OCTOBER 2015

Remember last year how Zachery won the Freddy Falcon Award?  Well it has been six weeks and at the first Pride Rally both Zachery and Zayne were chosen from their teacher to receive the Respect award.  It was so cool that both of them won the award!!
Charlie and I are very proud of them!! Yes, Zayne was not shy and he was very excited!!

The kindergartners every year have a storybook parade.  They pick one of their favorite books and dress-up as their favorite character.  Zayne is Mortimer from the book Mortimer.  It was fun to see all the different characters!  Zayne loved seeing all the parents and hearing his name as he walked the halls.  

We had a lot rain and the boys were restless, so we decided to go puddle splashing.  Zachery is starting to become a little bit more cautious as he gets older, so he didn't dive into the mud as he once did.  But Zayne had a blast and even laid down in the mud! So all and all it was a success! I think it was funny to watch people look at us like we were crazy, allowing these kids play in the puddles.

 

Our annual trip to the Texas State Fair, I have to be honest was not that fun this year! We decided to take the Dallas Area Rapid Transit (DART) down to the fair this year, which was fun, but the heat and the number of people this year made it not very enjoyable.  We did our normal rounds at the Hands on Garden area and the Tractor Pull.  But by the time we were ready to ride rides, the line to purchase tickets was so long and moving at a snails pace.  After 40 minutes of waiting and watching two grown men get into a fight, I thought it was time to leave! We sure hope next year will be better!

 

As part of school, Zachery had to bring home a cabbage plant and take care of it.  He had to water it and leave it somewhere where it would get enough sunlight.  We were asked to take a picture with our cabbage plant a few weeks after it came home with us.  It honestly didn't grow much ... I guess we should have left it outside, but the squirrels or fox would have surely eaten it!

This year for Halloween we were invited to our neighborhood Halloween Party, where the kids pile onto a huge trailer while the adults walk slowly behind or next to the trailer.  The kids get dropped off at one end of the street and run from house to house and wait for the adults and trailer at the end of the street.  It was a little crazy, but mostly fun to meet more people in our neighborhood and watch all the kids run and have fun! I think the best part of the night was when all the kids got up and danced to a song, I had not even heard! But Zachery and Zayne knew the moves!!

Those cowboy boots!! This is Zayne's favorite outfit right now ... a tight red shirt, belt and cowboy boots.  All he is missing is his skinny jeans ... yes, he loves his skinny jeans!

Did we ever tell you that we had a fox living under our back porch? Its true ... and if you look closely you will see the fox in the picture below.  They sometimes wake us up at night with a very loud and weird sound!! But they are fun to look at and we are thankful for the reduction in the squirrel population!!

SEPTEMBER 2015

We started AWANA's this month as well.  With the lack of leadership in the T&T Group, which is where Zachery is now, Jay and I volunteered to be weekly leaders.  So we are enjoying working with these group of kids learning their memory versus.  But what is different about the T&T Group is that they also have to be able to explain why the memory verse is important and how it applies to their life.  They also have to spend time looking up versus in the bible and answering questions.  Anyways, we are excited about this year!  Zayne also moved up into Sparks, which means in our family that you get your own Bible so you can start reading all by yourself.  Zayne is super excited about that!

AIRSHOW

We decided to go to the Blue Angel Air Show this year out in Fort Worth.  It was fun and very cool to see all the different airplanes! We were sort-of disappointed that we were able to see the runway.  So if we go again next year we will have to purchase better seats, well we will have to purchase seats.  This year we just paid to enjoy the exhibit.  As you can see they had all different kinds of exhibits, what is it about a fire truck?? Anyways, once again it was hot and hard to enjoy the time there when we were all getting sunburned.

