Last Day of First Grade!!!

We have a 2nd grader!!!  How is that possible?!  He is growing up right before our eyes.  Today was Drew's last day of first grade.  He has really grown a lot this year - he's come a long way with his reading and is a whiz in math!  We are so thankful for the wonderful teacher he had this year.  Let the summer fun begin!

Field Day Fun!

Jack and I got to go up and watch Drew's field day for awhile yesterday.  They had a lot of fun games and stations for the kids!  Jack is excited to get to have field day when he is in kindergarten now.  :)

Racing to the cones trying not to drop the ball on the flip flop!

Jack found a tiny dry area on the playground to sit and watch - I don't think he realized he was watching a different class.  :)

They had to move the ball to the other end using the water in the squirt gun!

Teamwork!

Ready.....

Running to the bucket before all the water leaks out of the cup!

He cracks me up with how fast he can be when he wants to be - his team won this race!

Parachute time!

Drew and Jake!

Bouncing backwards on the beach ball!

Mrs. Milbrandt's First Graders!

Crazy kids!

Happy Birthday, Papa!

We celebrated Papa's birthday on Memorial Day!  Drew and Jack picked out their own gifts for him and even wrapped them themselves.  Drew got him a tape measure and Jack got him a "funny hammer"!  The boys all had fun helping Papa open his presents and then blow the candles out on his cake.  Happy Birthday, Papa - we love you!!

Brrrrrr!!!!

Never mind the ICE COLD water, the boys had to break in the pool on opening day!!!  Crazy kids!

Mommy the Queen!

Last Friday I got to go to Drew's class and be the "Royal Reader".  I wore a cape, crown, and the kids even rolled out a red carpet for me and bowed and curtsied!  Drew picked out the book Big Smelly Bear for me to read - because he thought it would be funny since it was about something "smelly".  :)  The kids loved the book and, more importantly, the tootsie roll pops that Drew picked out for me to bring.  It was a fun morning!

Three Billy Goats Gruff

Drew's class put on some puppet shows for their parents last week!  He was part of "The Three Billy Goats Gruff" show and played the part of "Big Billy Goat".  They created scenery on the smart board, made their own puppets, and had a stage and everything!  Mimi and Papa got to go to the first performance and Daddy, Jack and I got to go to the second.  It was SO cute!!!  The kids all did a great job and we are so proud of Drew.  He even read all his lines in a billy goat voice!  I loved it!

Drew (Big Billy Goat) and the Troll.

The puppeteers introduced themselves and their puppets at the end!

Jack's Last Day of Preschool

I can't believe that Jack's first year of preschool is over already.  It seems like it just flew by!  He really liked school and learned a lot this year.  It's crazy to see how much he grew and changed from the first day to the last!!

Last Day of Preschool

He looks so big now!!!

Go Cubs!

Drew had his first baseball game of the season a few weeks ago!  Daddy is the coach this year and their team is the Cubs.  He is doing great so far - lots of hits off of the machine and a couple of great outs at first and second!  It's so fun to watch him play - we are very proud of you, buddy!

Jack and his buddy Joey entertained themselves with some football!

Mother's Day with my Boys!

I had a great Mother's Day a few weeks ago!  The celebration started the Thursday before when Jack's preschool had a special "Mom's Day" - his teacher presented each kid with an award and then the kids presented their moms with their answers to questions about Mommy and a beautiful flower in a handpainted pot!  

Jack got the award for "most caring" - that's my sweet boy!

Here are his answers to the questions about me - apparently my cooking (or lack thereof) has made a BIG impression on this 4 year old!!  Hilarious!

He made this one for me at Lexi's house.  I feel so special that he loves me more than cake!!  And the green hands with yellow fingertips are dandelions, in case you were wondering.  :)

Drew came home on Friday with a Mother's Day card that he ran upstairs to hide because I wasn't supposed to see it until Sunday, but he just couldn't wait and finally gave it to me on Saturday!  

His answers were pretty funny, too - he originally said I was 5 feet tall and 120 pounds, then asked Daddy and decided to fix the height and add 10 more pounds to account for the baby!!  Love how he knows I love him when I "go out of town"!!  I asked him about that and he explained that he knows I love him even when I go out of town.  Ok, that makes more sense.  :)

This is Drew and I playing basketball - MAN, are we tall!

Jack (my little artist) had to make me one more Mother's Day card!

The boys and Daddy picked me out some beautiful flowers and got me an iphone, too!

Jack's "flowers" he made me at Lexi's house.  He crumpled and glued the tissue paper flowers himself! (He says one of them is a butterfly.)

It was a busy day and we had Mimi, Papa, Ryan, Susie, Sam and Brody over for steaks that evening - when everyone was in bed I realized I didn't even get a picture of me with the boys!!  I did get one of Mimi with them, though.  :)

Marco Island!

Brian and I got to take a little 5 day getaway to Marco Island, FL last week to celebrate our 10th anniversary coming up in June!  We had a great time just relaxing, sleeping in, eating whenever we wanted (and not having to cut anyone's food), and more relaxing!  It was really beautiful there.  A HUGE thank you to Mimi and Papa for watching the boys for us so we could take this much needed trip!  

It was raining when we got there but luckily after we took a little time to check in and unpack, the sun came out!  We changed for dinner and then took a little walk on the beach before going to eat at C.J.'s on the Bay.  We had to take a lot of pictures of ourselves because no one was around!

I love palm trees!!  This one has coconuts if you look closely.

C.J.'s on the Bay - we sat right by the water and had a great view of the sunset, the big boats, and even saw a dolphin fin and tail pop out of the water a couple times!  (It was too quick for me to get a picture.)  So cool!  It turned out to be a beautiful night.

View from our balcony - not bad!

Friday we hung out on the beach most of the day (got a little too much sun), moved under the umbrella, took a nap, read a book, ahhhhh...so relaxing!  (Don't have any pictures of any of this for some reason.)  I was too busy relaxing.  :)

Saturday morning we took a walk on the beach after breakfast - it was SUPER windy so not warm enough for beach or pool until later that afternoon.  We collected some cool shells for the boys!

We walked down the beach to the Marriott Resort - it was SO neat (our hotel was wonderful, too, just much smaller and not much for kids.)  We walked up from the beach and checked out their pools and even walked around inside a little bit - we decided we have to come back with the boys and stay here!  I took a little break in one of their hammocks.  :)

We found a summer job for Drew!

I just couldn't get enough of these palm trees.  This was at our pool and right outside our room.

This little guy was just walking up the sidewalk at our hotel!

I think this was Sunday night - we tried to take a walk on the beach before sunset and it was crazy windy again so we didn't go far!

Finally got a real picture of us together!

We sat on the patio of our resort by the pool bar and had a drink and watched the sunset.  So pretty!

We had dinner at an Italian restaurant across the street from our hotel after we watched the sunset.

Our last morning - of course it was beautiful weather and not windy anymore!  We took a quick walk on the beach after breakfast before we had to head back to the airport.

Check out the "Good Morning" made out of towels - they put this out every morning at the pool!