Emery's 4th Birthday!

My crazy Emery turned 4 yrs old on Sunday. We are very proud of Emery and her recent accomplishments of potty training which I feared would never happen. Also, she has been better about being more independent and being more helpful. Emery is quite the character and has an infectious laugh and smile. Emery loves all things pink and purple and nearly always insists on having the pink/purple plate, cup, utensil, etc. She loves music and dancing and singing, as you can probably tell from the previous post. She is a good sister usually, when she's not teasing or taking away toys, she's getting better about that as well. Some of Emery's favorite things to do right now are ride her bike, jump on the trampoline, and play with her siblings. Emery has also been a big fan of play dates where we have been able to go swimming at least once a week at friends' houses over the summer. Emery is also enjoying preschool learning lots of new things , riding the bus, and making new friends. She keeps telling me she has a friend named "Sochee", I still don't know if that's really her name, Emery is saying it wrong, or if she made it up, because it sounds like one of her made up names. When Emery gets in trouble, she is quick to reply with a compliment for you. An example of this is..."I like your shirt, Mom!", as if this is going to keep her out of trouble. Emery is a very sweet and funny little girl who surely keeps us on our toes. We love you Emery and we hope you had a very Happy Birthday!

For Emery's birthday we took her out to eat at Cici's Pizza on Saturday since her birthday fell on a Sunday this year. Emery got a cool "monster" birthday card with birthday money from Grandma and Grandpa Fox, Rapunzel from Mom and Dad, birthday card and money from Great Grandma Black, and silly bands, books, and princess toy from Grandma and Grandpa Beebe.

Emery spent most of the time drinking her soda.
Modeling with her pizza.
I'm not sure what that face is, but she loved her Rapunzel doll with Maximus the horse. We let her open her present from Mom and Dad early since Chase would be at work on her birthday.
Silly bands and books.
Princess carriage with people and accessories.
Instead of a birthday cake, we made birthday cupcakes. This is our school of fish :)
Blue fishy.
Emery with her fishy cupcakes.
Making a fishy face.
Getting ready to blow out the candles.
Eating her fish tail.
Eating her drumstick-yum!

Emery Sings

Back to School!

It's back to school again already, I can't believe it! This summer just went by way too fast. I have mixed feelings about my kids going back to school. On one hand, it's nice to have a little more peace and quiet, but on the other hand I am paranoid and really do miss my kids. We packed up everyone's back packs the night before and Chase gave each of the school aged kids a blessing. This morning was way hard to wake up, especially with a summer full of very late nights. We ate puffed pancakes and drank Nesquick for a yummy send off breakfast and then took pictures.

Bailey is a big 6th grader now and out of all the kids, she was the most nervous. But thanks to a Father's blessing the night before, she told me she was feeling much better. Addie is going into 4th grade and will be in the same school as Bailey which will be nice for them to be together, well not according to Bailey, but I think it's nice. Cameron is going into 2nd grade and is still in the elementary school and will have Emery there also attending as a pre-schooler. Our new school district has all the schools right next to each other, it's kind of different but nice. When we had back to school night, I had a hard time finding a parking place, but all I had to do was walk from one school to the next and didn't have to worry about reparking the car. There are 4 schools...elementary, intermediate, junior high, and high school. The schools are smaller and the class sizes are smaller, so I'm hoping for a good year for the kids. What I'm really excited about though is that the kids will get to stay in the same school the entire year! Last year they attended 3 different schools, not fun for any kid to have to do.

Now, I would be lying if I didn't confess that I'm kind of excited about Emery going to school, more so than any of my previous children. Emery is a sweet kid, but this last year has been kind of rough and I know she's had some excess handicaps with living and moving everywhere with Chase's layoff, so I'm trying to cut her some slack. I think preschool will be very good for her and will offer me a nice break. It will be just me and Joelle for half the day, and Chase when he's home. Out of the 4 kids though, I'm most nervous about Emery. It wasn't until about 3-4 wks ago that Emery willingly went to the potty on her own consistently. She's been doing very well, but has occasional issues. I'm just praying she doesn't wait too long to go to the bathroom and then doesn't yell for the teacher to come help her wipe her hiney or pull up her underwear. I must have repeated to her over and over again until the bus came...."Now, Emery...who wipes your bum?"...answer Emery: "Me"... "Emery, who pulls up your pants?"...answer Emery: "Me". Then I went over all the different situations where she might be tempted to wait to go potty and try to hold it when she shouldn't. It's almost 2:00 now and I haven't gotten a phone call yet. I pray she is also behaving herself. She is an extremely stubborn child with attitude and I just want her to be good for her teachers and not cause any problems. The only other problem today that I didn't foresee is Joelle. She has been fussy and clingy ever since Emery left. She won't let me do anything, even when I got her to fall asleep in my lap, she'd wake up and cry when I tried to put her down. I think she misses the kids and doesn't know what to do without them. Well, here's hoping for a good year without too many issues.

Bailey ready for 6th grade!
Addie all dressed up and ready to go, they picked out their outfits the night before.

Handsome Cam all excited for school. He was most nervous about not finding a bathroom.

