CAA Soccer Spring Season first game

Connor's third season of soccer with the Giant Alligators started today. Connor has been keeping up on his soccer practice over the winter with the I-9 soccer at his school and it showed today during the game. He possibly had his best overall game ever.

Connor did well controlling the ball, passing it to teammates, defending the goal and he scored four goals himself. The team won 13-12 against a very good team. Everyone on the team played aggressively and everyone scored a goal.

Connor's fourth goal of the game.

Paige enjoyed playing with Cole on the sidelines.

After we were done, Connor still wanted to play some more so I took him to the neighborhood soccer field and we goofed around for a while. He liked being the goalie.

Chewing

Connor has an oral fixation and chews on everything, especially if he's nervous. He chews up his fingernails and drives Andrea nuts because he's chewed up the sleeves of multiple shirts as well as multiple nice jackets. It drives us crazy and we've been in the habit of checking his shirts before he goes to school and after he gets off the bus to see if he's been doing it.

This past week he wanted to do some artwork and at bedtime Andrea noticed that there were some weird colors when she was brushing his teeth. We looked in his mouth and there were bits of crayons all over in the grooves of his teeth. It was disgusting and normal brushing wouldn't dislodge it. I had to use a dental pick to scrape it off.

We decided to take a picture of him with some of the crayons he'd chewed for this post and right after I turned my back Andrea saw him chomp off a chunk of the brown crayon. We couldn't believe it, right after we were talking about it. I took a picture of the crayons in his mouth. Disgusting!!! Obviously we still have work to do on breaking this habit.

Sleeping in after six years

The past couple weeks there's been a subtle and welcome change in our house. The kids are finally to the age where they don't wake up before the sun comes up and aren't waking us up in the mornings. On the weekends, the kids will sleep until 7:30 or 8:00 and won't wake us up when they get up. They'll play nicely together in their rooms or in the play room.

We've actually been able to "sleep in" until 8:30 a few times. It's not sleeping in like some people do, or like we used to before kids, but it's a huge improvement from being woken up by a baby between 5 and 6 in the morning.

It's hard to believe we haven't been able to sleep in for six years on a typical weekend. Sure, there have been some vacations or some days where the kids were not at home, but it's amazing that on a normal weekend we have the luxury again of getting a little extra sleep.

Halleluiah! 

Brantley's birthday party

Today, we went to Brantley's birthday party at Fly By Cafe. Kerry, Brantley's mom, had arranged for lunch at the cafe and helicopter rides! We were pretty excited, since none of us had ever ridden on a helicopter before. Andrea and Paige didn't ride, but I did with Connor and Collin (Collin plays soccer with Connor's Giant Alligators team). 

The helicopter ride was a neat experience. The pilot took off by hovering off to the right as he lifted off and it was a weird feeling to fly sideways. We got up a hundred feet or so and then went out over the beach and ocean for a minute or two and then flew back to the airport. We all enjoyed the view and the ride, it was a unique experience.

After the rides, everyone sang Happy Birthday to Brantley and then we gobbled up some cupcakes.

YUM!!

Connor's Superhero Birthday Party!!! Six Years old!!

Today was Connor's sixth birthday! We've been looking forwards to it for a while now and Connor's been counting down the days and has been very excited for the party that Mommy put together for him. We decided to have the party at "Pump it Up", which is a party place with big inflatable bounce houses. It turned out to be a great choice since it was "cold" today (that's in quotes since 58 seems cold to us, but it's been a rough winter elsewhere and most other people would probably love to have a day in the high fifties).

Mommy ordered super hero themed outfits for both kids.

The party was from 1:45 to 3:45 and we arrived after lunch. Before we were allowed to go in to the play area, the kids had to watch a safety video and the parents had to sign away all our rights.

There were two play areas, and it was just our group in each of the play rooms for 40 minutes each. The kids, as usual, loved the big blow up play equipment and the games.

The attendants all dressed up like super heroes and took the kids on missions and played with them. They looked super cool in their costumes!

The kids beat the super heroes handily at tug of war!

All the kids loved the party dance!

After the two play rooms, we went to the party room to have cake and snacks. Andrea and I worked with the attendants to set it up and I got a few pics before everyone came in.

The cake turned out great, it was one of the cutest that we've had.

I made Andrea pose with all the decorations that she put together.

We were surprised Connor had trouble blowing out his candles, but it got worked out in the end!

 All the kids had superhero masks and M&M's for their party favors.

The party room was a perfect size for our group.

 

The kids all had a lot of fun and Connor loved his party! He opened up all his gifts when he got home and it was quite the pile of toys. Both kids were exhausted after today, and so were we! We're so happy everyone came to celebrate with our little man and we can't believe he's already 6!

Connor and Brantley's birthday celebration at school

On Friday, Andrea and I went up to Connor's school to celebrate birthdays with his class. Connor's classmate Brantley has the same birthday as Connor, so we and Brantley's mom brought some cupcakes and cake pops to school for the kids.

Andrea had a local lady make some special Minecraft cake pops for the day and they were a big hit with the children, especially the boys.

Paige's ISR swimming refresher

This past week, we got in the hot tub one day and relaxed with the kids and were pretty appalled with Paige's swimming skills. She was really scared to leave the side of the hot tub and the one time I pushed her in to the water, she flailed and struggled. It wasn't pretty. Connor was still jumping in the freezing cold pool, floating, swimming, and doing a wonderful job.

The next week Andrea started Paige again in with Michelle to get a refresher on her swimming. Paige absolutely hated it at the beginning of the week. She shrieked and carried on up until she got in the water, then she actually had a little fun. We went every day in the evening and by Friday she didn't even cry when she went in the water and she had a good time.

After her Friday lesson, she and Connor both got some cool temporary ISR tattoos.

Paige is probably going to go a couple days early this next week, then hopefully we're done. We're pretty sure that once we start swimming again fairly regularly that she'll get back in to her groove. She was doing an amazing job swimming at the end of last year.