Lucy’s dance studio hosted a super sweet tea party for the mothers and daughters. Lucy had a wonderful time. They started off with treats and drinks……Followed by a special visit from Princess Belle. (Miss Kristen in disguise.😉)The girls made rocking tea pots…… and had their nails painted, then blush and sparkle glitter added to their cheeks.Lucy felt like such a big girl to go dance with all the other girls.The girls had one final pose for pictures,…they got a BIG hug from Belle…….and finally a gemstone ring surprise to end the day.We had a wonderful time. 😊

William is infatuated with cars right now. He is constantly researching and reading all he can about them. He REALLY likes expensive cars too. 😕 While we were in CA, he made us drive down PCH by the luxury car dealerships in Newport. Traffic is pretty crazy through there though, so he couldn’t look as much as he wanted. We decided it would be more exciting to see them up close. So… we bought tickets for the Dallas Auto Show. He was SO excited!This Batmibile was constructed out of Legos!A Toyota Camry race carA McClaren (too expensive to go in!)Awesome JagCooperCooperA ZThe boys were so cute to involve Lucy in their finds. In a lot of the pictures, Lucy is actually in the car, you just can’t see her. 🤣A StangA FerrariA Lamborghini (Didn’t realize how small they actually came!)A Polaris SlingshotCorvette#1The totally Awesome Corvette

We sure had a great time!! We’ll have to make it a tradition!

Today was a disaster!! When my schedule is SO full, it just sets it up to be such if the slightest thing is off. Today it wasn’t a thing but a who, actually a few whos!! We stayed up WAY too late last night to start with. The kids and I were having way too much fun, we lost track of time. When we got up this morning, it was later than usual. The kids really wanted to jump with Lucy on the trampoline before we left for dance. What I didn’t realize was that none of us ate breakfast. No one said they were hungry, which is usually what happens the second everyone’s eyes open. We all just completely forgot. When Lu and I got ready to leave for dance, I realized her dance bag was missing. We were going to be on time too. I spent 10 minutes looking through everything! So I thought. When I finally gave in and grabbed the spare pair of dance shoes, I turned around to see Lucy’s dance bag on the floor in her closet. Ugh! Go to dance, and Lucy did NOT fall asleep in the van this time! Yay! Or so I thought. She was HORRIBLE in class. She wouldn’t listen, wouldn’t follow instructions, kept running off and disrupting the class. I was completely embarrassed. To top it off, she was mad at me when I tried to put her in her car seat, so she grabbed my necklace and would not let it go. In asking her several times to please let it go because it was going to break, she still wouldn’t. She yanked a really hard yank, and I snapped at her.  She started crying, but let go. The entire car trip I had to listen to her screaming to the top of her lungs. She has such a temper. I guess I did not learn enough about raising kids with the others. Lu is going to do me in. Even as crazy as Natalie was (and still can be at times😉) she never misbehaved in any of her classes like this. None of the other kids did. Luckily, after we made it to Academy to get Natalie’s equipment for soccer, Lucy calmed down and just laid her head on my shoulder. She fell asleep when we got back into the van to bring everything to Natalie’s school. After all that mess, we still had to run home to get everyone lunch, go to the store to get snacks for scouts, go to scouts, then leave early for a mandatory parents meeting back at the school for soccer. For the 15 minutes of the meeting, Lucy screamed for 13 of them! We have made quite the reputation of being the crazy lady with all the kids and the screaming baby. Sometimes I don’t even want to leave the house anymore it is so incredibly embarrassing! I’m trying to give the older kids opportunities, but it is horrible to try and do with Lucy. She does not make it easy at all! I am beginning to wonder about a Mother’s Day out program for her. I really think she needs some time away from me. Loving mom is great, but I am being smothered, and she is not learning that other people love her too and she can be fine and learn from them as well. After the meeting, the kids still had church activities they had to get to. Natalie tells me that her new soccer shoes are too small. Yeah, that is waiting for another day. I brought the boys and Lu home, and we played outside until we had to go back to get them. Then Dad finally came home. Sometimes I feel like it is a marathon getting to that point. Score at the end of the day: He brought home pizza for dinner! It might have been 9:00, but Lucy fell asleep in the van on the way to get the big kids from church, and was out for the rest of the night. I got to eat my dinner uninterrupted and go to bed somewhat early. Glad the day was over! I don’t want a repeat! 😳

After the craziness of today, the boys really wanted to climb the trees. Lucy did too. So after we dropped the big kids off at Church, everyone climbed. There is just something magical about climbing trees. They can get REALLY high! Alex is SO close to being able to get in the tree by himself. For now, I still have to hoist him up.I LOVE that the kids are able to do this now. 🙂There was no way I could hold the big camera and Lucy in the tree at the same time, so I was not able to get pictures of her climbing. She really loves to be a “Big” kids though.While the big boys climbed, she kept herself entertained by taking selfies. 

