Here's the video of Addie singing the National Anthem
http://youtu.be/Umi7Wj5JRM4

What does this say about me?

I bought my new spring purse today and am cleaning out the contents of my winter one and doing the big switcheroo.  I've dumped the contents on my dining room table and in honor of the many Us Weekly magazines I read while flying to and from Boston for a conference this weekend, I thought it'd be funny to share what's in my purse. Here goes:
10 (yes, double digits) different lipsticks, lip glosses or chapsticks
8 pens (you can tell I'm a mom based on that fact alone)
6 quarters
6 nickels
2 dimes
21 pennies
11 different people's business cards
6 cough drops
2 Dunkin Donuts Free Iced coffee Monday cards (sadly, which tomorrow is the last day for)
3 random keys that aren't on my keychain
1 stack of MY business cards
2 coupons
1 sunglasses case
2 Dunkin Donuts straws in wrappers
7 flash drives (OMG, this is too funny. Apparently  I get them at conferences as giveaways and then I keep my own presentations I give on my own)
1 pack of gum
So apparently I am a pen, lipstick and flash drive hoarder. There are worse things I think.

Playdate

Saturday was supposed to be a rainy day and then when we woke up, it was sunny and 75 degrees. We'll take it!

Uncle Teb was in town this weekend, so we spent some time with him.

Addie's friend Reagan and her sister Abby came over to play too.

It was really fun to watch them drive around.

Meeting Colin

Tonight we got to go down to Rob and Erin's house and meet Colin for the first time. He's such a tiny little fellow; only around 5.5 pounds right now. Claire has a cold and hasn't been able to hold her brother yet, so that means that Addie and Ben didn't get to hold him either.

The pictures I've seen so far were of his solely, which gives you no perspective. Seeing him in Rob's arms gives a little more perspective. He's so little.

Ben desperately wanted to hold him. He kept saying, "awww, he's so cute."

My darn glasses don't have the anti-reflective coating on the lenses.

Addie was so excited to meet him too.

He weighs less than a bag of sugar! Not that I'm a weightlifter by any means, but I felt like I was holding nothing! When we got home, I weighed the kids. Addie's weighs 54.5 pounds and Ben weighs 50 pounds. I lift them both regularly without difficulty, so it makes sense that Colin felt like nothing!

Just chillin'.

Highlands Hooray award

Yesterday Addie brought home a paper saying that she was a winner of one of the Highlands Hooray Awards, to be given out this afternoon (talk about nice warning for parents, right?!)

All she knew was that they give one award per class based on the four values of Highlands (courteous, cooperative, responsible, respectful) and then one ultimate winner of the Wildcat award, who demonstrates all of the characteristics.

This little boy in front of her cracked me up.

The assembly was for the kindergarten, first and second grades at the same time.

The awards were given out for Responsible, Courteous and Cooperative, so I knew that Addie was either up for Respectful or the Wild Cat. I knew it was between Addie and her best friend Reagan.

They started announcing the Respectful winner and... Addie was called.

Perhaps the LEAST flattering picture of her standing when she was announced humanly possible!

The smile didn't leave her face. Tonight at the PTA meeting her teacher even came up to us to say that her smile was so incredible while she was being acknowledged.

She was so proud of herself. And we were too.

Look at that face of pure delight.

Then it turns out that they give Perfect Attendance awards for each marking period too and Addie hadn't missed a day! So she got to go up again and get another certificate.

Overall, very proud of her and am glad to have a child who is respectful.

Teenager

Seriously?!? She'll be 7 years old next month and she looks like this!??!

Fun at Muddy and Guppy's

Muddy and Guppy put the zip line up at their house today. Here's the video I got sent at work. He apparently rode the line over 100 times today.

PS Love his little Chaps outfit- such the Mr. Preppy. Brian, of course, picked it out for him.

Weekend fun

We got the exciting news that Aunt Erin was in labor on Saturday night. She gave birth to new cousin Colin at 7:39pm. Addie and Ben are so excited to meet him. Claire got to spend time this afternoon at our house playing in the moon bounce for her first real time. She had a blast.