 

 FIRST SWIM MEET

We have been swimming all summer and it is time to see how we do at a swim meet! We only swam one event, the 25 Free.  I think they were nervous, well you couldn't tell if Zayne was ... look at that smile!! Anyways, they did GREAT! Zachery swam a 23.68 in the 25 free and Zayne swam a 37.54 in the 25 free.  I seriously think I had tears of joy as they swam their little hearts out.  Zayne was the youngest one therel! 

FALL BASEBALL 

Zachery had to play with another team during fall baseball.  He didn't enjoy it as much, but still did very well! He hit several home runs and played mostly shortstop or second base.  His field has improved, now we are just working on throwing without a sidearm.  So any hints on how to correct would be GREATLY appreciated!!  

Zayne also played with a different team this season.  We actually moved him up a year so he could play with kids that are playing at his level.  He isn't the best but he isn't the worst, so I think we have him in the right grade level.  At this age we are just continuing to work on throwing and catching.  But he is doing well.  He plays mostly outfield right now with occasional third base or short stop.  Anyways, it was a fun season of baseball and didn't last long!

  

 

FRIENDSHIP MINISTRY  

We have been trying to figure out how to teach the boys about community and helping in the community.  So we heard about the Friendship Ministry, where we adopt students from different countries that come to the United States to go to the University.  We met our our two students this month and are excited to get to know them throughout the year! Their names are Mahesh and Kartheek.  They are both from India and getting their master degrees.  They are both very nice!

    

AUGUST 2015

SPRING CREEK SWIMMING POOL FUN!

We joined the Spring Creek Club again this summer, for some swimming pool fun! What is nice is that several friends from school are members too so we are able to meet them up at the pool and play all afternoon!!

AFTER THE SPRING CREEK SWIMMING POOL FUN!

As the header implies, this is what Zachery and Zayne look like sleeping after a fun filled day at the pool!

 

PEROT SCIENCE MUSEUM

As summer is winding down, the boys are scrambling to think about anything and everything we can do that is "fun" before school starts.  So we went to the Perot Science Museum. We built race cars (I lost!) ... we experimented with wind ... were creative and made a crab out of paper ... played and put together giant dinosaurs ... and then ended our time doing science experiments!!

TRINITY RIVER AUTOBAHN CENTER ADVENTURE

Another adventure we took a very short hike around the Trinity River Autobahn Center.  It really wasn't exciting other than throwing rocks into the Trinity River and picking up sticks and complaining about the heat and humidity!  The Trinity River Audubon Center is located just ten miles south of downtown Dallas. The Center's 120 acres sits on a former illegal dump site, now a reclaimed haven for a vast array of birds and other wildlife in an increasingly urbanized metropolitan area. Anyways, we were able to have slurpee's after our adventure, so that made up for the lack of excitement.

NOT SURE WHAT ZAYNE WAS DOING - BUT FUNNY PICTURE!

FRISCO ROUGH RIDERS BASEBALL GAME

We finally made it to a baseball game this summer, it might not have been the Texas Rangers but it was the minor league team the Frisco Rough Riders.  We sat in the grass out over looking the outfield and had a blast watching the baseball game and eating hot dogs!  The boys ran around and found friends and wished they brought their swimming suits because there is an area they can play in a pool!!  We will definitely go again next year!

 

 FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL

I seriously though I was going to be in tears, as I send Zayne into Kindergarten or at least he would be in tears.  Nope everyone was super excited.  Zachery was very serious and it was hard to get a good smile from him ... but I think he was excited about being in the big kid hall this year.  Zachery has Ms. Perkins this year and Zayne has a new Kindergarten teacher Ms. Madison. 

Actually this wasn't the first day of school, he actually wore this the second day of school! Everyone loved it!! He got a lot of attention, which is something Zayne loves :)

KINDERGARTEN MEET-AND-GREET

This post got a little backwards ... we had a Kindergarten meet-and-greet, where the incoming Kindergartners (and parents) could meet their teachers and classmates.  As you can see they rigged up a hose and turned on the water for hours of entertainment (okay maybe not hours, but at least 10 to 15 minutes.