Sam has been out of town for several days, and of course my schedule is crazy hectic this week! It has been nonstop! Today I had a few errands that needed to get done, Natalie was trying out for soccer, Nate had to work, and Lucy had gymnastics. All were within 15 minutes of each other. Then,when I picked Natalie up from school, she informed me that there was a Cheer Parents meeting tonight as well. I was truly in panic mode. Luckily, everything went well and everyone was able to be at what they needed to be and accomplish what was needing to get accomplished. They even told us tonight that they are wanting to move Lucy into a more advanced gymnastics class. She has learned all her skills in the current class she is in. Hopefully the new class will have more scheduling options. Once we all got home, we played outside to just let off that last bit of energy. It was such a beautiful night!Lucy played peekaboo and swung with me,while Natalie tried to help William perfect his landing on his front flip.He’ll get it soon. He is very determined and has been continually trying since he completed the flip. 😊

After feeding the ducks, Lu found this rock. She LOVES to climb. I really have to watch her though because she thinks she is bigger than her britches.She kept finding bugs on the rock,and then talking to the ducks across the pond. (Like they actually could hear her.😉)Then she got the idea of taking her sandals off. No sooner would I strap them back on, she would have them off again, along with an explanation as to why she didn’t need them on. This girl is a crack up!Our neighborhood has done a fabulous job at planting tulips in various places. I really wanted to get some pictures of her with them.BAD Idea! It was like a kid in a candy store! Little girls LOVE flowers, but boy! This one does not know how to be gentle yet! I could just hear those poor flowers screaming, “No! Not a toddler! We’re all gonna die!!!”I diverted her attention with the idea of swinging, and luckily only one tulip suffered her wrath. We had a long talk about being gentle to flowers, and only looking with our eyes, not our hands, when we see some. Hopefully she’ll remember that when we go to the Arboretum. 😳We ended our beautiful day with a bit of dancing. Lucy really loves her dance class. She doesn’t let that be known during class, but when we come home she is always singing the songs, doing the movements, and asking when she gets to see Miss Kristen again. Now to figure out when to take pictures of the boys. That was my main goal for today, but they left because they said it was too hot! 😂 Hoping I can catch them soon.

“Charlie Duck”, actually. Don’t know how he got the “Duck” part, because he is not a duck at all. Really a goose, but Lucy could care less. His name is “Charlie Duck”, and Lucy had to make sure I knew that. We took her to the pond today to get out of the house for a bit. She still LOVES to feed the ducks. I think I am going to call her “Goose Girl” though, because she has absolutely NO fear of these creatures at all! She just walks up to them like they are the most docile animals she has ever encountered. (Hissing and honking at her all the while! 😳) We keep telling her that they can and will bite her if she gets too close, but she just looks at us like we are nuts, and proceeds to interact with them like it’s no big deal.They seem to have a unique connection. Lucy reminds me quite a bit of Brie, because Brianna had very little fear of animals at this age also.Lucy loved throwing the ducks and geese her bread, while snacking on some inbetween. Then, when the bread was gone, she moved to making them soup out of woodchips, convinced that they had to eat it.Refusal did NOT make her happy! 🤣 Oh the faces these little peanuts can make at this age! They have the best expressions!

Some nights, I am just SO exhausted! Of course those are the nights that Lucy is the most buzzed and will NOT fall asleep! Tonight was one of those nights. I just had to laugh because she just kept on going and going. I finally decided I needed to record her, after she had gone on for over ten minutes.

Even after this, she still sang Old McDonald and Humpty Dumpty before it was like she had been hit over the head with a frying pan and fell asleep. Oh blissful sleep! Thank You!

Sam and I have not been on a date night adventure in a while. We decided to go tonight, eve though we didn’t have a sitter for Lucy. We just decided to bring her with us.  She actually did surprisingly well. She was just our moving obstacle at Putt-Putt……and my personal server/feeder at dinner.  She decided that if she sat on a golf ball long enough, it might hatch. 🤣 Crazy girl!

What a fabulous day! It could have turned out really frustrating. But we chose to see the sunshine in the day and make it wonderful! To celebrate Pi Day, we played in shaving cream. Boy we made a mess! 🤣The boys really wanted to make pies, but Lucy had gymnastics, Nate had to get to work, and Alex had soccer practice. We decided to make them after dinner. They turned out great! William made a coconut cream pie.It was really pretty and yummy!Alex made a cherry apple pie.It was delicious! The boys are great cooks! Now it’s off to brush our teeth. 😉 

Update: Brie sent us pics of her pies!They look fabulous! I wish we could have tried them too!