Quick 5

I really miss the days when I could pick out Alaina's clothes for her.

1.  Kindergarten graduation was a lovely day.  The ceremony was fun and short and Alaina said her lines and sang her songs.  It was a great conclusion to her year and she is already proudly telling everyone who will listen that she is now in first grade.  We couldn't be happier with her kindergarten year at Collegiate Academy.  If anyone is looking for a great charter school (in Jefferson County) we can hook you up.

Alaina and Aaliyah

Alaina and Grammy

Mrs. Galloway, Alaina's fabulous teacher

Alaina and Nora

2.  Last Saturday we went to Tiny Town with my sister's family and my parents to celebrate Alaina's birthday (June 2nd) and Naomi's birthday (May 31st.)  My sister and I brainstormed forever to find something to do that would be fun for all the ages of our kids (ages 10 months to almost 6) and Tiny Town won out.  It was perfect for them.  My girls loved the playground the most, although they enjoyed seeing all the tiny buildings too.  The train ride was also a fun treat.  AND it was in the mountains.  I'm sad to say that we rarely go up the mountain, even though it only takes us about 10 minutes to get up there, but we hope to remedy that soon.  The girls loved the drive, as I knew they would.

The birthday girls with their birthday presents.

Oliver and Joya

Ellie and Bria (who was being shy)

3. After Tiny Town and after naps, we went to church on Saturday afternoon.  When we came out of church, we saw a wicked storm coming over the mountains, heading straight for the church.  We left and drove along the edge of it all the way home.  I thought for sure it would shoot out east, but instead it came north.  We got pounded with some penny and nickel sized hail and as soon as the rain stopped the TV started blowing up with a tornado warning for our area.  I had just put Bria to bed and there was no wind and no rain at that point, so we just waited.  The storm had moved just north of us and was going nuts, but the weather service was a little late to the game for our area.  Anyway, it made a huge mess of our yard.  But, pending the insurance adjuster's assessment, we may get a roof out of the whole ordeal.

4.  Thankfully we hadn't done any of our summer planting yet.  We saved that for Memorial Day.  We planted zucchini and tomatoes in the garden, and tried to make the front of our house look pretty.  It looks a little sad right now, but I'm sure the plants will grow and fill out.  All that is left is a bit of mulching in the front yard, and then maybe our neighborhood will see that we do care about this house.

5.  And all that happened before the beginning of this week.  This week we tried to get used to our new summer schedule.  It's nice to have lazy mornings, although I'm still waking up naturally around 5:30 each day.  I can't decide if I should train my body to sleep in later, or if I should just get up and do something without the girls, like write.  We had a couple of really warm days, which is good practice for the summer too.  I'm hoping I can be a bit more proactive and plan a few more things for the girls to do, because left on their own they quickly downgrade to arguing and begging to watch TV.

Thus ends our first week of summer break.  I'll leave you with this little money shot:

Oh, and my third nephew was born on the 27th!  Welcome to our crazy family baby Eli! 

Quick 5

I have a terrorist in my family.  Her name is Mindy.  She threatens to do nasty things, like buy my children loud, obnoxious toys if I don't do a Quick 5, even if my day might be crazy.  The worst part is she doesn't have children, so I have no way to retaliate.

1.  Alaina loved her first ride-the-bus field trip.  She called it the Luckiest Day in Her Whole Life.  We went to the Wildlife Experience, which was okay.  I was bummed we didn't get to go to the zoo, but apparently the kindergarten class went last year and I don't blame the teacher one bit for wanting to do different things.  Anyway, the Wildlife Experience is a museum of animals, with animal statues and robots.  Then we watched a 3-D movie about the arctic.  Then we had a picnic outside.  It was a dream come true for a five and a half year old. (My apologies for the shoddy photography.)

First bus ride

First 3-D movie

Picnic in the wind

2.  For quite awhile now, bedtime has gone like this: Bria in bed by 6:45, Joya to bed at 7:30, Alaina to bed at 8:00. We staggered the bedtimes way back when we first moved the girls into the same room so they would fall asleep, but they grow and change.  Now, more often than not, Joya is still awake when I put Alaina to bed, which probably means that she could handle an 8:00 bedtime.  However, she tries to fake being asleep.  She's terrible at it.  She squeezes her eyes shut tight and has the biggest grin on her face so obviously she's not asleep.  Unfortunately I think she faked me out last night, because I thought she was asleep, but then about 30 minutes later I heard enough to go check on them and found that Joya was out of bed, bothering Alaina.  Now that school is out I'll probably move her to the 8:00 bedtime, but I anticipate a Summer of Consequences as the girls learn to just go to sleep when I put them to bed.

