Last Day of School.....

I can't believe school is over... it seems like this year has flown by!

Brylee to me has not changed much but

Jackson has gone from a little boy

missing his two front teeth

to a big boy with grown up teeth

I see the most change in him!

We are ready for summer!!!!

Jackson's End of the Year Party...

Jackson had his end of the year party... I guess when you get to second grade there are no slide show video or "program"... it's come watch us eat pizza and brownies... how exciting! :) So basically I just followed Jackson around and took pictures of him and his friends...

i know this is blurry :( my camera was on manual focus but i still like it anyway!

thanks goodness the rest turned out...

i have decided you are pretty goofy in second grade... all these boys just make goofy faces in every picture...

jackson and his sweet teachers...

oh how we are going to miss mrs. joseph (and mrs. craig too)

but mrs. joseph was really "his teacher"

she is beyond the best...i can't believe i have a third grader...

that just seems so old!

Baseball End of the Season Party!

saturday was jackson's last baseball game and it was a GREAT game to end on... we beat a team that was undefeated in the second half... it was great for our boys to end with a BIG WIN!!!!

after the game we had our end of the season team pool party...and jackson added another trophy to his collection...

we had a great time hanging out the team,

grilling out hot dogs and enjoyed a yummy cookie cake too! Great Season as a Chelsea Ray... now onto more baseball Chelsea 7U All stars!!!!!

Brylee's End of the Year Party....

brylee had her end of the year celebration and class party. They all came in dress like pirates and sang a pirate song and said some poems too... it was so cute! :)Then they all got their Kindergarten Certificates... i can't believe I no longer have a kindergartner???

we love sweet mrs. prine :)

they enjoyed pizza and cookie cake... so proud of my big girl!!!Look Out FIRST GRADE... here comes Brylee!!!!

Jackson's 8th Birthday Pool Party!

Who plans a birthday party on Friday 13th and truly expects it to be fine????

That would be ME!!!!

Well... it was FINE (i guess) but not without LOTS of STRESS!!!

Jackson's birthday is may 2nd and he wanted a swim party so i decided to do it a few weeks later in May to let it "warm up".... ha ha ha ha ha ha... welcome to the south where you can swim on thanksgiving day, wear shorts on christmas, have snow in april, and wear your coat in may!

Needless to say my plan did not go as planned! All last week RP kept telling me it is going to rain... you are not going to have that party... don't go buy anything... cancel the room reservation... don't order a cake etc etc etc... well fast forward to thursday night... the night before the party and RP realizes OH MY you are going to get that party in... well really??? and then i wake up friday morning and it is beautiful outside... OMG!!!! I have nothing for this birthday party!!!!!!

Thank goodness for an understanding boss... ashley said take the morning... go buy what you need and get it done... so we had the most "thrown together" birthday party ever (b.c we really did not have another time to re schedule... due to baseball, end of school, etc)... i went to walmart and just bought what they had... blue cupcakes, birthday plates, water toys for party favors... i went from no party to party in about 2 hours...

*** side note... i get to work and was there for about 30 minutes... on THE busiest day of the year b.c it was our 50% off sale day... phones were ringing off the wall, emails were dumping in in boxes and the store was packed and get a call from the school Brylee has pink eye.... what????? and yes you have to come get here.... OH ME OH MY!!!! I get in the car, call my mom and have a 3 year old tantrum!!!! What else could go wrong???? Thank goodness my sweet dad was working from home and was willing to have a little helper.... and by the way she DID NOT have pink eye... and still doesn't... REALLY??? i was not happy to say the least!!!!****

back to the birthday party... well we ended up having it... I threw it together in about 30 minutes before everyone arrived and guess what they BOYS had a great time and in the grand scheme of things it really did not matter that is was or was not planned!

Now it was a whopping 65 degrees and windy and the pool was outside and not heated and they froze when they got out... but they truly had a great time playing like rowdy little boys!!! :)

The Pool Party in Pictures... and there are not many of those either!!!! the boys had the most fun throwing water balls at each other...it was way cold by the time we did cupcakes

and the wind kept blowing out the candles

one fun bunch a boys!!!!

Happy Birthday Jackson Man!

I am glad we got your swimming birthday party in...

even if it was not the nice warm planned birthday party we thought it would be

it was a birthday party none the less

and you and your buddies had a great time!

Teacher Appreciation Gifts...

Last week was teacher appreciation week at the school. This is a week I really feel like is so important. Being a former educator and having an educator for a spouse... i can say teaching is probably the most rewarding job but yet the job you feel the most unappreciated. So i always make a point to make my children's teachers feel loved, appreciated, and most of all thanked for all they do!

One thing our school does is send the teachers off campus to eat lunch at a local restaurant like a "real person"... this may sound so dumb but it is a really big deal as a teacher to get take out food for lunch and an even bigger deal to go "out to eat". I have the chance to go be teacher for 2 hours in Brylee kindergarten class. I had fun spending those few hours with her and her class but I was equally as glad to go and very thankful for my non teaching job! I love my BBTN girls! :) One Cool Kindergarten Crew! :)

Below are the gifts that i gave to the teachers each day (there are 3 b.c brylee has one teacher and jackson has 2) just in case you need a few ideas for the future... none of these are my original idea... i may have added an original touch but all of these came from blogger ville! :)

We had a different theme each day!

