Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Today we celebrate our Irish Heritage.  In our house we each have a little Irish in us.  No matter what though, it is fun to celebrate days with themes.

We started our morning off with green "shamrock" pancakes.

The green pancake batter.

The finished product.  I know it doesn't look the greatest, but the girls LOVED it! 

Now onto pictures of the kiddos...

 Katelyn posing.

 Julianne posing.

 Sisterly love...

 Katelyn wanted her hair like Julianne's, so we re-did it and took some more pictures.

 Once William was up and dressed we did a few pictures with him.  I am hoping that I can get some more of the 3 of them after school today.  If not, I really do like this one.

 My handsome little man, William.  I am trying to get some more pictures of him, but he just doesn't stand still very long!

Here's a close-up of the girls "flowers" they have in their hair.  A friend shared a website with me and I tweaked the project to go with the girls' shirts.

Again, Happy St. Patrick's Day from our family to yours!

Another week...another weigh-in

So, yesterday I had another weigh-in for the Get Fit challenge at the Y.  I have not written about my exercise and weight-loss recently for a number of reasons.  One, I haven't made great progress in my weight-loss and two, not much has changed in my exercise routine.  This week my weight didn't change from last week, that is good in that it didn't go up, but it also means it didn't go down.  I just remind myself to keep moving forward.

I am still exercising 5 days a week for at least an hour a day.  I do at least 35 minutes of elliptical each day and then I do weights.  Some days I also do the bike for 10-15 minutes or the stair stepper for 10 minutes.  Some days I am more motivated than others to workout.  Earlier this week I wasn't feeling motivated, but I kept going.  It took 18 minutes to finally feel motivated.  That day I went for 45 minutes on the elliptical.  After that I lifted weights.  Wow, did it feel good.  But I couldn't figure out why I didn't feel motivated.  I was ready to workout when I got to the Y, so why did things change or slow down when I got on the elliptical.

Thru this journey, I am discovering things about myself I never knew and what motivates me.  I find the first song that plays on my iPod sets my mood for my whole workout.  The day it took me 18 minutes to get motivated a soothing, slow tempo song came on first.  Today, when I was able to get a great workout in the first song that played was a very upbeat, motivating song.  So, now I need to make a playlist for just songs to listen to during my workout.  I have some that I know I want on the list, but I am open to suggestions of songs that others like to listen to while working out.

What else I have discovered is that I can move and get into tight spots that I struggled with before.  The Y here has an indoor play park.  The kids love it.  It is great to have this area available for the kids to burn off energy when we can't be outside.  William is getting more comfortable in the play park, but he usually goes up once, comes down the slide and is done.  Today that was not the case.  He went up and came down the slide and then went back up.  When he was up in one of the tunnels he spit up a bit, so up I went with some wet wipes to clean it up.  I was amazed and how easy it seemed to get up the stairs and thru the tunnels.  It was nice to be able to do it.  I even got to go down the slide!  So, while the weight may not be coming off quickly, I am noticing a difference in my body and I LOVE it.

So, another week and another weigh-in has passed.  I found my motivation this week and will keep working towards my goal of losing a few more pounds next week!

Dance Recital - February 2011

My girls are "tiny dancers".  They are beautiful, talented, dedicated, and care free spirits when it comes to dancing and so many other activities.  This past weekend we had the wonderful opportunity to watch both Julianne and Katelyn dance on the "big stage".  Julianne did two dances, Loot Scootin' and Music.  Katelyn did one, See My Balloon.

Both girls did a wonderful job and had a great time.  I am glad to see them doing something they enjoy and are succeeding at it.  I know they will both miss the studio here when we leave, but will find a new one they will like just as much!

Julianne during dress rehearsal for Loot Scootin'.

Posing for a picture in costume.

Julianne with some friends, Abbey (in pink) and Emily (in red).

Katelyn in her costume for her dance.  She was being a stinker and would not let me take a picture of her posing!

After about 10 minutes she finally posed for a picture.

When she would get warm, her costume would start to itch, so I folded the top down and she thought it was HILARIOUS!

The girls posing together.  I wish I had a better picture, but this is it.

Julianne and some of the girls that performed Music.

Julianne posing.  I love the form she has!!

Julianne will be going to competition in about a month in this costume, dancing to Music. 

I am one proud Mama of my girls.  They both did a FANTASTIC job dancing on the "big stage".  They smiled, remembered their choreography, and had fun.  Each day they continue to amaze me with their talent, dedication, abilities, and love.  I hope I can help to keep each of these things going and help them to grow into young women who contribute to society and are strong all on their own.

They are beautiful both inside and out and will ALWAYS be my little girls!!

Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day...a little late!  We had a great Valentine's Day this year.

It started of with pancake and strawberry face.

 Julianne and Katelyn were excited when they got to breakfast.

William enjoyed his breakfast also.

After breakfast the girls posed for a few pictures.

 Aren't they adorable and lovely?!?!

After having some fun in the morning, I got balloons for all 3 kiddos.

William did not want to let go of his while he had lunch! 

Katelyn loved her balloon too!

Some more posing by the girls!

 It is a challenge to get all 3 kids to smile and look at the camera, but I was lucky to get 2 good pictures!

MY BEAUTIES!

 MY HANDSOME LITTLE MAN!

I even got a picture with my little man thanks to Julianne!

All in all it was a great day to celebrate the love we share for each other, family and friends!

Powerful memory...

I hear a lot of parents say their child has a "steel trap" for a mind.  Meaning, their child remembers EVERYTHING!  I say this frequently about my kids too.  This is especially true for Julianne!

Most nights we read stories before bed.  Right now we are reading Bible stories from a book that has made the stories easy for the kids to understand.  The girls love this book and get excited to read a couple stories each night.

Tonight, as I am reading the Bible stories to the girls I come across the name of a town (Nineveh) and started to stumble over the word, wanting to say Nine-vah.  Julianne looks at me and says it is Nin-a-vah.  I looked at her in amazement and she says, "Veggie Tales mom"!  She says it as if I should know that.

This isn't the first time she has had to help ME!  What is going on here?  Maybe I should start watching Veggie Tales to learn more about the Bible and how to pronounce towns and the names of people.  I am so excited to know that while she is at "daycare" on Wednesday nights, she is actually learning something and that on Sunday morning in Sunday school she is paying attention to the lesson.

What I do love so much about this is her fascination to learn and her ability to remember.  So many times we struggle to teach our children and wonder if they are listening to us or to their teachers and then we are surprised to learn they are.  This is so true in so many aspects!

To continue on with the Bible stories...

Before I start a new story we talk about the title and if either of the girls knows anything about it.  Katelyn sometimes remembers one or two little things about the story.  Julianne on the other hand can usually tell me most of the story!  I am proud that my little girl, okay my big girl, continues to learn about the Bible and Jesus.  What a blessing our Bible book is, as it has brought me closer to my girls thru God's word!

Julianne...learning to correct

At school Julianne is learning about the proper way to correct writing papers.  I think this is awesome.  However, I noticed something the other day when she was writing a story.  She was purposely not capitalizing words and leaving out punctuation.  I waited to see what she would do and she went back and corrected it.  Underlining the letter that should have been capitalized 3 times and then writing the capital letter by it.  Then she went and put the little sign for insert and put in the punctuation mark.  When I asked her why she was not writing it correct the first time (and she clearly knew she wasn't), she said she liked to go back and "correct" her paper because it is fun to add in all the fun correcting marks!

Maybe I have an English teacher on my hands!

I love it, I just hope she grows out of this phase because it drives me batty!

I had to just laugh when I opened a paper from school that she did and she had corrected herself!

Katelyn the witty...

Each morning we have a routine.  Get out of bed.  Get ready for school.  Eat breakfast.  Shoes and coat on.  Get in the car and buckle up.  The girls are usually good about doing all of this.  Once I have William in the car and buckled up we are off to drop the girls off at school (on Tuesdays and Thursdays they both have school).  On the way to school we talk about what is going on for the day and what they each have after school.  Today happens to be dance day for both girls.  I usually remind them of this a few times in the morning or they say I didn't tell them.  As Julianne got out of the car this morning, I reminded her one last time that she has dance tonight.  She just gives me that look that says, "You already told me, why are you telling me again?!?!"  I tell her have a good day and we are off to take Katelyn to preschool.

On the way to preschool Katelyn asks if she has dance tonight.  I tell her "Yes".  She says do I get to dance on the "big stage" tonight.  I tell her "No, that is on Saturday."  "Oh", she says.  Next she asks, "Are you going to put my hair in a bun?"  I tell her again, "On Saturday".  She then continues on, reminding me that buns do not stay in her hair.  I tell here, "Mommy will get it to stay in."  She then replies, "Are you going to use Jell-o?" I started laughing and reply, "No, I will use gel to get your bun to stay in."  She looks at me in the most serious way and says, "Close enough, they are pretty much the same!"  I just left it at that, no use in arguing with the logic of a 4-year old.

Oh how I love her and how she makes everything seem so simple.  I can't imagine using Jell-o to get her hair to stay in a bun, it is nasty once it is in hair (yes, I know from experience...Jell-o wrestling at USD).  I think I will stick to the gel for her hair and let her eat some Jell-O!