A Tiger in the Yard

We've officially jumped into more uncharted territory.  Levi (and Shawn) signed up for Cub Scouts.  They've gone to two meeting and all Levi hoped before the first meeting is that his friend Griffin that was in his Kinder class, be in his Den....and he is!!!  It's interesting to hear how things are done, from Shawn's point of view, after doing Girl Scouts for 4 years. He'll start out as a Tiger and it won't be until 5th or 6th grade that he actually goes into Boy Scouts. 

 We went and spent our retirement money last week to get Levi's "necessary" items....a shirt, patches, a belt, a hat, a neckerchief, a holder for that neckerchief and a book.....it cost A LOT.  Annoyingly a lot.  But, this is probably going to be the only "thing" Levi really does.  He's not into sports THANKGOODNESS so we thought this would be something that was good for him that's all his..and he gets to spend quality time with Shawn.  Seeing him in his uniform almost made the memory of how much it all cost go away.  He's SO CUTE!  

Forcing Fall

Yesterday was the first "official" day of fall here....but of course you wouldn't know it because as I heard someone explain, we have now actually entered the season known as "Summer II."  It doesn't sound fun.  But, there IS a cold front on the way...the first one of the season and it's supposed to be here in the next day or 2 and that is what I have been hanging all of my last shreds of sanity on.  My hair is tired of the messy bun....I'm sick of having to wear shorts and extra deodorant.  It's time.  So I'm just forcing Fall at this point.  I pinned about 59 recipes that needed pumpkin and then picked my favorites and printed them off.  I told my family to prepare for every single food they eat for a while to have a pumpkin flavor.

I've also been hunting for food at the store that has the word pumpkin in it.  If they offered pumpkin scented toilet paper, I'd buy it. 

In other news, I've also completed a few craft projects that have been hanging over my head for almost a year...or more.  Here's the one that shows 3 generations of girl scouts.  The girls are entering their 5th year!

I also completed these two pieces I'd been wanting to do forever.  I knew they would be a little tedious and time consuming so I procrastinated them and constantly put them at the bottom of the list and just finally jumped in!  I love how they turned out and they hang on my craft room walls along with the girl scout frame.

I made a list last year when I started my first year of being at home alone...a long list of things I wanted to accomplish.  I finished every single thing except repainting the girls vanity (which I simply don't have the budget to do right now) and finishing Levi's first year scrapbook.  I wavered a few times thinking he would never have a complete book, but I just kept telling myself that I couldn't do that to him after having 2 other kids who's books were complete....I REFUSE to give him the last child syndrome.  Anyway, I had about 29 pages I needed to do to complete his book....that is  A REALLY REALLY WHOLE EXTREMELY LOT of pages....so I made myself a little countdown and tore off a number every time I finished a page.  Today, I got to tear off the last one!!!!  It felt amazing!!!  I have worked hours every single day for the last few weeks to complete it and it's finally done!

Here's the last page.  I did the same thing with both girls too, for their last page.  What's funny is that I told Shawn the other day that I didn't know what I was going to do with myself when I finished this scrapbook, since it was taking so many hours of every day....oh silly Emma.....

We figured out what I'll be doing with my time for the next month....Elle has decided to be Little Red Riding Hood for Halloween.....oh boy.

Perfect 10

September 13th......a day that is played up every year for MONTHS ahead of time in our house!  Birthdays are probably more important for Ava than anyone else in our house....maybe except me.

We both just love our special day!  I finally had to tell Ava to stop telling me every detail of what she wanted it to look like and just enjoy what we did for her!  Such pressure!!!  Let's get started:

She asked me to bring her cupcakes for her class, and specifically she liked the idea of dirt cupcakes with worms.  She was so excited to have them and the kids got a kick out of the worms.

 After school was out, we headed down to Austin Aquarium.  Elle was the only one that had ever been and all of us were excited to go.

This is the look on Ava's face when we got to touch and feed the sting rays!!!

Look at my face!  It says it all.  I was actually feeding the rays and it was FREAKING ME OUT!  I kept screaming and then doing it again.

We also got to feed sharks which all the kids LOVED!  It was just so much fun to watch them.  We also got to see some shark eggs, which we could see through and see the baby sharks wiggling around in their sacs....it was crazy!

After the aquarium, we headed to Chuy's for dinner.  This is Ava helping Levi with his homework while we waited for our food.

After dinner, we headed to Amy's Icecream for dessert--this was Ava's request, but I like to think it was a gift to me for planning her birthday!  :)

Then the part that Ava couldn't barely handle waiting for!!!  We headed home to open presents!

This was her favorite gift....and it cost us $9.99---the price of the plastic container!  

It was a box filled with all kinds of metal parts, nails, screws and pieces of wood.  It's an inventors box for her.  I can't wait to see what she'll make with all of it....and what this creativity will lead to in her future!  We stumbled on all the wood at a neighborhood garage sale last week, for a man that was a woodworker and getting rid of his shop!  He was just giving this away!  We have lots more in the garage that just wouldn't fit in the box.  The metal parts were from a friend at church that has a shop on his land and lots of things we could have!  Shawn and I were just so thankful that both of those things came together right around her birthday....we couldn't have afforded all of this stuff!

Ava's not the only imaginative one....both other kids were dreaming right along with her of all the things they were going to make with the things in this box!

She woke up this morning and told me that it was the best birthday ever!  All the pressure and hard work are worth it when I hear that!

Labor Day Weekend

Our weekend was quite eventful this Labor Day!  My parents came in to help celebrate Ava's birthday a week early.  The weekend consisted of my mom doing french braids on the girls, scratching backs for as long as they wanted and giving pedi and manicures!  My dad took the kids to a nearby construction site two different times and let them go hog wild.  Their clothes and shoes and bodies told the tail.

Ava wanted to go to a sushi place for her birthday dinner with grandparents....when we say sushi, we mean COOKED meat.  The waiter overheard me telling Ava happy birthday and surprised her with a big bowl of icecream and a candle.  I thought that was so very sweet of him!

He also brought 3 spoons and the scene reminded me of those Discovery shows where the wolves take down a small animal and devour it in minutes.

On Monday, we had good ol' BBQ'd chicken, homemade potato salad, Texas caviar and to top it all off homemade cinnamon vanilla ice cream..it did NOT disappoint at all!

This also happened this past weekend.  Shawn and I salvaged some old fence panels from a neighbor a few months ago.  I asked him to make me a planter table out of it.  He was really in his element which surprised me because I didn't know he had this hidden talent.

Here's the finished product!!!  I am absolutely in love with it!  The only thing we bought was the window!  I am so so so happy with how it turned out and even more impressed that Shawn built it!

Changing subjects, we got an amazing deal for the month of September, to try something called Camp Gladiator for only $8 each.  We started dark and early Monday morning at 5:30 am!  I am traumatized at this point.....but DETERMINED to go through the month of September.  I have definitely figured out that I DON'T like competition-style work outs at all.  I'm not sure I'll survive the month, but we'll see.  I couldn't lift a finger to even take a selfie after the first....or second class, so this funny quote will have to do.  I'm thankful beyond belief that Shawn is taking the class with me!  Tonight we both took Epsom salt baths....we are hurting so bad!