Dance Recital 2011

I am not quite sure why I can't get my pictures in the order that I want for my blog posts, but oh well I guess. Friday was the girls dance recital and I am so proud of them, they did an excellent job. The theme was the Wonderful World of Dance and each class was assigned a different Disney movie song to dance to. The twins danced to Beauty and the Beast and Abigail danced to A Whole New World from Aladdin. All of the pictures are of the girls in their Ballet costumes. I was so busy getting everyone changed into their tap outfit that I totally forgot to take pictures. The girls each did one ballet dance and one Tap dance. The twins tapped to I Just can't wait to be king from the Lion King and Abigail tapped to Friend Like Me from Aladdin. It was a really cute recital. The girls favorite part was when the "REAL" princess came back stage to sign autographs in their dance programs. I also did not get pictures with the princesses, but the girls were in awe. The REAL princesses did an opening number and it featured Jasmine, Sleeping Beauty, Belle, Cinderella, Tinkerbell, Ariel, and Snow White. Back stage in the dressing room, one of the big girls does some stretches with the twins class. I would just like to say how much I love the studio that my girls dance at. They offer a variety of dance (Ballet, Tap, Jazz, Contemporary, Hip-Hop, etc.) and they are good at what they do. I think they are the perfect mixture of fun and professional and they turn out beautiful dancers. The older girls take care of the little ones and it is really like one big happy family. Just recently a graduate from DSDS made it to Vegas on So You Think You Can dance. She actually made it into the top 30 just shy of the top 20 chosen to be on the show. Pretty impressive, I think. Dance is very expensive and we have to sacrifice quite a bit to have our girls participate in it, but they love it and I can see everything it is teaching my little girls, which is why I think it is well worth the money. Also, the studio owner is LDS (she actually danced with the Osmond's) and I feel like she has a pretty good moral compass, so I don't need to worry about things being tasteless.

Elizabeth - Princess Belle

Mommy & Her 3 Beautiful Princesses

Emily - Princess Belle

Abigail - Princess Jasmine

Dancing Sisters

Wow, can I just say that it is a lot of work to be a dance mom of 3 little girls. It took me 2 hours to get the girls ready start to finish. I was exhausted. Thanks to Aunt Alana's suggestions we had some pretty good looking buns with the help of some hair pieces and a bun donut.

Crack Down

This blog post is really jumbled up. I couldn't get my text and pictures to go along with eachother and I don't want to take the time to type this up again, so it is kind of like a brain teaser trying to figure out which picture goes with which paragraph of text.

Picture #1 See Picture #2

Picture #3

Picture #4

June 1st was our last day of school. I have been really excited for the summer so that I could do some fun activities with the girls that I don't usually get to do during the school year. I also want to make sure that Abigail doesn't regress over summer with everything that she has learned this year. We have worked so hard. Another thing I want to do is teach my kids the importance of hard work and I want to do chores with them and stuff. I know, ambitious, right? Well, I was really excited about my plan, butI forgot that my kids don't always make life easy and even fun things aren't so fun when there is so much fighting, screaming, arguing, etc. going on. Especially when all three girls are together for an extended period of time (like the summer). So, this morning was the crack down. I came up with a few charts and rules so that I could keep my sanity, the girls had a goal to work towards and we could get to all the fun stuff.

Here they are... the potty charts.

See picture #4

"But wait" you say, "Aren't your twins 3 1/2 and potty-trained already?" My response to that is yes, friends, my twins have been potty-trained about 4-5 different times. I think we started discussing this when they were 2. This last time I was sure we were in the clear cause both girls had gone an entire week with not one single accident. That is what I get for thinking. We are back to several accidents a day now for what seems to be the one-thousandth time. We even threw a party last time and did a conga line all around the house when I was sure the twins were potty-trained for good. This is getting beyond frustrating and ridiculous and the thing is that I know the girls can do it. I think they choose not to sometimes out of sheer laziness or just not paying attention to what their bodies are telling them to do. So here we go AGAIN on the potty-training. This time, they get a sticker if they go in the potty, but they have to get an X through a sticker if they have an accident. Once they have 21 stickers on their chart with no X's we can go to Wal-mart and pick out a toy that is $10 or less from the store and if this doesn't work folks, I give up and they may just be wearing diapers at their high school graduation.

"Here we go again."
Elizabeth is a sneaky one. I have to keep an eye on this girl. She got a hold of the stickers that I was keeping safely tucked away and was filling her chart up. I made her remove all of the stickers and we had a chat about honesty. Little Stink!

See Picture #3
Thankfully Abigail is potty-trained, but she needs some improvement on listening, obeying, and doing things the first time that Darin and I ask without argument. So, this chart is very similar to the potty chart except she will get a sticker on the smiley face chart if she does what she is told the first time she is told to do it. If she doesn't do it or has to be reminded she gets a big X through her sticker. When she gets 21 stickers that don't have X's through them, she gets to pick a toy out at Wal-mart under $10. Why 21, you ask? Well, because it takes 21 times of doing something before it becomes a habit.

Picture #2

Nazi mom is out in full force. Do you remember the Zero Tolerance policies at your grade schools? Well my house now has a Zero Tolerance policy. I was beginning to notice that I have become more grouchy, loose my temper more than I should and I don't like how that feels. The things that frazzle me the most are screaming, fighting, and arguing. So, I now have a Zero Tolerance for those things and the children have been informed that they will be immediately removed from what ever they are doing if they start screaming, fighting, or arguing. There will be no negotiating or trying to talk things through. I just can't take any of that stuff. Today was the first day implementing these things and I think it went well for the most part until about 4:00 in the afternoon. I will try again tomorrow and see if we can make it to 5:00 with out any major issues.