3.  Bria is a chatterbox.  Not only does she chatter all day, but if you ask her a question she'll answer.  She'll not only answer, but she'll answer in a paragraph.  A huge long string of meaningless baby babble.  Last night she talked all through dinner, including while eating her food.  I always thought that since Alaina was so outgoing then perhaps one of the other girls would be quiet and reflective.  Nope.  Not in this family.

4.  All my girls have rest time/nap time in the afternoon.  I put them all in their rooms at 12:30.  Bria will sleep until 2:30 or 3:00.  Joya naps but pops out of her room at 2:00 (when the cow clock lights up.)  Alaina actually hangs out in our room.  She actually still naps about three or four days a week, but just plays or reads the other days.  She's supposed to stay in the room until 2:00.  On the days that she doesn't nap, she pops out of that room the second the clock hits 2:00.  Lee asked her about that the other day.  This is what she said:

"Well, I start cleaning up around 1:57 or 1:56.  Then I stand in the bathroom and watch the clock and when it turns to 2:00 I open the door."

Lee's response:

"Hmm...you might just be my child."

5.  Today is Kindergarten graduation.  Which means, thanks to Mindy, you'll have to wait until next week to get a report on that.  I was going to add it in later today, but Mindy insisted on it this morning and apparently Mindy holds all the cards in our relationship.

Happy last day of school!

Quick 5

Seeing leaves on all the trees makes my soul happy.

1. Last Saturday we drove down to Colorado Springs to see my niece Naomi's dance recital.  Naomi is almost four, and there really isn't much cuter than seeing three-year-olds in a dance recital.  Naomi killed it, which was so fun to watch.  We were disappointed not to see any nose-picking out of the 19 classes that danced, although one class featured the little girls tossing Kleenex, and one of the dancers actually used hers before she tossed it.  Anyway, my girls did fantastic too, including Bria.  They all were pretty content during the hour and a half performance and really enjoyed seeing the dancers. 

Cousins

2. Mother's Day was a lovely day, despite the fact that it snowed all day.  It was relaxed and capped off by my much-anticipated fried chicken dinner.  Lee came up with a dessert of ice cream and raspberries, which made me so glad that I decided to plant a raspberry bush instead of a blackberry bush in our backyard.  I love fresh raspberries.  And the fun thing about this year was Alaina was old enough to participate on her own, presenting me with a bunch of stuff that she made at school.  It was a sweet day.

My Mother's Day booty

3. On Monday, May 12th, I got my sock wet because I stepped out of my car into a big ol' pile of SLUSH.  Slush (and snow for that matter) in the middle of May is just lame.

4. It has been so fun to communicate with Bria more and more each day.  Most of her communication is just nonsense, but she has her moments.  I coughed the other day, and Bria said "Bless you!" (Not that articulately, but the sounds were there, if you know what I mean.)  I told Lee and he was quite skeptical until the same thing happened between him and Bria.  This is notable because we did NOT teach her to do this.  There was zero coaching involved.  I've just said it to her enough that she has learned that that is what one says when one hears someone cough or sneeze.  We have been coaching Bria on animal sounds.  She knows what a kitty cat, a duck, a cow and a snake all say.  I've also been trying to coach her on saying "please" so she'll stop acting like a caveman at meal times, when she sits there chanting "More!  More!"  The other day I was feeding her and listening to this, so I said, "Bria, what do you say?"  And she said, "Meow!"  We're still working on that one.

5. Alaina sang in her school concert on Wednesday.  We understand that we're pretty biased, but we think she did the best job out of all the kindergarteners.  She knew all the words and all the actions to the songs AND she said her lines loudly and clearly when it was her turn.  We were so proud of her.  It was great fun to watch her perform.

On to the adventure of the day...Alaina's first field trip!  We'll report on that next week.  Catch you then!

Quick 5

Last year our neighborhood (and yard) was overrun with bunnies.  This year there are NO bunnies.  I'm kind of glad not to see any, but where did they all go?  I find it vaguely creepy.