Difference of a year!

Seriously? How did they grow up so much in a mere 349 days? Who would have thought that going from almost 6 to almost 7 is such a big transformation?!?! Even look at Ben from 4.5 to 5.5!!

"Is Daddy gone yet?'

This is the question that Benjamin asks me almost every single morning. Now before you start to think "why does Ben so desperately want Brian gone in the morning?" let me fill you in on some background.

I think before I may have mentioned that while Addie was a new baby I participated in the Leadership Institute. One of the faculty there told me a story about raising her daughter and how all children need a chance to be naughty, without being too bad. She gave her daughter the parameter that she could never eat anything blue. So this little girl took every possible opportunity she could to eat blue lollipops or blue candy. It didn't cause her any harm and the little girl felt like she was making her own decisions, etc.

So back to Ben's question... the kids and I have serious talks about words and their meanings frequently. They know that they are being raised to know the right names for their body parts and that other kids may not be, etc. They also know some words that are grown up words that kids shouldn't say like "damn" and "hell."

As you all know, Benjamin is a dance party music guru. Well one of his favorite songs is "Sexy and I Know It."We've had plenty of conversations about what sexy means and who can say it. Addie and Ben both know that sexy is a word that grown ups say about people they think are attractive, but it can't be your own mom or anything like that. They also know that they aren't supposed to say sexy at all, since it's really not an appropriate kids word. But that rule is tough to enforce when a song like Sexy and I Know It comes on (or any one of handful of other pop songs), so I told them that they can only say it to me, and that Daddy will be really mad if he heard them say it.

So each morning when Ben wakes up, he wants to know if Brian has already left for work and then he whispers "I'm sexy and I know it." It's very cute. Every once in a while he'll walk by me and say it under his breath and get the orneriest smile on his face. Adorable.

Hello, Happy Easter!!

My Easter kiddos were happy to go downstairs this morning to see what the Easter Bunny brought. Ben had just gotten his hat on Friday night and loves to wear it.

Some of these are out of order- sorry!

The Easter Bunny made her annual appearance at our house, which Addie and Ben believe happens at everyone's house. Look how grown up they are now!

Brian and Guppy chilled out and enjoyed the nice weather while the kids hunted for some loot.

Later on, we went to MomMom and PopPop's house and hung out with Graham.

Addie wore her 2012 Muddy-created-Easter dress, of course and looked adorable.

We went over to Muddy and Guppy's for Easter dinner too. Aunt Kim and Uncle Tom were there too, they just didn't make it into this picture. It was a really nice evening full of fascinating dinner conversation and yummy food.

Back to the hunt at our house, Addie and Ben each got a water balloon pump and balloons!

The Easter Bunny hid 12 presents around our front yard. This is when they had found 11 of them and the 12th was in the black flower pot by Addie's head. It was really funny to see them walk by over and over again.

The Easter Bunny commented on Guppy's use of his cane and mimicked it too.

Addie was SO THRILLED to find a real locket in her basket this morning. She was equally impressed that the cardboard it came on said "not intended for children under 14 years of age," which meant that the Easter Bunny believed she was mature enough for such a special necklace. As she told us later on, "It's so good the Easter Bunny got me the locket necklace, because the Easter Bunny's job is to make kids happy and that way no one in our family had to spend money on it." She is really excited to have it! And yes, I do realize that she looks like a teenager in this picture- it makes me shiver a little.

The Easter Bunny also brought them each their own tennis rackets, and rackets for Brian and me too! We spent the morning playing tennis out back with Muddy and with Guppy watching us. Really fun.

Overall, a wonderful Easter.

Hope everyone got to spend time with special people in their lives too.