Day 1: Wear red and give your teacher a hug! So we gave them a little treat too...

idea found here...

Day 2: Supply Day: We made them these cute little Post E Note pads... this might be my favorite one all week! :) idea found here

Day 3: Snack Day: We sent M&M's with a cute little poem!i can't find the site i got the poem from :(

Day 4: Something to Pamper Yourself...we gave Coffee Shop Gift Cards... I know this was a stretch for the theme... but coffee is pampering right? I just loved this little card and idea i just wanted to use it so i did...Day 5: Write a Note... so we wrote a note and gave beach towels too! I enjoyed making the gifts each night and honestly i did not break the bank either... all these gift ideas were fairly inexpensive, yet nice! All teachers want is to know is that you love them and appreciate all the time, money, and effort they invest in your child.

My Little Flower Child...

Last year we took pictures in the red "flowers"... well this year we missed the red "flowers" so we decided to take pictures in the yellow "flowers"...

i love you baby girl...

Mother's Day....

we had a great mother's day weekend celebrating with our families... saturday we celebrated with richard's mom and family with a picnic at the park... no pictures from that... sunday after church we went to my parents and the guys grilled kabobs for us and we had sides too... we enjoyed a nice meal and then the kids played in the water and on the slip and slide... i did not do very good taking pictures... only a few! :(

these are the precious gifts my sweet babies made me at school and were so excited to give them to me on Friday when the got off the bus... i must say there is nothing money can buy that are better than these... i love their little homemade gifts! :)

nannie and mr mark came up mother's day weekend...

we enjoyed seeing them...

me and my babies on Mother's Day....

these little cuties are what makes this day so special...

i am blessed to be their mommy!

More from the Ball Park...

Baseball season is coming to a close... we only have a few games left... i hate to say it but i am ready for this season to be over... our poor little team is not very good... and i am way to competitive to sit and watch us loose game after game... especially this second half we have only won one game... it has been rough... but hopefully Jackson will get the opportunity to play all stars again this year... so we can play some "real baseball". :) Cousins Katie and Zac are playing t-ball this season and we actually had an early baseball game so we got to see them play too...

Katie (decked out in all her pink accessories) up to bat

Zac ready to run... Three Little Ball Players...

Jackson thinks that catcher is the coolest position on the field... he ask all the time to play catcher only b.c he thinks the equipment is so cool... and not to sound mean but in our league the catcher is where you "hind" one of your players... the catcher is just not real important in our league...first base or pitcher covers home and the catcher stays against the back stop if there is a play at home... but one game richard let jackson play catcher the last inning... to say he was excited was an understatement...

he took his "job" very serious... takin' that catchers mask off and covering the plate

i know the coach that pitched was glad to have jackson back there...he actually had someone who could get the ball back to him..i am not knocking the catcher... just simply explaining how it works in our league... i know there will come a time when catcher is very important but just not 7&8 ball... this was also the day they had the dunking booth at the ball park and all the coaches took turns getting in it... here is daddy's turn and as you can see Jackson was all excited about dunking his daddy and he did it several times. :)

Happy 8th Birthday Jackson Man!

today was the big day... my baby boy turns 8 years old... richard and i were talking this morning about how fast these 8 years have gone by... it truly seems like yesterday he was born... and in 8 years he will be DRIVING... gasp! :)

Today for his birthday we all went to breakfast at Bojangles, the daddy went to lunch with him and brought Popsicles for his birthday snack, then we went to mt fuiji for dinner and of course tree top to end the celebration! We had a great day celebrating!the lucky little guy won 1000 tickets on the plinko game...

he was so excited! :) Happy Birthday Jackson Man!

(see below for his bama birthday bash)

(his friend birthday party is next week)

Bama Birthday Bash!!!!!

We had Jackson's 8th Bama Birthday Bash last night with our family! Jackson always know EXACTLY what he wants in all situations and his birthday party wishes was no different. I was talking with his last week asking him what he wanted to do for his "family birthday party". He told me he wanted a surprise party... of course I laughed b.c you don't really plan your own surprise party! (he watches G**d Luck Charlie and Teddy has a surprise party that is where this whole thing came from) After much thought i decided to make his "theme" a surprise and he just happen to have to baseball pictures that afternoon so i would have everyone here, decorate the house, and then he would come home and we would all yell surprise... and that is just what we did! :) He LOVED it!!!!! (BTW I am an Auburn fan so to have this much Bama Stuff in my house was tough... but like they saying goes... i would do anything for my little man) Decoration (thank goodness Nonnie has lots of tasteful Alabama stuff)

Here's the BIRTHDAY BOY coming home to his Surprise Party! :)Happy 8th Birthday to my Jackson-Man! Present Time...He got some great presents:

Granny & Pap Pap: Row Boat and Oars for the lake; GoGo & Grandaddy: Baseball Bat (he opened a plastic bat and ball b.c it was on order);Nonnie & Poppie: Alabama Baseball Jersey; Zac & Katie: Snorkel, Mask & Water Gun;KK: Money; Cathy & Randy: more Moo-la

His Birthday Cake.... My Big 8 YEAR OLD!!!!

GoGo, Grandaddy & the b'day boy!Granny & Pap Pap We love you Jackson Man!

Happy Birthday Jackson! we love you so much and hope you had the best bama birthday bash!