End of Summer (Baseball) & Day Before School Starts

Tonight we went to the Westurban Baseball Awards Ceremony. Beau's 6 year old team tied for 1st in their division!  Yeah. How exciting!  It was a fun year.

And now our attention turns to school tomorrow. Brenley starts with a new teacher (same room), and Beau moves on to Maize South Elementary School as a 2nd grader. We met his teacher last Tuesday night.......Ms. Catron. She has been teaching for over 25 years.  He knows some of the kids in his class already, and knows a teacher down his same hall. And he'll ride to school on the bus that picks him up at Northridge, so he is sure to know some kids on the bus. Big day for him, and bigger day for Mom. I'll be a nervous wreck all day to rush home to get him after school and this is what I'll get from him when I ask 20 questions.........."I don't remember. It was fine. I don't know." Ah well. The beauty of having a boy, I guess.

Stay tuned for 1st day of school pictures. I bribed him to wear a certain shirt. We'll see if Mom gets her way. hee hee

Beau's 7th Birthday (Weekend!)

I'm still having a hard time believing my little preemie boy that came into this world a whopping 4 pounds 11 ounces and spent 2 weeks in the NICU is now  - 7 years later - a strapping 66 pounds and 51 1/2" tall!!  He is solid as a rock, with a very soft, kind, and gentle heart.

Before I begin on his birthday weekend, let me mention a few things about this summer that really make me proud to be his Mom.....I asked him at the beginning of this summer to do 3 things (cause I'm all about setting goals).  1. Get more comfortable in the swimming pool. 2. Learn to ride his bike and 3. Tie his shoes (no more Velcro, Mom. Shame on me!). And he really has done well at all these things. The pool.........while I would still worry about him in the deep end, he jumps in, goes under, and gets the swimming motion really well. He has come SO far from where he was last year.   The Bike?  Still having trouble pushing off on his own, but that has really improved. And his shoes?  Frustration still sets in from time to time, especially when I am trying to rush him in the morning, but he has got the concept down. We are going to spend this last week before school starts re-focusing on these last two things.

Also this summer at Northridge Academy, he learned all the Fruits of the Spirit, and he can successfully write and recite all the books in the New Testament.  He is now working on the Old Testament. Are you kidding me?  He is a rockstar!  I didn't get him to the Library like I wanted too, but he still liked reading magazine and an occasional book.

Okay, on to his Birthday.  We spent Friday together. Brenley had to go to school, but Beau had his Mom AND Dad's attention most of the day. We started with breakfast at IHOP. Then the boys got haircuts, came home and played a card game, then took off to a "round the clock" baseball tourney in town. I picked him up at the ballpark and we headed to the movies, only to be told it was sold out! Ugh. So he wanted to go to Exploration Place to see the Grossology exhibit, so we went there. Then we picked up sister and headed home to get ready for his first family birthday party with the Grant side. It was a lot of fun and we enjoyed the time together and Beau enjoyed the presents!

Not sure if you can tell the theme of the birthday party, but just in case you missed it............our boy LOVES the WWE!!!!

Okay, so on Saturday we hit the road to Garber, Oklahoma to see Mom and Dad. We hung out there most of the day and around 4:00 we headed to Stillwater for a pizza party with all our cousins, aunts and uncles at Hideaway Pizza. YUM!  Then we went over to Troy and Lori's for a swim and trampoline bounce.  We came home Saturday night, but Beau stayed at his Grandma and Grandpa's house with his cousins and now ww are anxiously awaiting his return.

Our big boy. We just hope he enjoyed his weekend as much as we did.  We sure do love you, Beau Charles Grant. Thanks for blessing us with your spirit, love, and wit.

Where did it go?

That's a famous Brenley line.........."Where did it go?"  And what are we missing, you might ask????  Beau's first top row middle tooth!!!!

It's been loose for what seems like forever, AND it's been hanging down from his gum line like a snaggle tooth the past two weeks.....and finally he lost it today after biting into a muffin during snack time at Northridge.

We've got the snaggle tooth in possession and the Tooth Fairy comes tonight. He looks so cute and grown up without that tooth.  He even has the typical lisp. Ah........big boy teeth here we come!