Explanation about Ben's crying

I've been corrected. If you haven't read the blog post called Nanny McPhee yet, go read that one before you read this. Ok, back to the correction- remember how I said Ben was crying because Addie not taking her tooth out was prohibiting him from getting ice cream? Well, I've been corrected and reminded of what the real reason was.
It went something like this:
Brian: Addie, if you take your tooth out we can go get ice cream for dessert.
Addie: No way.
Brian: Really, Addie, you can pick Friendly's or Sweet Lucy's or Temptations. Your choice. Just pull your tooth out.
Addie: Not gonna happen.
Brian: Addie, if you just pull your tooth out we can go to Disney World.
Addie: Nuh uh, no way.
Brian: Not Disney or ice cream will make you take your tooth out?
Addie: Right.

So Ben was sobbing hysterically about not being able to go to Disney.
Once the sling-shot-heard-round-the-Volvo happened, Ben immediately stopped crying and said, "Yay! When are we going to Disney now?"
Uh oh. Daddy needs to be careful what he bribes with, right?!?!

Nanny McPhee

Addie aka Nanny McPhee was quite thrilled with her tooth progress today. Look how far out that tooth is! She ate dinner like this and was adamant that she wasn't going to pull it out.

At the end of dinner we offered that if Addie took her tooth out we could go get ice cream. Addie was all about not pulling it out, which made Ben leave in tears. He was so furious that she wasn't getting them ice cream.

In the car ride home, Ben was sobbing a major fit over not getting ice cream. As we got closer to each possible place, I offered to Addie to take it out. She kept refusing. Finally I reached back and offered to just touch her tooth. I gave a little push and that bad boy sling shotted across the car. She was a little stunned but was immediately proud of herself and the smile hasn't left her face since. Her adult tooth is visible already! I swear I'm never going to have pictures of her with teeth missing, they grow in so quickly for her!

Here she is in Temptations, the ice cream store. Woohee, isn't that space huge?

So we still can't find the tooth. We put a letter under her pillow telling the Tooth Fairy that it's in my car somewhere. I suggested we look tomorrow and if we find it, we'll put it under her pillow. I also offered for the Tooth Fairy to try to find it in my car herself.

Oh and after having spent a solid ten minutes searching my car for it, I've learned that there are a heck of a lot of crumbs on my floor that look eerily like a little girl's front tooth! I must've thought "I've got!" at least five times. Oh well.

Thirty-oneth

Addie loves to read, which shocks no one. She's into the Magic Tree house Series right now. At the Easter Egg Hunt this past weekend, the Easter Bunny gave each child a book. Addie chose a Magic Tree house book, the Summer of the Serpent or something like that. It's number 31 in the series. (Seriously, I should start writing kids books!).

Well Addie has been talking about the Serpent book. Tonight on the phone she spoke with Uncle Teb and mentioned her new book, which she told him was the "thirty-oneth" book. I corrected her and said, "thirty-first" and she looked at me like I had four heads. She again said, "thirty-oneth." I looked at her like she had four heads and said, "thirty-first." "Why isn't it thirty-oneth?" she asked. I said, "Addie is it, 'oneth, second, third...'?" She looked at me and said, "I'm still going to say thirty-oneth. It just sounds better." So if you hear her say it wrong, she knows what the right way is and just chooses to not say it right!

Addie's big treat for us

This morning Addie said to me, "I made you guys breakfast!" She was so proud of herself. She said, "they're sandwiches." I suggested she bring them upstairs for us to have breakfast in bed. She brought up two sandwiches and gave one to each of us. She was really excited for us to eat them. She said they were peanut butter and jelly.

Brian took the first bite and immediately Addie burst into fits of laughter. Brian said, "What is that?" And all I could smell as mint. She could barely contain herself as I opened my sandwich to see it filled with white stuff. I thought mayonnaise and by that time I was crying from laughing so hard, just thinking of Brian eating a mayonnaise sandwich. Well it turns out that it was toothpaste!!! She was so incredibly proud of herself. She shouted "April Fool's!"

What a blast.

Can't believe it!

Ben passed Basic Level I in ice skating yesterday and Addie passed Basic Level II! We knew Ben would pass, since this was his second six-week go-round, but I was shocked that Addie passed II! These are their badges that they are proudly showing off.