The Start to the Last Month in 2017

 Matthew is Spotlight Stallion!

 A pretty start to the month, but it has gotten chilly!

November 2017

 Andy and Sam coached Matthew's baseball team.  

It was a season of lots of growth!

 Matthew had to have his birthday party very late due to a bunch of little factors.

We did it at Main Event and went rock climbing.

The kids had a blast!

Happy (Belated) birthday to Matthew!

 This boy of mine.

My crazy, crazy boy.

He is 8.

That is so hard for me to believe. 

He may drive us nuts, but he makes us laugh.

We laugh every single day.

He is smart.

Too smart sometimes. :)

He isn't a  huge fan of reading, but is making progress.

He loves to share his stories.

Math is his thing.

He likes to play baseball with daddy coaching.

That is pretty cool.

His sisters are very patient with him, most days.

Natalie and Matthew play a lot, but Meagan has fun teaching him things like gymnastics.

We love him so much!

Natalie is 12!

 We had a regular party at our pool.

I didn't get many photos.

It was busy. :)

On her actual birthday, we went to Mr.Gatti's.

We actually had a blast.

Andy was just happy they had a salad bar, and actually a good one!

Natalie is still our funny, goofy girl.

She has adjusted nicely to middle school, but misses her friends from elementary.

She is careful about doing her work.

She also is good about studying for tests and asking for help.

She loves to play with her same toys as always, but also likes electronics and hanging out with her friends.

She makes us laugh all the time.

Very proud of my 6th grade sweetheart! 

Ordinary Life, Busy Life

 Meagan started up a class in Georgetown, so Natalie and I have done some exploring.

 Tamara and I got to go hear Jason Reynolds speak in Hutto.  

It was really, really cool for book nerds like us.

 My big girl

My sweet Peanut.  She is getting so old.

I often gingerly lean down to pet her when I wake up in the morning because I am worried she won't be around anymore.

She is very skinny.

She doesn't seem to be in pain, though, so we will just keep on going.

Go Astros!

No, I am not an Astros fan.  I am a Royals and Cubs fan.  However, Andy is very excited, so we went along.

Peanut is 16!

We had a birthday party for Peanut.

It was her Sweet 16!

We were joking at one point about it, but then we started to take it seriously.

She had lots of friends over.

She was not always understanding of the party, but she LOVED the pupcakes!

 Matthew selected an unique outfit to celebrate.

 Natalie had some of her pet loving friends over.

 The dogs all got dressed up. 

Peanut got the fanciest dress.

Chloe were a dress.

Charli wore a pink bandana.

Here is Peanut lunging her pupcake.

It was funny because she did not realize what it was at first.

Then, she did and was SO excited!

 This was actually not at the party.

Just more dog love.

Another Visit to SF...a Great Trip!

 I love San Francisco.

I love Bodega Bay and Sonoma County.

Love all of it.

Andy and I went for a few days to Sonoma County on our own, and during that time Brian took the kids to do some neat stuff in the city like a cruise around the city and to do some exploring of areas we haven't been to before.

We also went to all of my favorite food places.

I have a few I must always do: the Indian pizza place, sushi, gourmet ice cream (we have good ones here too, but they have several particularly good ones there), and seafood.

We spent 4th of July with Michelle, Pete, and Kai, as well as the Brians, in Monte Rio on the water.

Crazy because it was around 83 during the day and pretty hot, and then in the high 50s when we returned for the fireworks later.

All part of the magic.

The city had a bunch of "Summer of Love" exhibitions going on.  The photo above is from one at the deYoung.

 We went to the Shell Beach, just down the road from Brian and Brian's house.  The kids loved the tide pools, and of course, the shells.

 Something that was unexpectedly cool was that Matthew and Natalie LOVED collecting wildflowers.  They are plentiful and very pretty.

They looked for them for quite a long time!

 The kids had fun with Kai. He spent the night with us a few nights.

 Ahhhhh, the redwoods.

LOVE the redwoods.

I am dreaming of heading back there soon.

The beginning of Summer

 Chloe the pug has been doing much better!

She got a treat of a pupachino to celebrate a good checkup.

 We finally checked out Snooze.

It was really good.  

Going during the week avoided the rush, which was great.

Nat and her friend made homemade dog treats. 

The dogs were very happy!

The kids all went to Camp Invention a few weeks ago.

Meagan got to be a CIT, a counselor in training. 

She loved that.

The other two had a lot of fun as well.

Matthew had 3 of his best friends there, and Myka joined Natalie.

I loved that they got to use their imagination and be creative.

End of the school year

 Matthew is currently VERY into gymnastics with his sister.

He has been set on doing a handstand on his own.

They worked on it for a very long time.

 They are pretty much there!

 Matthew, Andy, and the rest of the A's finished their season with a tournament.

They won 2/3, so that was good!

Grandma and Papa came to see one of the games, which was fun.

The season is over.

Matthew is going to play soccer this summer with his friend Tyler, but he wants to play baseball again this fall.

 Meagan and Natalie were in Suessical this weekend.  

It was the best performance their class had done yet.  

Meagan was Gertrude McFuzz, a bird in love with Horton, as in Horton Hears a Who.

Natalie was a Jungle Citizen.

Michael, my cousin, drove up for dinner and the play.

Their center is running Annie next year, so it will be interesting to see if the kids choose to sign up again or not.  They do like that show.

Beach weekend!

 We went to North Padre this weekend.

It was a lot of fun.

We had absolutely perfect weather.

Gorgeous!

We had one minor jellyfish sting, but Meagan survived.

We also drove over to Port Aransas for a few hours, which we haven't done before.

I would like to stay there in the future!

Matthew and Leo (in the picture with Lia, Leo's mom) were in the same group for their big presentation.

They were so proud of themselves.

I wasn't able to go, but Matthew brought the poster home and presented it for me.

Baseball Season!

 Andy is coaching Matthew's team again.

They are the A's this time.

The kids seem really sweet and Andy is having fun.

A Fun Few Photos

 Sweet Myka and Natalie with some mega marshmallows.

Yummy treats!

 Charlie got a new bed.

Matthew lost his tooth! 

An awful photo, but loving the gap-toothed smile.