Heading out the door, it was still dark outside.
Going down the driveway.
Watching for the bus... we waited a long time. The first day is always unpredictable, we could've gotten a little extra sleep.
Silly kids waiting for the bus still.
Here the sun is finally starting to come up. I went down the driveway a bit as to not embarrass them...well not too much that is. I'm sure that's how every kid wants to start their first day...with their mom snapping pictures in her pajamas of them getting on the bus. They kept telling me to hide behind the bush....ha ha, but I didn't :) What else is a mom for if not to embarrass her kids once in a while. I really wanted that first day of school bus shot, thank you very much :) But seriously, they were ok, I don't think anyone was permanently scarred. I was wearing a t-shirt and capri type lounge pants...it's not like I was out in a nighty, slippers, and a robe. Besides, they were joking about me jumping out from behind the bushes with the camera when the bus pulled up. I think they secretly love it :) I won't follow them out there tomorrow.Kids getting on the bus finally.
Emery showing off her Dora back pack. Now, I don't like Dora...it's not a secret, but I got this back pack for only $4.00 at Goodwill and it was in excellent condition and much cheaper and better quality than what I paid for at Walmart. So, I took all the back packs I bought from Walmart back and returned them for about $40.00 back on my card. I found the other kids back packs for $4.00 each there also, and I was amazed at how much better quality they were than the ones for full price at Walmart. I love Goodwill, sometimes you have to hunt for good stuff, but sometimes like this time... I scored big time, only $12.00 for 3 really nice back packs! Cam still had his new back pack from last year.
Emery, ready for school!
My cute, big pre-schooler!
Heading out the door.
Down the driveway accompanied by Joelle and Zeke...Joelle is always up for an adventure.
Emery waiting for the bus and getting concerned about Zeke going into the fields and getting bit by a snake.
Emery trying to get Zeke to get back in his yard.
Still concerned about Zeke and snakes...this time Zeke was sniffing in a drainage hole. I told her he was fine if he wasn't barking. I've only heard him bark at snakes, snake skins, or another dog.
Emery's bus coming.
Emery hopping on the bus. I was very surprised that she had no issues with this and hopped right on without even a look back.

Happy Birthday Cam!

My sweet, silly boy Cam turned 7 on Wed. ! It's hard to believe he is that old now. We are so thankful to have Cameron as part of our family. He has a tender heart and is so loving, helping, and teasing. Cam is so thoughtful and loves to help others and is a good friend also. He loves video games and playing on the computer. He has also been taking a Hip Hop class and hopefully will be able to start some team sports here in the near future. Cam is a very active boy and is a good helper and takes good care of our dog Zeke. Cam loves to hang out with Zeke and ride his bike around the property and jump on the trampoline. When he's not playing outside you can find him inside usually either running around making "fast" noises with his mouth, or playing bejeweled blitz, zuma, the playstation, or the wii. Cameron is such a kind boy but can be a big tease as well. I guess being smack dab in the middle of 4 sisters you kind of have to be a tease. I love my "Bubba Cam" so much and sure hope he had a good day!

Here's the run down of the birthday... Cam came in and woke me up really early (he's our early bird, no matter what time he goes to bed, he's usually the first one up and about). I wished him a groggy happy birthday since I'd been up late the night before with the baby and asked him to give me a few minutes to wake up. I then told him I had to go outside and water the garden and he of course wanted to come and help. So, I walked over to the shed and opened it and asked Cam to go inside and look for a shovel for me. Previously, Chase and I had gone and picked out a bike for him since his bike was too small for him, the kid grows like a weed. Chase had put the bike in the shed. At first he glanced at the bike and even put his hand on it while he looked for my shovel (which I didn't really need of course). He kind of did a double take, but seemed a bit confused and continued to look for my shovel. He then looked at it and back to me a couple times, so I finally asked him "Whose bike is that?". He got a big grin on his face and asked if it were his. I told him it was his bike; I guess he thought it was Chase's bike. It was very funny, I should have video taped it instead of just still shots.

Then after riding the bike around and falling a couple of times because he's not used to having a bike that size, we went in for some breakfast. We had puff pancakes with strawberries and orange juice. Later in the day we went to the library for a magic show. I had no idea that it would be Ronald McDonald doing the magic show. I didn't know Ronald even put on magic shows. The kids had a fun time watching the show and checking out library books. One of the kids' most favorite places is the library. I have to limit how many books they check out, because we run out of room on our card and some of the kids over estimate how fast they'll be able to finish everything and I end up having to renew the books over and over.

We came home and the kids played and then Chase took Cam to the store to get stuff for burgers. Cam requested Chase make his hamburgers for his birthday dinner. They turned out really good and really big! After dinner we cut Cam's shark cake which was a white cake with vanilla pudding, white chocolate chips, and a white chocolate orange frosting and ate homemade strawberry ice cream.

Happy Birthday Cam, we love you so much, thank you for being the best son ever!

Cam trying to figure out what was going on with the bike.
Realizing that the bike was actually for him.
Very happy to have a new bike!
Cruising down the driveway.



Eating breakfast.
Opening Grandma's and Grandpa's presents.
Ronald McDonald performing a magic show at the library.
The kids minus Emery with Ronald after the magic show. On our way in, Addie kept saying how creepy and scary Ronald McDonald was, so of course Emery freaked out and refused to go in and sit down with the kids. She hid behind me up against the wall, until I had to take out Joelle when she started to act up. We spent the rest of the magic show in the bathroom and outside in the hallway. Emery, of course, refused to be photographed with Ronald as well. I'm actually shocked Joelle humored me with a picture, but as you can see she didn't take her eyes of him.
Cameron assembling his delicious Chase burger :)
Sizing up the burger and trying to fit it into his mouth.
Delicious! I'd say "yummy", but then I'd face the wrath of Chase who made the burger and would detest that word used in any type of association with any of his food.
Look how huge this thing is!
Cam's shark cake with fish. I was going to pipe on some star fish as well, but thought it might look too busy.
Shark cake without fish.
Cam with his shark cake.
Anticipating blowing out the candles.
Blowing out the candles.
Cam with his cake and ice cream. Isn't he so handsome!