportunity to show her moves.  As the crowd started to gather, we thought she would have gotten shy about being on stage, but it only seemed to motivate her more. =)

Avery Sings Yankee Doodle

Avery's school had an assembly today in rememberance of 9-11. Her and her classmates showed their patriotism by wearing red, white, and blue and did a great job at singing "Yankee Doodle." (she's the one in the red dress) :)

Butterflies are Free

Our little critters have finally turned into beautiful butterflies and were set free last week. Avery and Callum helped daddy bring the butterflies to the surface and we watched them fly away. We had so much fun making sure to name each and everyone and watching them grow everyday. They were our little pets for a short amount of time and we enjoyed everyday they were here with us. Avery and Callum have now observed first hand the transformation of the caterpillar to the butterfly from beginning to end.

Our caterpillars had formed into their chrysalides

Inside the butterfly pavilion they have turned into butterflies

Avery and Callum getting ready to let butterflies loose

One last look as the butterfly decides to sit on daddy's finger for just a second!

Caterpillars are getting so Big

Day 5: Our little critters are getting soooo big! Should be forming into chrysalides soon. :)

Our Caterpillars Have Arrived

Avery and Callum are very much fascinated by the bug world these days. They are always making little cages for their rollie pollie bugs and making sure they have plenty of leaves and flowers for them to eat. (im only assuming that's what they eat) Avery loves butterflies and had studied about the life cycle of the butterfly last year in school. I had remembered that my sister (thanks Auntie Jeanette) had sent the kids a butterfly kit about 3 years back and we had forgotten all about it, until I recently found it in our garage. I thought this would be a perfect time to send away for our live caterpillars. Well, we got the caterpillars yesterday and we didn't see them moving. We thought that their life was sadly cut short by the heat. (It was only near the 100's yesterday) Poor little things. We decided to keep them anyway and put them up on the fireplace just in case, which I'm glad we did. Sure enough, almost every single one started moving by the evening and we have atleast 8 little critters climbing around the cup today. Yay! So now we wait and watch them grow. After 7 to 10 days they will climb to the top of the cup and attach themselves to the paper where they will form into chrysalides. Then we get to transfer them into the butterfly cage and watch them turn into Painted Lady butterflies and Avery and Callum will eventually release them. How exciting! I thought it would be neat to keep an update of the transformations. Here are the little critters climbing around. We haven't named all of them, but we have atleast 3 names picked out so far, Snappy, Crystal, and Bella. :)

Callum's First day of Pre-K

Callum started his first day of Pre-k at his new school last Tuesday. The teachers are very hands on and nurturing and it is a smaller in-home class environment. I think he will transition very nicely. There seems to be lots of activities planned for the kids to keep him very busy during his day. It will be nice for me too, as the school is just a 4 min. drive up the street. I think Callum is happier and feels more secure knowing that I am only a few min. away. Just that alone gets us all off to a good start!

                              Callum at his 1st day of Preschool

Avery's First Day of School

Avery started 1st grade back at her school last week. She was assigned to Mrs. Sheehan and absolutely loves her (thank goodness). She only ended up getting about 5 of her friends in class this year, but she's excited to make some new friends. Phil and I had the opportunity to meet her teacher at Back to School Night and we're really happy with her. Another great year filled with lots of new and exciting things! Here's a picture of Avery and her best bud on the first day of school. They didn't get the same teacher this year but will still have lunch and recess together.

                                   My "First Grader"! :)

Canyon Lake

We were invited to come up and spend the day in Canyon Lake with some friends. They had recently bought a home on the lake and had us over for a day of fun activities for the kids. The kids went swimming in the lake and got to ride little motor boats just their size. I have to say we've really enjoyed all the time we've been able to spend on the lake this summer!

Trip to Mammoth Lakes

We recently took a family trip up to Mammoth Lakes and we all had a great time! The temperature was freezing the first day we arrived. Well, it was more like the lower 60's but it still felt very cold, not to mention rainy as well. Genius me forgot to bring jackets and pants, so we decided (had) to stay indoors the first day and sit around the fire to keep warm for the rest of the day. Luckily the temperatures warmed up each day we were there and by the last couple of days the weather was perfect and in the 90's.

We did lots of sight seeing and hiked the trails in the Inyo National Forest. I was surprised how well Avery and Callum did with the hiking. With the exception of a couple minor scrapes and  bug bites, they did awesome. I learned to never go hiking in the forest without lots and lots of bug spray. Otherwise you will pretty much be eaten alive, no questions asked.

We took the kids horseback riding, which they loved. They've ridden on ponies before, but this was their first time riding on a big horse. Avery rode on Haas and Callum rode on Barney. I think Avery's horse had  a cold because he kept sneezing on me the entire time...lol

We also decided to rent a pedal boat and go out on the lake, which was a lot of fun. All I can say is that Phil and I got some great upper and lower leg exercise. What a great work out! The lake was beautiful and very relaxing. We planned on being on the water for a couple hours, but it was cut short when my little guy decided he needed to use the bathroom after about 35 min on the water. Sounds about right...hee hee!

Philip had brought his poles with him and spent some time fishing. Avery and Callum were very good helpers and were very determined to help daddy catch a fish. Unfortunately they didn't have much luck but still had fun reeling in the fishing line.

We had such a peaceful and relaxing time up there. I cannot wait to take more trips to the mountains and next time I promise to not forget the jackets!!

Mammoth Lakes

Sleeping Beauty

Here are a couple photos we took of Avery and Sleeping Beauty on one of our recent trips to Disneyland. We happened to run into the princess right as we were leaving the park. :)