Ok, so it doesn't seem like that long ago she was like this.

And honestly I can easily picture her younger than this, but that is as far back as my pictures go digitally.  :)  Oh, my sweet baby girl.  You are growing up.  And while you are ready, I am learning that I may not be quite as ready as I had thought.

You had your first day of kindergarten and you handled it like a champ.  Me, well, I suddenly wasn't sure I was ready for you to go.  But off you went in your very carefully selected backpack and lunch box.  Sigh.  See instead of my sweet baby this is you on your first day.

Super cute in pink (naturally) and your requested hairbow.  Humoring Mommy with pictures as I warned you the night before I would be taking plenty.  :)  And I promised I would not make you late, so you wouldn't worry.  So you willing obliged me.  And I so appreciated it.

You insisted on a princess backpack and lunch box, but not just any princess one

but one with Tiana too.  And from what I can tell you sweetheart have the only lunch box with all of the Disney princesses (or at least the largest number of them).

And I love how your backpack that you insisted on filling with your supply list (I took some of your supply list in to your cubby ahead of time and tried to take more, but you insisted that you take the rest in your backpack)

even though you admitted that by the time I was done taking pictures it was starting to get heavy.

So when I stopped to adjust my camera you took it off to rest.  :)  And so I caught you completely off gaurd here, which is what I loved about it.

Just do your Mommy a favor and try not to grow up any quicker, ok.  :)

And just remember that no matter how old you get (and one day you will learn that 6 and 7 aren't old, lol) you will always be my baby girl.

Every weekend the kids get to watch a dvd or show in the morning after breakfast.  It might be a whole movie or it might be a show or two on dvd.  It depends on their moods.  Sometimes they both can agree on a movie and sometimes one picks one day and the other picks on the other.  Sometimes this means we watch the same movie every weekend for well, months.  I can recall a Little Mermaid time period (so much so that I went and found the prequel and sequel for variety as this stage lasted for quite some time).  Then after the release earlier this year it was The Princess and the Frog. 

His go to favorite is Mickey's Twice Upon a Christmas.  So yes, they watch Christmas movies year round around here.  (And if anyone has any recommendations of a similar movie that is NOT Christmas related I would be oh so grateful.)  The funny thing is that most of the time they don't last very long into the movies before they are up and about playing in they play room, but they like knowing that they get to pick their weekend movie. 

I love watching them get up on the couch side by side to watch their carefully selected movie together (though here they chose to not sit side by side, most of the time they do, which is nice to watch those sweet sibling moments). 

And as a side note these kids LOVE pj's.  I am not sure what it is about winter pj's either, but this girl is into them.  In case you can't tell there are frogs on the pants.  Hmmm... wonder what movie these reminded her of.  :)

And being the sweet big sister that she is when she was out shopping with me and she saw these pj's she insisted that we get them for him saying that he'd love them.  And I knew she was right.  He does indeed love them.

Someone just needs to remind my kids that it isn't winter just yet.  :)  In fact it is very much summer still here, but that's ok I suppose if they enjoy their cooler weather pj's early.  Just don't tell me you are hot while wearing them.  :)

Recently the kids had waterfest at their preschool (well his now, but it was hers too).  I made treats for the event.  They passed our daughter's taste test.  :)

Just like the name of the event implies there were lots of water events.  They had sprinklers,

water tables,

a giant water slide,

bubbles,

and all sorts of other water based activities.  They also had crafts

and lots of food.

And then there were the cake walks.  He never stood a chance, but she got so close.  So close in fact that she walked away with a set of cookies.

So to help him out (or to help me out) he went with me during the parents only round.

Let's just say we didn't get any cake or cookies.  So then we headed out to see the fire truck before heading home.  Much to my surprise both of them got on it and checked it out.

She's as tall as a tire!

So in writing yesterday's post I realized that I never shared any photos from our visit to the zoo this summer.  So I figured now is a good time.  :)

The kids had a blast despite the summer heat.  We were there when they opened and left around lunch time, so we avoided the worst heat of the day.  From the start she was into seeing all the animals.