(See picture #1) Now for the things that started this all. There are 3 jars that I have made a chore jar, a learning jar, and an activity jar. The girls get to pick out of these jars each day: chores first, then learning (reading, math, writing, etc.), then if they have finished those things the reward is the fun jar. The girls were really excited about this, so they really stayed on task with their chores and "homework" so they could get to the fun stuff. For our fun activity today we made a time capsule. We will be burying it in our backyard tomorrow and plan on opening it in 10 years when the girls are 16 & 13.

School's Out

Abigail's last day of school was today and she was very excited to begin summer. We have had a tough first grade year with the move right in the middle and all of the adjustment that goes with that, but I am so proud at the progress that she has made and excited for some fun things that we have planned this summer.

Re-Charging

Elizabeth fell asleep ontop of my laptop cord the other day. I had to laugh cause it literally looked like she was re-charging her battery.

Pocatello Zoo - May 2011

Shane (Heather's husband) had a sister in town so we decided to take the kids to the Pocatello Zoo. The zoo is just the right size for little legs and little attention spans. It doesn't have the exotic animals like lions, tigers, elephants, zebras, giraffes, and hippos, but it does have animals that are more in their natural Idaho habitat.

The kids favorite animal was the baby black bear cub that was only 4 months old. He was so cute, just like a little baby.
In the middle of the park the kids took a break to do a dinosaur dig.

Our friend Collin found the first bone.

There were "dophers" everywhere.

I felt so sad for this big grizzly bear. She was just pacing back and forth in a space no larger than my front living room. She seemed really crowded and unhappy.

We brought our friends the Evans with us to the zoo. They seemed to have fun. Notice how my kids are really hard to spot in any of these pictures. They wouldn't sit still long enough for me to take a picture of them. I loved the tree that they are standing under. I don't know what the tree is called, but I would love to have one in my front yard.

I think my favorite was this Peacock, although I don't think they are native to Idaho.

End of the School Year Fun

The kids at Abigail's school have been working so hard for the IRI (which is a state standardized test). Now that it is over, the kids can actually have fun. They had a field trip to the fire station, a local petting zoo, and a park. They have also had their Spring Carnival. One day, the first grade had a cook-out at the school where they had a magician and comedian come for entertainment. I am glad the kids (and teachers) are able to take it easier now. They have an un-birthday party for all the summer birthdays and a bubble party scheduled for next week. The last day of school is Wednesday, June 1st. Even though it was tough to start a new school in January, I think Abigail would tell you that she has enjoyed her first-grade year and I can tell you that she has learned ALOT.

Memorial Day Campout - Destination: Backyard

We had a camping trip planned for Memorial Day weekend, but not sure that the weather was going to cooperate and recovering from our extra expenses that we had on our surprise trip to Texas, we decided to cancel the mini vacation. The girls were a bit disappointed, so Darin, being the fun dad that he is, decided to set the tent up in the backyard. The girls had just as much fun and when it started raining at 2:30 in the morning we were able to escape into the warm house and we didn't have to worry about preparing food in the cold rain. We will have to reschedule a REAL camping trip later in the summer

The Wonderful World of Dance

Last Friday the girls had pictures for their dance classes. This year's theme for the younger student's recital is "The Wonderful World of Dance" each class is assigned a different Disney song to dance to. Abigail's ballet class is dancing to A Whole New World from Aladdin and the twins ballet class is dancing to Beauty & The Beast. They love dance and are excited that
their recital is coming up. As a side note, it took me 1 1/2 hours to get the girls ready with Darin's help. Being a "dance mom" of 3 little girls is going to be quite the adventure. The twins were very excited that I was putting make-up on them for the very first time.
Emily (Belle), Abigail (Jasmine), Elizabeth (Belle)

Elizabeth

Abigail

Emily

Garden

I love when the flowers bloom in the Spring! Here are some things we have going on in our front yard. The back yard still needs alot of work, so it may be a couple of years before I post pictures of it.

Bleeding Hearts by the front steps.

Old Wheel Barrow Planter

Milk Can, Tulips & Wagon Wheel

Whiskey Barrel with Phlox & Viola

Our House

When we first moved back to Idaho, I thought the exterrior of our house was rather drab and boring, but it is growing on me. Expecially since I can see grass. I took some pictures of our house the other day and thought my blog readers might like to see where we live. It is a one story house with a full basement and a one car garage. The layout is perfect for our family and it is just the right size. Behind our house is the field to the Elementary school. I am so glad that this is where our family landed.

It's Spring

I think Spring is finally here in Southeast Idaho! The girls were on their way to a birthday party and I decided to snap some photos of the little cuties. I like these pictures because they fit each one of the girls personalities perfectly!.

Emily

Classic Elizabeth

Abigail

Our Suprise Visit to Texas

Last weekend (5/13 - 5/17) we decided to hop in the car and drive 24 hours straight to Texas. My adopted grandmother (Grand Bev) passed away just before then, and I really wanted to go to her funeral cause she was a major part of my life for the past 20 years. Darin and I did some math and figured it would cost the same for me to get a last minute plane ticket as it would for the entire family to go on a road trip. Yes, we are crazy to subject ourselves to 48 hours of driving in a 96 hour time span, but we did it and the kids had a blast and I got to say goodbye to a good lady. My parents were totally surprised, they had no idea that we were coming and it was great seeing the shock on their faces. Of course the girls had to hit the pool, but I didn't dare swim because it was only 65 degrees.

My parents just happened to have some Texas shirts for the girls and they were excited to wear them on their trip back to Idaho.

Flowers For You

The other day the girls picked me a bunch of "flowers" and knocked on the door with huge grins on their faces "for you" they said. How could I resist that bunch of weeds they had picked for me. We decided that they would look best on our picnic table outside and used a 5 gallon bucket as a vase. It's the thought that counts, right?