YOLO

YOLO! {You only live once!! A new  hip term I just learned. YOLO!!}
So why not jump in the lake on the last day of 3rd grade with some of your best buds?!?!

Here's to summer, and spending it at home with my kiddos!!! So happy.

Ari, I'm very excited to cross off the many fun things we have on our list of things to do.

For one, make Nutella pops!

Pumpy

My heart gets a little pumpy on the last couple days of school.

I have that excited/sad feeling where I keep having to take deep breathes over and over again. And I'm not even in school!!!

It's been a good year. Some major learning experiences but overall, a good year.

I've loved watching Ari grow into such a little lady.

These last 4 years have FLOWN by and I'm really proud of her...I think she learned a lot of life lessons this year. Which for a 3rd grader can be hard.

But here's to the last weekend before school is out!! Woot Woot. Couldn't be more thrilled to spend it with you and your little bro bro.

Getting ready

For Cali. Cali. Cali.

It's been a rough day. Really hard parenting day. Really hard lessons learned today. Parenting is so hard, and it's only going to get harder, but such a blessing!  And since Lu and her friends are now followers of this blog (which I love) I'm going to leave it at this.
Be kind to one another.
Be honest.
Be strong.

And we're off to Cali for my sweet cousin's wedding.
Ari has a flower girl to play.
And Briggs gets to meet a ton of people he hasn't ever met.

Really excited.

Wonderland

Drama is over!!! So glad, to be honest I'm not a fan of it and wasn't a fan of this after school activity (maybe because it made Lu cry?!?!?). But sometimes you gotta just let your littles do what they want to do.

They did a great job. Such an improvement from last year.

Here's to the cast of Alice in Wonderland.

Ari played a wonderful 3 of hearts and Iris the flower.

Sluggerrrrr

 We want a pitcher not a belly itcher.

 P. U. M. P  pump it up pump pump pump it up

Hey you, on 2 can i get a whoooot whoooot

We want a single, just a little single. S. I. N. G. L. E. single. single. single.

Mean while Case wants his toy back...

 And decides that Briggs' hand will do.

Auntie

Uncles

The Bandits Season has ended.

Next up, summer.

158

Laps around the track = one full marathon!

Lu! You did it! You completed a marathon. You are awesome. You've tried to finish this each year...and this year you did it!

I'm proud of you.

Free Time

At school, Lu gets 30 minutes of free time on...FRIDAYS.

This past week she told me that her and her buddies checked out my blog on the school computer. YELP!

SO GIRLS, this one is for you!!

a pinterest find

Cake Pops!

Every month Ari has Market at school (where they are able to buy other students crafts with the fake money they earn, pretty cool if you ask me). And this month, she partnered with a buddy who was making Cake Pops. Sooooooo, that meant we had to make some of these little yummy balls as well.... and I just happen to have a couple for breakfast.

Side note: Coaster Boy takes Ari to school every morning (love him) and there were some tears on the way to school. Let's just say, said cake pops didn't survive a little bump in the road and they went flying. Thankfully, all survived but one.
Zeb said, there were 2 minutes of tears. This makes me giggle. I love him. I can totally picture them on the side of the road picking up these dang little balls. How the heck are you supposed to transport them? I stuck them all in a styrofoam ball...

They are really stinkin cute. And good. Next time, less frosting.

I would totally make these for a wedding, baby shower, birthday....

Green Thumb

Ari is helping Nonnie with her garden.

They planted thyme, cilantro, tomatoes, jalapenos, rosemary, sage, mint and oregano.

Love them gardening together. These are memories Lu will never forget.

xoxo

Countdown

Here we go.

21 days until SCHOOLS OUT FOR SUMMER!

Meet Furry

This here, little, furry, fluffy, hairy guy (who creeps me out) was Lulu's pet for the last week.

She found him when we were walking home from the bus stop.

He was standing smack dab in the middle of the sidewalk.

Ari said to me, how lucky am I?

She proceeded to build him a mobile home out of her legos.

She would come in our room in the morning for snuggle time with him in her hand (and was sent right back out until he was no longer visible).

Yesterday while rearranging her room I found Furry under her American girl doll bed. I screamed.

And that was the end of Furry.

I told Lu it was time for Furry to go back to where he came from.

She cried instantly. TEARS. Huge. Red Eyeballs. Sobs.

What if bird eats him????.......................tears...rolling...down her face.

We need to get this girl a pet. Stat.

Dear Lulu

It's been a minute since I've written you a little love letter and as I was cleaning the house I stumbled across 2 things. A book you made me for mother's day in kindergarten and a book I received from my besties full of all my best gals memories they've had with me...and it had me thinkin and teary up.

You are in 3rd grade. The same year I met (and became friends with) people I still know to this day (Rae to name one) and had so many fun memories with. She was part of this memory book I was reading and it made me realize you will probably know some of your friends you know today in high school and when you're in your 30's like Meme. And I just have to say a couple things to you.

Friendships will change. But you should never let a friendship end. No matter what, you might not be as close, and may have differences but don't let those things ruin your friendship.

Be kind. I know this is hard, when girls brag about their big houses and boats and 5 lululemon zip ups...those things don't matter. Remember Lu, when we die we don't take ANYTHING with us. So all these "things" really aren't needed and honestly don't make you cool. Your personality does that. I know this is so hard to understand now...someday when you are older it will be easier.

Be adventurous. I know I don't instill this in you very much when I say you don't have to jump off the dock if you don't want too...but I guarantee if you do, you will love it. Some of my favorite memories involve adventure (riding my bike to Zips, sneaking a rated R movie, staying in AZ when my mom flew home).

