March 16 - Spring Break 2020

we made it! 

Beaches Jamaica...booked for summer 2016 and cancelled due to zika.

Beaches Jamaica...booked for summer 2019 and cancelled due to hurricane fears (I was willing to risk it but JD wasn't). 

Beaches Jamaica...booked for spring break 2020 and cancelled due to kids wanting to go Disney so we could have a vacation where we do everything together (opposed to JD doing things with Julia and Luke while Jillian and I do our own thing). 

So...needless to say, I am pretty sure I'm going to have to schedule a girls trip to Jamaica because it just isn't happening as a family trip. 

family photo attempt LOL

So, Disney. We made the change to Disney approx 6 months before our trip. As a family of 5, our on-site room choices shrunk to studios or extremely expensive 2-bedroom units (oddly, their 1-bedrooms rooms do not hold families of 5). Since we loved Wilderness Lodge last time we were there and they had studio option in Boulder Ridge Villas (DVC-Disney Vacation Club), which is the building adjacent to the lodge and booked that. 

We started our journey on Saturday and stopped in Tallahassee for the night. The longer drive on day 1 resulted in a short 4h drive on Sunday and we arrived at the hotel at 3pm. Our room wasn't ready until 4pm (actual check-in) but the kids were super excited walking around the property. Wilderness Lodge is (in my opinion) the most beautiful Disney property. It's wooded and on a lake. It's so peaceful and serene. Once we were notified our room was ready, we headed over. The room itself was pretty underwhelming. It actually smelled musty, but we opened the door to the patio and figured "Eh, how much time do we spend in the room anyway?" and headed to the pool! 

After swimming, it was time for dinner Whispering Canyon, a casual restaurant in the hotel that is great for kids. Midway through dinner they did a hobby horse ride around the restaurant and Jillian LOVED IT! 

Next day..Magic Kingdom!

Pool time

Hobby Horse ride!

February 28 - Puppers

Exciting news everyone. We finally have a new fence! Our fence has been in bad shape for years now. It wasn't a big deal with Amelia or Apollo..when we just had Apollo. It became a big issue once Bella was added to the mix. If the dogs were out in the yard together, they would go for a joy run, which usually ended in neighbors capturing them and posting them on the neighborhood website. "Found White and Black Labs!". If they were out by themselves, I didn't have much of an issue with Apollo but Bella would run out and go swimming in the ditch multiple times a day..resulting in bathes around 10am and 3pm daily for months. I finally had enough, quoted some fence companies and pulled the trigger. The fence took two days to complete and I never thought I'd say "Wow, this fence is beautiful" but...I do multiple times a day! The dogs spent the first day going board by board trying to escape..no luck puppers!!

February 25 - Threenager

Well folks, I was recently commenting on how wonderful Jillian has been so far at age 3 and I jinxed myself. She has quickly turned into what I like to call "threenager." She must do everything by herself, including getting dressed, undressed, brushing her own hair and climbing into/out of the car. She attempts to brush her own teeth and bathe herself (don't worry, we don't allow that) and even takes out the recycling. She's a pretty awesome little person..until she doesn't get her way. Case in point. Last week it was time to take her to school. I loaded up her backpack and turned around..the little stinker was on her balance bike and halfway down our road. I told her to turn around and come home. She shouted back that she was going to school..."Luke's school" and she would see me later. She proceeded to keep going. I had to chase her down and tried to convince her to turn around and ride the bike home. No dice. I eventually had to pick up her and the bike and manhandle her into the car. Did it end there? Nope. I drove to preschool while she blood curled screamed. We sat in the parking lot for 45min until she calmed down. I finally brought her into her class and she was exhausted from the long tantrum. 

The next morning..she came down for school dressed in an elaborate, flowing Elsa dress. I told her that was not allowed at school and to please go change. She then came downstairs in her Owlet Halloween costume. Little stinker! I helped her change and wouldn't you know..she snuck the Owlet costume in her backpack and this is what I saw as we were driving to school. Never a dull moment around here!

February 17 - Preschool Friends

Jillian & Mia

Jillian is quite the social butterfly and loves her friends from school. We had a playdate recently at a local park with Mia. The girls played together for over 2 hours! They were so adorable. In addition to the slides and swings, the girls attempted to jump rope and had fun holding hands and running around together. It was simply adorable! 

Yesterday we went to a local swim school for her friend Charlotte's, 4th birthday party. We swam for 90 minutes! Julia came with me and Jillian loved bouncing between me and her big sister. By the end of the swim portion, she was jumping off the side (into our arms) and asked me to dunk her completely under water. Little fish! 

Jillian and Charlotte

I tried to get a picture of the girls posing for a picture...Mia, Amelia and Charlotte all sat down while Jillian tried to pose on the handle LOL

February 10 - Catch Up

Well, the year has started off so busy I've been slacking with blog entries. Here is another catch up!!

Me
Rare Christine picture! After 3 years of being a brunette, I decided to go lighter again. It feels good to make a change. I was in Orlando recently for our Global Sales Meeting and I thought our marketing department did a great job with these stairs. Otherwise, my life revolves around work, shuttling kids around and walking the dogs. 

