Dress up

I'm sure one day Fisher will be so embarrassed by these pictures but for the moment they are adorable.  I want to say, however, that I did not ask him to put the tutu on he came to me and insisted he wear it.  Shelbie and Coral were playing with some friends and they were putting ballet clothes on and doing a ballet video.  Fisher just wanted to be included and he had the best time.  He tried his best to do the moves and was cracking me up.

The last field trip of the year

Homasassa Springs

I was excited to be able to go with Shelbie and her 1st grade class to her last field trip of the year to Homasassa Springs State Park.  It was a really fun trip with tons of exciting animals to see and learn about.  I just love being able to spend one on one time with my individual kids!

If you look close in the above picture you will see a squirrel with a whole ice cream cone in it's mouth.  Out of all the animals at the park this squirrel got the biggest reaction.  Shelbie's group was cracking up and talking about this squirrel for weeks :)

The Manatees were really cool to see and they even had an underwater viewing area where you could see them up close.

I sure do love my Shelbie in all her sweetness!!!...

My Daughter the Manager

The three 1st grade classes at Shlebie's school, while studying economics, organized a Mexican restaurant.  They had to "apply for a loan at the bank, apply for restaurant positions and go to an interview, run the restaurant and collect pay and then pay back the loan."  Shelbie applied for a waitress, hostess, and manager.  She actually really wanted the waitress position but her teacher said that after her interview she knew that Shelbie just had to be the manager.  Her teacher gave me her interview paper and it is truly priceless!  Shelbie talked about how she would make sure that everyone would do there job and quote, "if someone didn't want to do there job or was tired I would tell them that I hired them and I can fire them so they better get back to work."  I was cracking up!  When the day for the restaurant came around we went as a family to support our girl.  She did such a great job and stayed on task.  I could see the other kids asking her questions and she would give them the answer and check her checklist to make sure everything was running smoothly.  She even went around to the tables and asked everyone how they were doing.  I was definitely a proud momma!

 

April Pool Fun

So the kids have been waiting for the pool fun to start for the year so when April rolled around I started to let them go swimming.  The water was really cold but they didn't seem to mind, at least for a short period of time.  Fisher mostly played in his water table while I watched pool side (there was definitely no way I was getting in).

Fisher set up the boogie board as a boat and very meticulously placed his toys on it and pulled it around the outside of the pool.  He is so funny!

Busted!

I've mentioned several times how picky my Fisher is but thing he does like is peanut butter.  Just the other day I found him on the counter with a spoon helping himself to one of his favorite treats.  How can I resist that face so I let him have a few more bits while I grabbed my camera :)

Easter Sunday

My most favorite people in the world!...  How can you not have a great Easter with these faces smiling back at you!

Spring Break (first week of April 2012)

We went up to North Carolina to my parents house for spring break.  We also celebrated Shelbie's 7th birthday.  She was so excited to help make her cake and decorate the top with strawberries and it was definitely delicious!

 Fisher had the best time at mama and big daddy's.  he loved watching movies and falling asleep in mama's chair.  We also went to
Dollywood over spring break and had a great time.  Miles was the only tall enough kid to ride every ride and boy did he!  He loves all roller coasters no matter how scary.  In the below picture Miles, myself, Coral, and Shelbie are all on the ride.

Above Coral, Shelie, and Fisher are on the train.  Below is Fisher on the tram back to the car.  This picture melts my heart cause he is snuggling with his new stuffed kitty that we had just gotten at dollywood.  It melts my heart so much cause he has never liked stuffed animals but as soon as he saw this kitty he just had to have it and has never let it go since.  I am a big stuffed animal fan and so it was so sweet to me that he has someone to snuggle :)

My sweet Fisher still snugglingly his "kitty cat".

Fisher and CoCo

We are glad every day that we got our sweet kitty CoCo!  She has got to be the best kitty around!  She has especially bonded with Fisher and can be found morning, noon, and night snuggled up with him.  I wanted to post just some of the pictures I have caught of the two of them so I can remember these sweet moments (and I cant wait to show them to Fisher when his is older).  Just recently Fisher has started talking a lot more and every time CoCo comes up to him he says, with such excitement in his vioce, "she likes me!"  Fisher will even share his special blanket with CoCo and when she is sleeping he will cover her up with it.  Such precious moments!!!

Shelbie's friend Bday Party

I saw this idea on Pinterest for a girls birthday party and I thought it was so fun so I decided to give it a try for Shelbies friend party.  The idea was a lot more elaborate then I did but the general idea was there and the girls had a lot of fun.  I made 8 thin flat sheet cakes and thinly iced them in vanilla icing.  I gave each girl there own cake and let them decorate it how ever they wanted.  I had some candy, different colored icings I had made, and some fondant that I made and let them cut different shapes out.  Two of the moms stayed to help out and I was so grateful for there help. 
When each girl was done decorating there cake they got to put on a special apron that Shelbies Grandma Cooper made her and get there picture taken with there cake.  We then made frames for there pictures and craft tiaras for fun.  Shelbie also organized musical chairs and limbo to play.  Shelbie has a great group of friends and it was a great afternoon with 7 cute 7 year olds :)

Here's my sweet Shelbie with her apron and her cake.  She cracks me up cause she doesn't like to smile showing her teeth so pretty much every picture is her cute little grin.  I have to say that I am so proud of this girl and the young women that she is to soon becoming!  She is a great big sister (especially with Fisher), she is a great friend, she is smart, obedient, caring, thoughtful, helpful, creative, artistic, fun and just down right sweet!  I love my Shelbie so much and she definitely helps balance out some of the craziness in our home.

Shelbie and Lauren.

Eliana, Lauren, Sophia, Sophie, Shelbie, Ami, and Jocelyn (in front)

Time Out For Women

(in the picture from top to bottom is:  Lori Potter my sister in law "s.i.l.", Lana Dahle my "s.i.l.", Alison Cooper my "s.i.l.", myself, Angie and friend of Lori's, and Heidi Michael.  Heidi is a sweet friend of mine and her and I got to ride together from Gainesville.)

I was so grateful to get to go to a women's conference, called Time Out for Women, in Orlando on the weekend of March 9th.  I went with some great friends and family and had such an amazing and spiritually experience.  Some of the main lessons and reminders that I took away from the conference were to:
*Focus on the positive rather then the negative - your circumstances won't necessarily change but your attitude will and you will feel so much better.
*Be forgiving and just "let it go"
*A reminder that my actions will affect my children tremendously, therefore I need to try my best to keep my cool and discipline with love.
*Charity isn't something you do for others its the pure love OF Christ for us.  We have to have a relationship with Christ and truly feel his love for us and then how we treat others will be an effect of feeling Christs love for us!

There were many more lessons and beautiful music during the weekend.  It was also a great weekend with some dear friends and some of my sister in laws.  We went out to dinner, stayed one night in an awesome hotel, and some of us did a little shopping after the conference was over before heading home.  This weekend was exactly what I needed to recharge!  A big thanks to my sweet husband for taking care of the kids so I could go!