A Short Time in Pre-K

Lucas and Megan will soon be moving on to their new school, so Megan will only be in Pre-K at Bright Horizons for a month.  She was lucky enough to get one of the teachers Lucas had, Ms. Carol.  She also got to know Ms. Stephanie for a bit.

Happy Birthday Daddy!

Daddy should be more careful when he allows someone else to pick what kind of cake he gets.  :)  Megan already knew she wanted a castle cake for her birthday, so that's what she said Daddy should get, too.  Mommy didn't object since it gave her a chance to try out some things in preparation for Megan's cake.  We did try to make it less girly than Megan's cake would be, though.

Megan even spent some time reading to her babies today.  We really need to get her out of the bathroom when she's naming her babies.  I forget which these two are, but Towel, Mirror and Sunscreen have been the names she's been using lately.

Independence Day Fun

 After a hard day of trimming (and being put up in) trees ...

    

we headed to the Lake Zurich fireworks.  We were a little nervous after last year when Megan tried to watch, but also cover her ears and hide her head because she doesn't like loud noises.  This year she enjoyed them, so maybe we can start to get a little closer now.

Moving on to Pre-K

Megan transitions to Pre-K this week!  We're going to miss Ms. Eula and Ms. Tiffany ... Lucas and Megan both did awesome in their class and came home knowing things we never thought they would know.  Seriously, what 3-year-old sings about condensation and evaporation?

Happy 6th Birthday Alicia!

We got to celebrate Alicia's 6th birthday today!  Ignoring the small amount of rain, it was a beautiful day for a birthday celebration at a park.  In addition to a tasty grill-out and an awesome Snow White cake by Heather, the kids all got to enjoy the petting zoo, playgrounds and a pony ride.  I think the pony ride was a hit.  :)

Go Gray Swords

Lucas loves playing soccer. Based on the statistician on his team that kept score (even though there wasn't supposed to be any score keeping), the Gray Swords won most if not all of their games. Lucas' favorite part was scoring lots of goals (his best was 3 in one game!).

Bye-Bye to Abby

Megan's friend Abby is moving to San Diego, so we wanted to get one last play date in before she left.  What better place to hang out than the zoo?  We got some great up-close views of many of the animals and had a great time with Abby and her family.

Kindergarten Graduation

Lucas graduated from Bright Horizons Kindergarten today!  Their ceremony was very impressive.  After a precession, they recited their morning poem, including "Mistakes are good, they help us grow, they teach us we need to know."

(sorry for the bad conversion ... working on a better one)

Each graduate took their turn on the bridge to share the two favorite things they learned over the last year.  Lucas was happy to have learned about the ocean and dinosaurs.  They also sang a couple of songs with Ms. Lily, their Chinese teacher, and she gave them each a red dragon and a page with their name in Chinese.  After that, it was graduation time!  As they went through their class, Ms. Lisa and Ms. Sarah handed out their diplomas.  I think a lot of kids were timid in front of the large group of proud parents and family, but they did great!

We're very proud of our Superdude!

Car Wash Service

The kids seem to have an appreciation for cleaning, at least on their terms. Back in February (and several times since), they really wanted to clean the bathroom. Now that it's nice outside, time to put them to work on Mommy's car. :)

Happy 2nd Birthday Hannah!

We got to celebrate Hannah's 2nd birthday today! The goldfish cupcakes were a big hit!

Wedding Bells

Megan's teacher Ms. Tiffany is getting married! To celebrate, all the kids in Hubble room dressed up for the occasion. :) Megan got to be paired up with her buddy Alex!

Space Diorama

Lucas made his second diorama for school ... this time with a space theme. He was very proud of the finished product. He had fun rolling little balls of clay and then painting them once they were baked. Convenient that he had an astronaut as part of one of his Lego sets. :)

Happy Easter

Time to make some pretty eggs!

Happy Easter! In order to get a nice picture, we also have to get a goofy picture. :)

Hunting for eggs in the backyard ...

Hilton Head Island

Vacation!!! We headed to Hilton Head Island to spend a week with Aunt Barb, her friend Wilma, Uncle Mike, Aunt Dawn, Kayla and Chelsea. We had an awesome time! We had a heated pool at our house, so we spent a fair amount of time in the water between the pool and the ocean. We also got to visit several parks and several ice cream shoppes (Lucas determined "Blue's Clues" was his favorite - blue raspberry with marshmallows, and Megan liked pink cotton candy best). We also made a trip to Savannah to dine at Ms. Wilkes' Dining Room ... after an hour or so, we finally got in and enjoyed massive amounts of food ... very tasty!



The kids loved the water. They spent more time in the pool than the adults since the pool heater quit working, but the adults had fun with them for a few days. Everyone had a great time at the beach, we just had to watch out for the many jellyfish. We found shells and sand dollars, dug holes, buried parts of people, made sand castles, chased seagulls, splashed in the water, played frisbee and more.

Our Little Cuties

Water, Water, Snow

In preparation for our trip to the beach, more swimming lessons.

Then over to the Kluesner house for some outside water in its frozen white form. :) We all had a blast sledding down the hill, across the walkway, and sometimes through (under?) the evergreen trees.

"Campout"

Lucas and Megan attempted a sleepover in Lucas' room last night.  Attempted, because after two hours of playing around, they were sent to their own beds, but they had fun anyway.  I'm not sure they had enough stuffed animals, though.

Happy 1st Birthday Nathaniel & Ben

Today we got to celebrate Nathaniel & Ben's birthdays at a double birthday bonanza! Twice the birthdays, twice the cake and twice the birthday fun! Their smash cakes were pretty cool!

100th Day of Kindergarten!

Lucas and his class celebrated 100 days of Kindergarten today! Everyone made their shirts with 100 100s on them to wear for the day, and took in 100 of something edible and 100 of something non-edible ... for snack and to decorate their sign, respectively.

When the parents showed up for the celebration, the kids calmly kept listening to Ms. Lisa reading a book. Impressive, considering that as soon as Ms. Lisa gave the okay, they all charged the parents and threw snowballs (cotton balls) at us. It was probably not easy for them to sit there hiding their cotton balls. :)

Play Date

We had a bunch of Megan's friends and their siblings over today for some lunch and some fun. I'm not sure if the play dates are more for the moms or the kids, but everyone has a good time.