Be spontaneous. Again, some of my favorite memories are when I just do something that isn't planned. Again, hard for you little rule followers but I encourage you to sometimes just do something that isn't routine and this doesn't include not brushing your teeth in the morning.

Love. Hard. Love. Big. Love. Fierce.

Be honest. The biggest lie I told to my friends...surfaced years later when my best friend started dating her hubby.  Honestly is so important and always ends up biting you in your firm booty later.

Hug your friends. I am getting better at this. I wasn't a big hugger, but now...I think it's so important to hug those you care about. Hug your hubby. Hug your momma. Hug everyone. No one gets annoyed of a hugger.

Be confident. So important. You are an amazing little person. Your heart is so big, you follow the rules, you love animals. You LOVE facts. Be proud of who you are. I am.

Forgive. Forgive. Forgive.

Dance. Probably one of my favorite things to do. Even at home, alone. Just dance. Especially with your girls. Best type of dancing is with your girls.

I love you little Lu. My little pumpkin patch. My little girl who keeps saying: I'm almost as tall as you.

xoxo,

Meme

PS. I love my coupon book. I'm almost positive it will as an entire year.

My favorite one is: Picking out meme's outfit.

xoxo

1st

Lulu playin 1st...
I love her at 1st. Probably my favorite position. If I ever played softball, I would want to play 1st.
All the action is at 1st.

This morning

I found this little set up in Ari's room.

A mini classroom. Each creature had a table group # and a name tag. This melted my heart a little bit.

This girl was such a trooper this weekend...waiting around a lot for me while feeding brother.  I did learn that she knows what MASH is and there is even an app for it!! I love that she still plays with her littlest pet shops.

Love you mucho Lu.

Friendship

I got a text from one of Ari's friend's mom last night at 10pm asking if we could talk, regarding the girls. My heart immediately sank as I thought of what the heck it could be. I thought it had to do with Ari and this little girl both being "brown" and being excluded, or made fun of...or maybe Ari was telling her friend everything she was learning in her new Body Book we were reading (a great book about puberty, etc for girls) and her mom wasn't ok with all the details Ari was giving? Then I thought maybe Ari stole something...my mind went a little crazy for those short 2 minutes until I called the mom.

A very long story short. Ari's little posse was leaving a member of their posse out and it was really affecting her. Which it would anyone...and my heart broke a little bit. I totally knew how she felt and I think we all have been in that situation...at school, work, whatever. And it urked me a little bit that Ari was part of this excluding deal. Which, I'm sure I was apart of many of times back in the day. But I wasn't having it and I hated to think of Ari's dear friend sitting alone at lunch because "the girls" didn't want to sit next to her. Ugh.  

So this morning, during our daily morning snuggle time with Briggs, I brought up how important it is in life to honor our friendships, to be kind to one another, even when we don't agree or when maybe standing up for someone might not be the cool thing to do. I told Lu that if she was in her friend's shoes she would be so sad, and she got a little teary. I know Ari knew what she was doing wasn't right...

This conversation brought me to so many amazing post that Momastery does. And THIS one (click on this to read) is so, so, so good about friendships and girls. What it comes down too is, we need to take care of each other.

And just like I told Lu this morning. We have to be kind to our friends, because when we are sad or left out, when the world is not our favorite place to be, our friends are the ones that are there to make us feel better.

I really hope it clicked for Lu.

The Backpack

I love searching through Ari's backpack.

There are all kinds of good finds in there. Letters from her friends, pieces of bark, little treasures she finds on the playground (that I always throw away)

This morning, while going through her school work from the week I found this little gem.

A is for animal Lover!!! Love m
R is for runner ---Fast---
I is for inopendenet. Smart!
A is for avancherous. I've gone threw a forest!
N is for never gives up on tests.
N is for no pets :(
A is for awsome cool :)

J is for joiful. Hip hip hurray!
O is for only one brother.(she drew a picture of a baby saying waaa waaa)
I is for in love with sports! Softball, basketball, soccer, football

I is for I love mustard
S is for smart. I'll tell you anything
S is for sintific. I love sience
A is for attitude is good (in my opion)

B is for Briggs, my little brother
L is for lots of stuffed animals. My room is full of them.
A is for actress when older
L is for lisner. I lisen to all your questions
O is for ola. I can speak spanish
C is for colorful cloths
K is for Kirkland. I live in Kirkland in 3rd grade.


I love it. Every bit of it is so true. I hate that she put no animals for N and LOVE that she put "ola" for hola. She definitely get her spelling from her momma.


xoxo

Lulu Lemon

So sometimes I call Lulu...lululemon.
Any who, we crafted yesterday. Like we do at the end of every month for her school market...so she can make bank and then go buy a bunch of other crap crafts from the other kiddos.

And what better way to get rid of a large wooden box of crayons that have accumulated over the past 8 years?

Melt them all together to make little hearts and nuggets.

Lovely if you ask me.

Thanks pinterest for the brilliant idea. You are becoming my all time favorite pass time.

Sorry blog that you are being neglected.

Quicky

Just a quick little sledding/igloo making trip to finish off a busy day at the office {see post below} errrr couch.

It's supposed to snow 8 inches tonight.

Bring it.

Classic.

Every time

I pick up Lulu from a slumber party there is always something new to learn.

Today when I picked her up, she had new red highlights.

I kind of like them.

Press On

Lu's been wanting fake nails for...ever.

So today we got her some broadway dive nails.

Before tucking her into bed, I asked her how she is going to play bball with them on.

She said since I put so much glue on them, she had no idea.

I don't remember lee-press-on nails having glue?

Just little sticky tabs?