Sammy's Basketball League

Pretty sure anyone who knows our family, knows how much Sammy loves basketball. 

I found a league here in Vegas and signed him up. They had practice twice a week, played 8 regular season games plus play-offs...and he loved every single minute of it.

His team ended up winning the championship for their age division! It was so exciting for him and he can't wait for next season!

First game of the season. Official uniforms hadn't arrived yet.

 Action shot (he's #4)

 Team huddle

 Championship game!

Champions!!

More birthday stuff!

Since Sammy was having his birthday party on Saturday at...yep...you guessed it: Chuck E Cheese's (again)--I didn't do a cake or anything on his actual birthday. I know that may sound mean, but I had spent the night before making 26 cupcakes to take to his class. And I was also making the birthday cake for the party. And I was planning to make a cake for Helene's birthday the following day.
And he doesn't even like cake.

Anyway. I digress.

So, Helene helped me make her cake on Wednesday.
OK--she just licked the beaters, but that's really the best part anyway.

Group pic. So love it.

And yes, that's Christmas wrapping paper...cause that's just how I roll.
(and she's only 2 so I can get away with it!)

My adorable girls

She couldn't have been more excited about her Cinderella and Little Mermaid figurines. I wish I could have captured her face the moment she opened them, but you get the excitement.

Poor Hannah was so jealous...and I really don't blame her. It's hard to sit by and watch everyone else get presents while she has to wait until July for her birthday.

Luckily, Helene was willing to share.

Sweet girl.

CAKE!! AND PRESENTS!!!

I don't have a ton of pictures from Sammy's party. It's just too crazy to take any while keeping track of kids, ordering and distributing food, giving out tokens, changing Helene's diaper, and trying to socialize.
I did manage to get a few.

Air Hockey!
(Mom's favorite!)

Stephanie and Riley and Danielle and Michael

Sammy's cousin, Jon, was in town visiting from Las Vegas--and Sammy was so excited to see him. CEC has this new thing for the birthday kids to do called the Ticket Blaster. Basically, they put you in this capsule and they start a wind tunnel and release a ton of tickets. Sammy really didn't want to do it (and I didn't blame him), so we enlisted Jon to do it for him.
It was pretty funny.

Chuck E. has a really really big head.

Cake!

My mom was so sweet to make Helene her very own birthday cake so she didn't feel left out.

Two forks...my kind of girl.

This is so Helene. She is my Prim and Proper girl.
Always saying "please" and "thank you"....and always wanting a napkin. She hates messy hands.

Presents!

Happy Birthday Sammy and Helene!

Happy 7th Birthday Sammy

Dear Sammy,
I still remember that day 7 years ago when you were put into my arms--and I finally totally and completely understood what it really meant when my own mom would tell me "I love you". I've never felt such an overwhelming feeling in my life and I never wanted to let you out of my arms.

And now you're 7.
So hard to believe.

You're such a sweet and helpful boy, always have been. Being the oldest, I'm always asking you to help me out or get things for me and you do it without complaining.

You love your sisters, despite the tormenting from Hannah, and you are always keeping a loving and watchful eye on Helene. Yesterday you shared your Valentine M&Ms with Helene, without any prompting from your dad or me, even though M&Ms are your favorite candy.

You're so thoughtful and friendly. One of the moms from your class told me how her daughter was new in class, and that you were the first to walk up to her and introduce yourself and then help her get caught up with school work.

I love that you and I have a similar passion for music. You always have an opinion about what song we listen to--and always want music on whether we're in the car or at home. Fortunately, we have similar taste.

You are so loving and affectionate--always giving kisses and hugs to me whenever you can. I'm going to miss that so much when you're a teenager and won't be seen with me.

Happy Birthday to my sweet baby boy!

Of course, Hannah wanted to be in the picture this morning. She's taller than he is--and reminds him of it almost every day. He hates that.

School update, a brief grammar lesson, and some fun

Has anyone else noticed that the days of me updating the blog three times a week are gone?

So, what am I doing with my time now that I don't document every moment of our lives on the blog?

Being a mom?

Updating my FB?

Oh, who knows.

Well, I guess some people know if they chat with me often enough, but really, the poor blog has had some serious neglect. Time for an update.

Let's start with Sammy's school situation.
His permanent teacher started this week, just in time for Back to School Night. Literally.
And if you were keeping track, that's 3 weeks after school started.
Nice.

She's seems...fine.

I know, I know...have a little more enthusiasm. Show that positive attitude you've been working on, right? What happened to "no more complaining"?

It's just hard to have a good first impression of someone who sends home a letter to the parents introducing herself--and it has a glaring grammatical error on it.

Yes, I will admit that I have a tendency to judge people when they use poor grammar. And I'm certainly no grammar queen myself, just look at all my run-on sentences and all the "--" and "....." I use. (Although I do have very strong feelings about the Oxford Comma. Yeah, I'm a big fan.) But, I'm not a teacher, so I can run-on all I want...right? Anyway, I digress.

IMO, when you are a teacher. And your job is to educate on such things as grammar and spelling and the like, I would expect you to know the difference between plural and possessive.