However, here they snuck up on him if you will.  He went and pressed his face up against the glass in time for the sea lion to come quickly swimming by and totally scaring him.  Not sure what he was expecting, but that was NOT it.  :)  So he preferred to watch a little further back (and from the safety of his stroller).

He loved that the polar bear was trying to nap with a ball.  "He's sleeping with a ball just like me!"

And when he dropped the ball, I'm pretty sure that our son was more upset than the polar bear.  I think if he could have gone and gotten his ball for him he would have.  But we assured him that he was indeed OK.  :)  We did let him close to this bear though.

Of course getting a good photo of both of them together is well, next to impossible.  Apparently they can't stand near one another when I have a camera in my hands.

Can you tell she had fun?  :)

She walked (or ran) most of the way through the zoo.  He was a little more laid back about it and wanted to ride.  I can't say that I blamed him.

Though he did walk a fair share.  In fact a few times we apparently weren't moving fast enough so he took off ahead of us.

And then he'd realize that he was by himself and come running back....

Here was the exhibit that made Daddy nervous until I assured him that I did indeed have an epi pen on me.

So we went and checked out the bees.  Maybe, just maybe, the kids will quit telling me there is a bee in the house or car or where ever now when it is really a fly.  Maybe.

But of course playing in the dirt is always the most fun.

And we are off again...

She can barely see to drive, but she tries so hard.  And she does very well on pretty flat ground.  But when we hit the hills, not so much.  But she is quite a helper.  And check out those calf muscles!

Such hams!

Oh, and she was so excited that we stopped during the visit and she got a frozen lemonade.  Yummy!

He decided that he would not even try it.  Most of the time he doesnt' like ice cream or popscicles and this was one of those times.  So, he stuck with his water and snack and kept passing on the treat despite her offering to share numerous times (and she was more inclined to offer once she knew he was going to refuse, lol).

Today I spent the day with our daughter.  Just a mommy and daughter day.  A chance to celebrate her growing up.  So we went to a local life and science museum, which sadly was the first time we'd been.  I am just glad that the rain held off for most of the day as a lot of the exhibits were outside and well, that wouldn't have been as much fun.  The highlight for me was we happened to time it so that we were in the right place for the daily release of butterflies in the butterfly house.  Very cool.

We didn't actually hold one on our hands, but we were that close.  A great start to the day.

And of course we had to ride the train ride.  But once she heard the whistle we moved way back on the train.  :)

To be honest I think we did almost everything today.  We saw farm animals, various wildlife, she hunted fossils,

we saw dinosaurs (and tested mommy's ability to pronounce them all - luckily there were cheat sheets :) )

she even tried to flap her wings like an insect,

and watched how different shaped seeds floated in the wind (not shown, but a part of this).

While we were out and about outside I asked if she was hugnry around lunch time.  You know cause most people get hungry around that time.  She kept insisting she wasn't hungry.  Finally I was like ok, well I am, so I'm going to stop for lunch now.  Oh, she says - me too.  Turns out she thought I was suggesting we go home for lunch and that we were done.  Sigh.  No, honey, I just wanted some food in my belly and thought you might too.

If it was outside we at least looked at it.  :)  She wanted to do it all.  And then she wanted to play in the play area outside and I was trying to convince her that there was a whole area inside that she hadn't seen.  Yeah, she wasn't really convinced at first.  Guess I can't blame her because it was sort of like spending a day at a zoo outside.  But with cool cameras that allowed her to zoom in on animals, which she loved to do. 

But once she was inside she realized that there was so much to do that she was overwhelmed.  Overwhelmed to the point that she couldn't focus.  So we had to work on that.  And I had to let her know that we had to pick and choose what we'd be doing as well, we did have a time limit.  So she did settle down and was able to enjoy quite a bit including the music room (dancing that makes music - oh yeah all her), the young child play area,

(the girl was ready to climb and was disappointed that it wasn't higher) and lots of activities on shapes, math, volume, etc.  So I think I'd have to say it was a hit!  When I asked if she was tired she said no (of course not) and was pretty convincing.  With all that walking I was kind of surprised.  But not when I saw this later on during the ride home.  :)

So this week is all about catching up for me.  A chance to catch my breath from the rush of summer as we head into the fall and the beginning of the school year.  See this year this affects us.  Well, actually it affects our eldest as she starts kindergarten.  Kindergarten!  She is quite ready to go, me, well, I am mostly ready.  Though I have moments that it just doesn't seem that enough time has passed in her short life.  But alas it seems she is ready.  Sigh.