1.  I failed to mention some exciting news last week.  Last week Alaina had another eye appointment, as a follow up on how her glasses are working and all that.  We were going to discuss patching, since at her initial exam the lazy eye had such poor vision that the doctor thought we were going to have to patch her good eye just to teach the lazy one that it did indeed need to see.  Well, the doctor was surprised and delighted to find that we may not have to patch at all.  Even the bad eye has been almost completely corrected with glasses, which means it IS responding without force.  This is great news!  Alaina was kind of looking forward to the patches (so she and her pal Macy could be Patch Buddies), but I was not.  It sounded like a terribly frustrating experience.  We go back at the end of June just to make sure, but it looks like glasses are all she'll need.  Thank you Lord!

2.  Last Saturday Bria began walking.  She had been taking steps for a few weeks, but something seemed to click last Saturday and now all she does is walk.  I've hardly seen her play with toys all week; she just wants to walk.  She'll pick a toy up and carry it around, but she wants to be doing laps at all times.  And if I let her out of the living room then all she wants to do is walk and carry things she shouldn't carry and touch things she shouldn't touch.  It's probably time for me to dig out some shoes for her, eh?

3.  This week we ran an errand to King Soopers.  I haven't been there in awhile, since they opened the Walmart Neighborhood Market just down the street, but I knew they had something on sale that I wanted, and I get tired of going to Walmart.  Plus they have Car Carts, which the girls love.  Bria got to ride in the car for the first time in her little life.  She loved it.  She spent most of the time leaning out the window (thank you seat belt!) or hanging her legs out the window.  It was a great source of entertainment to many of the other shoppers (all who were elderly).  Little things like that remind me that she won't be a baby forever.

4.  Wednesday night was AWANA Award night.  Alaina was recognized for finishing her First Sparky book, plus the review, plus the extra credit.  Her little green ribbon is her pride and joy right now.  Joya couldn't quite understand why she wasn't on stage with all the kids who were her size, but for the thousandth time this year, I explained that she would be in Cubbies in the fall.  Another year of AWANA is in the books.

5.  The rest of this month is a big month for us.  Next week we have Alaina's school concert, where her class will sing four songs and she'll have a few lines, and her school field trip, that I am lucky enough to get to be a chaperone on.  And the following week is Alaina's kindergarten graduation.  These are exciting times in the Kimble house.

Hope you stay warm on Mother's Day!  (Because it looks like we'll get three inches of snow here.  Nothing says Happy Mother's Day like having your kids cooped up inside with you. )  :)

Quick 5

May makes me happy.

1.  This past Wednesday was Wet Sponge night at AWANA.  All the clubbers get to throw a wet sponge at their leader, and our silly leadership team came up with a whole slew of other things they could throw at their leaders if they had enough AWANA bucks to upgrade.  Mud, worms, noodles, jello, you get the idea.  Alaina was pretty excited that she got to buy noodles and sauce and jello to dump on her leader.  She was excited about the idea anyway.  She didn't seem to enjoy it in practice.  I think she enjoyed watching everyone else make the mess, but when it came to her actually doing it, she was pretty freaked out.  She had rolled up her pant legs and everything because she didn't want to get messy.  The whole night is supposed to be a reward for all the hard work the kids do in memorizing all those verses, but I think Alaina would have been happier with a caramel apple sucker.

2.  Along those lines, today is Field Day at her school.  We spent the morning coaching her on the fact that it will be Okay To Get Wet.  The kids were instructed to come to school in clothes that could get wet, even wearing their swimsuits under their clothes if they wanted to.  Alaina DOES NOT like to get wet in her clothes.  So Lee and I repeatedly told her that it would be okay and that she would dry and that the water would NOT hurt her clothes and that she could change when she got home and that water would NOT hurt her glasses.  It's not as if she's going to go swimming in her clothes.  Lee reminded her that the whole day is designed for fun and then commanded her to have fun.  I hope she does.

3.  Here we are on the cusp of summer, and I feel like we have things planned all the way through the end of July already.  Most weeks are clear, but things keep popping up for the weekends.  Which kind of puts a damper on when we can do our garage sale.  I see two weekend possibilities: the weekend of May 30 or the weekend of August 1.  Is it bad to do a garage sale in August? 

4.  Bria has a new word!  Ready for it?  It's...Bria!  I suppose all four of us have said it to her at least 50 times a day since she was born, so it shouldn't be a surprise that she says it.  She doesn't really say it in reference to herself; we think she just likes the way the word feels and sounds coming out of her mouth.  She toddles all over the place saying her own name.  We may have many lessons in humility in her future.

5.  The week has been cold and windy, but starting today we are suppose to have beautiful weather.  So Joya will close us out, celebrating the fact that she gets to wear a t-shirt. 

Peace out!