Labor Day fun.

This morning just as I was getting ready to go grocery shopping for the next two weeks, my cousin's wife called and wanted to know what we were doing. They were going to be in the McCausland day's parade and wanted to know if the girls would like to ride in the float along. The float was to commerate the fact that there were 6 generations of Holst on the family farm. Of course the girls jumped at the chance to see their second cousins Aviana and Brielle. We quickly got ready and headed to McCausland. A small town about 15 minutes away from us. When we arrived we helped to decorate the tractor and wagon. Kevin was driving the old Oliver. This was one of the older tractors on the farm and I am not sure but don't believe that it is used much anymore. Jessica's sister also brought her children down so there were 5 girls who rode in the wagon with Jessica. Brielle was to young and chose instead to watch the parade with Grandma and myself

One of the earlier floats was the veterans. My uncle Gary was in this float.















Here comes Kevin with the tractor and wagon.














All of the girls waving












Sarah and Jessica waving from the back of the wagon. Even though it was warm, a good time was had by all. It also was nice to see my aunt and uncle and get to talk to them for awhile.

What was supposed to be a boring lazy day at home, ended up with a little excitement and a chance to see a few cousins.

Thanks for calling Jessica.

Family Fun

Last night we went to my sister-in-law's home for supper. It was a great time. The 4 kids really enjoy playing together. Of course it helps that the younger are close in age. There is just about a year between each kid, with Kristen being the youngest. Sarah is only 4 years older than Zach so she is still not to old for them. After supper we went out and had a fun time competing in a whiffle ball game. The kids played the adults. The little neighbor girl came over so this made the teams uneven. The kids team consisted of Sarah 13, Zach 10, Austin 8, Kristen 7 and the neighbor girl who is about 5 or 6. The adult team was Kurt, his sister Ardith, her husband Carl and of course myself. A good time was had by all, including the neighbor's who came out to "cheer" us on. It reminded me so much of the family picnics we used to have every summer where all of the kids would get together and play softball. It didn't matter what the ages were, everyone played and no one needed to play inside or with game boys. It was a much simpler time then.

Saturday Fun

Last Saturday, the 25th I was able to take both of the girls down to Scrapaganza for the Mommy and Me class. This is a great time for all. Sarah does the 12 x 12 Mommy project and Kristen does both the 8 x 8 Me layout and the me project. The girls always have a great time with this. We then met Dad at Chick fil a for lunch. We all love this fast food place, I think because it is different from the usual fast food place. Kurt took Kristen home with him and spent the afternoon and evening bonding with her. Sarah stayed with me. At 2:00 we went back to Scrapaganza for a Memory Cube class. This is a very fun and easy project. Would be great for a small gift. May have to make this for Christmas. (Grandma if you are reading pretend to be surprised) Just as we were finishing up our cubes, Darlene called and wanted to meet us for supper. She came over and picked us up. We had about 1 1/2 hours before our next stop on the day started. We decided to go to Fuddruckers. When we got there we were very disappointed to discover that they had closed for good. We ended up at Ruby Tuesdays. After supper we made it back to Scrapaganza right at 6:00. Sarah had decided to join me for a fun night of cropping. Before we started cropping we made these really cute little books out of the plastic name tag holders. Since we did a paradise theme, I guess Kurt needs to take us somewhere where we can get pictures for this little book. (like maybe Hawaii, guess I will have to tag along with Sarah and the rest of the high school band in 2009)

After this we spent the rest of the night scraping. I was working on the Disney album. I am almost done with volume 2 and then just have to work on the third volume to finish it up. Sarah was working on several different pages including making an album of the cats. It was a wonderful day of bonding and older girl time. Tomorrow Kurt and I will switch girls and do things with the other child.

Another season of learning begins

Today was the girls first day back to school. On Tuesday we went to Washington for back to school night before dance. Sarah was able to meet most of her teachers, even though she already knows most of them, and take her school supplies. Wednesday after dance we quickly ran up to Whittier for Kristen so that she could meet her teacher Mrs. Matheny. She was also able to take her supplies to school and place them in her desk. She was so excited to see two textbooks already sitting on her desk. Kristen is thrilled to be moving up this year. Second graders move upstairs and join the older kids in the old wing of Whittier and in Kristen's mind this means that she is no longer a little kid.
When I turned on the lights and told the girls to get up at 5:45 this morning they both jumped right out of bed. Today will be the easiest day of the year to wake them both up. Around 9:00 this morning Kurt called to let me know the girls would be getting out of school early. He is the lucky one for the district who gets to decided if school is going to be released due to the heat. His first stop was to check second floor at Washington. While there he saw Sarah and she guessed that he was there to determine if they would be letting out early.
About the time Washington was dismissing a huge storm came in, so all walkers were kept at school and not allowed to leave. About 20 minutes later they release the walkers and one of Sarah's friend's mom offered her a ride home. She called to let me know that she was in and then wanted to know what she should do about Kristen. She decided to walk up to Whittier and take an umbrella so that Kristen didn't get to wet. When she got to Whittier she found out that they wouldn't let Kristen leave until the next storm had passed. Sometimes I wonder where her brain is, when she found out that Kristen wouldn't be released until the storm was passed she walked back home again and then went up to check on Kristen later. Why she didn't stay at Whittier is beyond me. The girls finally got home about an hour after Kristen should have been home. By now Dad was getting worried because Sarah had never bothered to call and check in with him. He even asked our neighbor who also works for the school to check when she got home. In the mean time, the school allowed Kristen to call and say that she was still at school and couldn't leave until the storm passed. We talked to Kristen about next time calling Dad's cell phone instead of home, since no one was at home.
DeWitt also released early, but I had parent, student meetings scheduled all day so didn't get to leave. When I got home, we had to run out to Office Max to buy new school supplies. Apparently the list that was sent home, for Sarah was not accurate and she needed many other things including a flash drive. As crazy as today was, it is nice to be on a schedule again.

Sarah's new room

Sarah has decided that for her home improvement project this year that she will redo her room. She has already painted the room and removed the carpet. We bought her new furniture, actually both girls got new furniture. She has done a good job on deciding where she wants everything to go. As you can see she is having fun transforming her room and also loves her new furniture.

Dance 2007

Last night we finally had the Spring Recital for the girls dance studio. The children's ballet was Fleur de lis", The advanced Ballet was "Fever" and the Tap and Jazz show was "Hello Dolly". Kristen was in the children's ballet she did a good job with the ballet, Kristen was also in the tap and jazz show. Sarah ended up assisting all of the younger kids in the children's ballet, so was on stage for almost all of that show, she was also in Fever and Hello Dolly. The Children's ballet was about a prince and princess strolling through their flower garden. The advanced ballet was not what you would normally think of as a ballet. It was about the animals of the jungle and what they do at night. They only had a couple of lights on the side and the fog machine running during this ballet. The music was from Mannheim Steamroller. Even though this was different I really liked this ballet. Finally the tap and jazz show was Hello Dolly. Yes, this was from the musical by the same name. Since Sarah is in the advanced jazz group she was in the show also quite a bit.

Gracefully aging, not

It happened this morning. Kurt and I were running a few errands while the girls were at the dress rehearsal for the dance recital tonight. Walmart is having a children's carnival with all kinds of fun little games that the kids can play and win those silly little prizes that they like and parents end up throwing away. Anyway, while we were checking out, the cashier suggested that we get our grandchildren and bring them back to the carnival. Considering that my children are only 13 and 7, I really hope that there are no grandchildren for at least 10 years. I do realize that people are age are grandparents already, but I am so not ready for that stage of life yet.