And ready she is.  Her supply list has been bought.  Her backpack and lunch box have been carefully selected.  (And along those lines I'd like a word with Disney on their lack of marketing of their newest princess, but I won't harp on that as we were able to find the princess supplies.)  We all meet her teacher and assistant.  Her bus route has been gone over (and the county contacted about reinstating a previous bus stop as well).  So, all in all I think we are ready. 

Now someone please just remind me of that on her first day.  :)

For me I am busy thinking of how much she has grown recently.  She did an eight day swim class recently (two four day weeks, leaving a day open in case of bad weather).  When we signed her up she refused to put her face in the water.  REFUSED.  So she went in the level one class as a result.  Then on the first day when the instructor asked her that changed.  By the end of the class she was given the go ahead to skip ahead to level 3 if she signed up for another class.  Sigh.  Here is a quick look at her skills that I took during class.  In fact I think that this was after the first week.  Poor child had a hard time reaching the bottom of the pool despite the fact that it states it is 3 ft deep (and can easily stand at our pool in 3 ft), so she had to swim on the steps.  And if I can get a second video going I'll share one of her at our pool after the class was over.  You'd never know this was the girl that needed floaties and wouldn't put her face in the water no matter how we asked.

I have a few more beach pictures to share.  Funny how now that photos are digital and easier to share it takes longerl.  Because it is also easy to take thousands now where as before I might have taken a single roll of film.  Ok, maybe hundreds vs a roll of film, lol.  Makes it great for getting that "perfect shot," but more timing consuming to go through them since you can also alter them.  Oh, well maybe once they are grown I'll be caught up.  :)

But back to the beach photos...

They were excited to go to the beach this year, now that they understood what it means.  Last year I had to field questions on what I meant.  So that part was simpler.

(Can you see that she got surprised by a wave on our first night?)

I only had my little point and shoot camera that night and not many shots turned out.  But I had to share the pretty sunset we saw while walking along the beach the first night.

Later in the week they did lots of digging in the sand.

And in doing so I got lots of requests to fill up their buckets with water.  After awhile this one discovered that she could fill her own bucket (as long as someone was down by the water when she did so).  And she'd even offer to fill his up for him as well.

So she did a LOT of this.

And she had lots of supervision.

But the creativity did not end there.  Oh, no indeed.  They had all sorts of imaginary things going on.  Here I believe she was pretending to apply sunscreen.  Funny since he does not like sunscreen applied - especially to his face or torso and appropriately calls it sunscream.

They also helped Mommy make a sand castle.

(And yes his Sponge Bob swim trunks are the same ones as last year.  This year he has some legs in them.  They just made them really long - who knows he might get another year out of them.)

The kids are into going to the pool this year.  Whether it was the kiddy pool at the beach, the one on our patio, or the neighborhood pool - they love it all. 

He started off a little shy of the water.  He preferred to sit on the side of the pool and touch the water.

Or to sit on the side and kick his feet in the water.

He could make it look like so much fun that she'd join in.

But eventually he'd give in and get into the water.  V E R Y  S L O W L Y..

Now he is becoming quite comfortable with the water.  Floating around with his floaties by himself and jumping into daddy in the big pool. 

This year she has always been into the water.  No shyness on her part.

Put on her floaties and she was good to go.

Add in other toys and she is set.

And I love how she can talk him into trying new things (though sometimes this has its drawbacks).

This photo cracks me up.  Especially since he did a move similar to this with glasses while waiting on the elevator that just gave us a flash of him as a teenager.  I don't have a picture of him doing it, but I think it is fair to say that the girls had better look out.  :)

Here though he refused to put his glasses on.  That's ok - we were inside afterall.