Mini Vacation #2, or Beau's early birthday party celebration

So I won't bore you with the story of how the weekend came together, but it came together very well. What started out as a weekend to celebrate Beau's birthday (in absence of a friend BD party), he chose to attend a LIVE entertainment Wrestling event. We originally planned on heading to Tulsa, OK on Monday the 19th, but plans started shaping up for us to head to Topeka on Saturday the 17th, so we decided to re-route our trip and go to the LIVE Pay Per View event in Kansas City - WWE MONEY IN THE BANK!

So here is how the weekend broke down.........
I got to visit my very dear bestie, Heather G.W. who was in town from Seattle visiting her family.  Brenley and I spent some time with her on Saturday. We went out on her sister's boat to the lake. That was a first for me and Brenley and it was a lot of fun. Bren was a champ!

 
Then Brian and Beau headed to Heartland Park Arena for PINKS ALL OUT (Show on the Speed Channel). They happened to be in town filming an episode and it's one of Brian's favorite shows, so he got to take that in - only after enjoying some Hooter's Hot Wings with his good buddy, Mike.

Then.........we headed back to the hotel to get ready for a grown up dinner out with our other dear friends Heather (different Heather G) and Kyle.  We left the kids with her oldest daughter, son and other daughter and we headed to a new Mexican restaurant.  Good company, good conversation and Peach margarita's with no kids in tow?  Are you kidding me?  That's a vacation right there.

We headed back to the hotel from there. Brian and Beau hit the water slide located INSIDE the hotel and were up until 11:00pm. Needless to say, Brenley and I hit the hay. Next day we got up to head to KC.

Shopped at Legends mall. Hit the T-Rex cafe. Then to our next hotel to get ready for the MAIN reason for the entire trip.

Beau and Brian had tickets to the Sunday night, WWE Pay Per View Event called Money in the Bank. Who was excited more? Hard to tell. I describe it like this............$10 Souvenir Cup, $25 John Cena T-Shirt, and one happy little boy.....PRICELESS!This "event" replaced a birthday party with friends. Beau got to decide and this is what he picked, so it was really a win win for everyone.

Then finally Monday morning rolled around. We rolled out of bed, hit IHOP for a hearty breakfast, then hit the road for home. While it is always good to get back home and into a routine, it was really really nice to visit our dear friends, escape Wichita for a bit, and just be together to create our summer memories.

The kids had their moments, we (Mom and Dad) had our own moments, but that's what it is all about, right?

Private Swim Party

We had an opportunity to attend a private evening swim party at the NW YMCA. We had never been to the pool before and swiming in the evening sun sounded a whole lot more appealing than the hot hot sun, so we jumped at the chance. Plus the kids are LOVING the water this summer, so even more incentive.

It was a FANTASTIC evening. The pool was awesome, the sky was clear and the kids were well behaved. We topped it off with ice cream afterwards and I can't think of a better way to spend a Saturday night.

If Brenley went down this ship wreck slide once, she went down 1000 times! No lie. It was up and down, up and down, over and over and over again. She was happy though!

4th of July

Nothing spectacular planned here at 3510 N. Valerie Circle. The rain did finally stop. The humidity and bugs were out, so that wasn't too much fun.

The highlight for the kids were the snaps. Beau continued to be timid around the fireworks, but it didn't stop Daddy from buying a load of them and giving us a show to watch.

This city amazes me each year at the size and quantity of fireworks everyone shoots off. We had awesome firework display shows going on all around us.

Once sister got tired and Beau stopped whining from burning the side of his face with the hot end of the parachute.........we called it a night!

Texas Ranger Game 6.25.10

We always have a fun time when we go down the Ballpark at Arlington to watch the Texas Rangers play. This year was no exception. This was our 4th time going, and the 2nd time for Brenley.  We all flew down there. The kids did AWESOME on the plane ride. It was Brenley's first time on a plane and she was a champ.

We enjoyed swimming together that afternoon and it was a late night for us at the ballgame, but it ended with a spectacular fireworks display.

The next day we got up for an awesome breakfast and then a few hours at our favorite mall with my brother Tyler's family. The kids love to be with each other (at least my kids love to spend time with their cousins!), and I of course cherish anytime I can spend with my siblings. Family time is so important and this was a really nice weekend getaway for us. Short, but splendid!