And clearly that is asking too much.

I'm just saying. There is a big difference between coaching "lady's basketball" and "ladies basketball".

Guess which one she used to coach? (HINT: she wrote lady's basketball)

See my problem?

Ummm, yeah..."oh my" would be the correct reaction to that. sigh.

It really is not that hard people. Use an apostrophe to show possession. Use an "es" or "s" to indicate plural. And yet, that's too much to ask of a 1st grade teacher apparently.

(Aaannnndd.....rant...OVER. Thanks for listening.)

So, yeah, he has a permanent teacher. Yay.

Moving on.
Here are a few random pictures of what the girls and I did recently while Sammy was at school.

One day I had to go to Nordstrom (yes, had to...I was almost out of lipstick!!), so after shopping I decided to let the girls ride the train. Hannah loved it. Helene cried the entire time. In fact, they had to stop the train so I could take her off it, she was that upset. Mom of the year, I know.

Another day we met up with my friend Laura for lunch, where Helene proceeded to eat two cups of ketchup. I don't know where she gets it from. I don't eat the stuff.

Friday we made Halloween cookies at Krista's house. The girls were really excited about the entire process.

But I think frosting was their favorite part.

Look at that concentration.

There were A LOT of sprinkles on those cookies!

I'm not sure which I love more in this picture: Hannah's close up face with the big smile or Ally's black teeth from all the sprinkles.
When the little ones got up from their naps, they had a few cookies too. Despite their looks of disdain--I think they enjoyed them.
So that's my update.
I know it doesn't totally make up for all the blog neglect (and there's been a lot the past few months), but I'm trying to get back into my blogging groove--because I need more chips and salsa too. :)

First Day of 1st Grade!

Sammy looks so excited, doesn't he? With school starting so late this year, we were all getting a little stir crazy and climbing the walls. Tuesday could not have come soon enough!

He was especially excited to see that his friend Nick was in his class. Nick is such a sweet, polite, and all-around nice boy--and his mother is just as delightful. I was just as happy as Sammy was, it seemed like a good omen.

Apparently that was wishful thinking.

So, what am I not happy about? Oh, just the fact that he doesn't have a teacher. Well, not a permanent teacher. He's had a different substitute every day this week--although I've been told that the "real teacher" should be starting on Monday. Hmmmmm, I won't hold my breath.

Sammy doesn't seemed to fazed by it, I think he's just happy to be back at school. And so I'm trying to not complain. I realize I tend to get worked up over things that really aren't as bad as I think, so I'm working on that. (Shut up, don't laugh!)

But really people. Really.

How hard is it to find a 1st grade teacher by the first day of school? Especially when you hear about ALL the teacher layoffs in SoCal.

Whatever.
After all the drama last year...I can't expect much from this school...and so I won't.

All right. So who wants to bet me a Diet Coke that he won't have his permanent teacher tomorrow? (Oops...is that my bad attitude showing through again? Sorry. Baby steps....baby steps.)

Descanso Gardens Visit

We stayed home from church today because Sammy randomly came down with a 102 degree fever Saturday night and I was up until 3am with him. He threw up only once, but was lethargic for the entire day.

Today was a gorgeous day with temps in the high 70s. I just couldn't bear to stay inside another minute, so I called Krista to see if she was up for a visit to the Arboretum. Well, I had perfect timing because she had the same thought...only it was to go to Descanso Gardens to see the lilacs in bloom.

Perfect.

I have never, ever, seen it so crowded--obviously everyone else had the same idea. Fortunately, the grounds are expansive, so the crowds weren't bothersome at all.

Hannah and Ally always hit it off and love to hang out, giggle, whisper, and pretend.

First stop was to check out the pond.

And see all the fish.

Sammy still wasn't feeling well, so he spent pretty much the entire time in the stroller with Helene.

The lilacs were so pretty and smelled divine!
Not sure why I don't have more than one shot of them.

Then we headed over to the amphitheater area, where the girls
sang and danced and jumped around.

Sammy even got out and joined in.

Love the pose
(You can tell which pictures are mine and which are Krista's since she has a much better camera than I. The colors on her shots are amazing!)

Helene was a bit obsessed with pushing the baby doll stroller around...

But then decided to play with the big kids on stage.

Love all the colors.

Hannah wouldn't cooperate with me for a shot...

but Krista managed to capture one for me.

There was plenty of rest time with snacks.

And I really do let Helene out of the stroller to play a bit. She discovered the daisies...a girl after my own heart, as daisies are my favorite flower.

These mini daisies are just adorable...

Me and Helene

Discovering flower petals...

Then we headed over to play in the maze.

Helene found a friend just her size.

Hannah and Krista hanging out.Poor Sammy, he looks like he's trying to hard to smile here...you can tell he just doesn't feel very well. And he actually looks a bit pale to me in this picture. Poor guy.

Helene also found a chair just her size.

We headed home soon after that--and poor Sammy went straight upstairs and put himself to bed. I felt like a bad mom making him go out after that. I guess he really wasn't feeling any better. He'll be staying home from school tomorrow, for sure.