JD
JD has been extremely busy with work lately, even working full days on the weekends. He's currently in Seattle on a business trip. He's still mentoring the North Pointe Elementary robotics team and they are getting ready for states in a few weeks. 

Julia
Julia attended her first school dance last Friday. In true Julia fashion, she wore jeans (as did her friend Addison). However, she did let me flat iron her hair and didn't put it in a ponytail. She had fun!! She is doing great in school and had a swim meet this weekend where she officially  moved up to the next swim group. She's been running with Bella a few times a week and they are definitely bonding. She is also selling GS cookies, this is always a busy time of year. 

Luke
Luke is doing great in school, almost acing his recent state benchmark tests. I officially withdrew him from wrestling while he swims a few days a week. He's become close with a friend from school, Jacob, and they hang out almost every weekend now. He won a Nintendo Switch Light at the school fair this weekend (our families first win in 7 years) so he was excited. Of course, the last thing we need is another electronics device though, ugh.

Jillian
Jillian is reaching what I like to call the "Threenager" stage. She is very sassy and loves the word "no!" She is doing great at ballet and last week she found out what they are doing for their dance recital..Tinkerbell! They already started working on their routine and it's so adorable. 

Julia & Bella snuggles

Cookie Time

Best cookie helper ever

Until she starts eating the merchandise

Field trip with my favorite little man

January 27 - Bike Bust

Last weekend Luke was riding on his bike full speed, hit the brakes and then ran into leaves. The result? He flew off his bike head first..cut his head open and chipped a tooth. Poor dude (and how gorgeous are those eyelashes?):

Jillian seems to take after Luke in that she isn't tired at the end of the day. One night last week I put her to bed at 8pm..again at 8.30pm..once more at 9pm..and this is how I found her at 10pm:

And my independent, fierce, Julia. I actually had the kids take professional Valentine's photos this year (why not? My friend had a cute set up) and I made Julia wear her hair down!

January 15 - Aquastar

16H at the pool with Julia over the weekend

After a 5 month hiatus, Julia is back swimming with Aquastar. She was on her way to getting back in shape when she became sick over Christmas and missed a week, but she is quickly getting back in the swing of things.  She competed in her first meet of the short season (the season started in September and ends in February) this past weekend. She really didn't have any goals except to gauge where she was at compared to summer. She needs 3 USA A cut motivational times to move to the next swim group. She has 1 official backstroke time and 2 unofficial (i.e. summer league) times over the summer. This past weekend she did the 50 back, free and fly. She is above 1 second off her summer times but was still fast enough to earn her A cut fly time (woo hoo!) and she qualified for finals in the fly, placing 16th. Great job Julia!

After a 2 year hiatus, Luke rejoined Aquastar last night! He has been fighting me about wrestling practice recently and I told him he has to do something. Monday he didn't want to go to wrestling so I gave him the option-wrestling on Monday or swim on Tuesday. I was pretty shocked that he chose swim. Aquastar was a miserable experience for both of us 2 years ago-primarily because the indoor pool was being renovated and practices were outdoors. While the outdoor pool was heated, Luke was freezing and would cry during every practice.  So we dug out his bathing suit and googles and headed to the pool yesterday. He did fantastic! He was worried he would be in lane 1 with "the babies" but he was in lane 4 and swam 1st for most of practice. So proud of him!!

Julia and Kennedy

Julia and Addison 

January 8 - Apollo & Bella

Apollo and Bella..Salt 'n Pepper. Black and White. My little Oreas. I need a cute nickname for these guys because while they can be double trouble and the hair they produce is horrific, they are simply adorable!

Saturday afternoon snuggles

Nap with Julia

They went to bed like this..literally paw to paw

January 6, 2020 - Timothy for the Win

Luke loves all of his Christmas presents but he especially loves "Timothy" the bear from Uncle Bryan. Timothy moves all over the house with Luke.

Watching TV with Timothy

Reading with Timothy

Playing a video game under that blanket..with Timothy

Timothy and Luke..ready for bed

December 30 - Wonderful Christmas

We wish you a Merry Christmas

We wish you a Merry Christmas

We wish you a Merry Christmas

And a...Happy New Year!

We celebrated Christmas with Bryan and Karma and had a wonderful week. To start off the holiday week, we drove through River Oaks (a wealthy area of Houston where the 'inexpensive' homes are $6M!) to look at Christmas lights, they were incredible! Another day, JD and Bryan took the big kids go-karting and they all had a blast! I took the kids to Urban Air Adventure park (trampolines, climbing wall, zip line, ninja warrior course) another day and we had the place to ourselves for two hours. We spent a lot of time vegging around the house (a round of colds rotated through the kids which wasn't ideal). Karma got along great with Bella and Apollo and the kids had fun with Uncle Bryan. 

All the retrievers!

Wonderful Christmas morning!

Julia loved her Harry Potter ornament

Uncle Bryan may have bought "THE" gift of Christmas for Luke..Timothy the giant bear

Jillian loves the Barbie house from Julia and Luke

Thank you to everyone who helped me this Christmas so special!