Swimming with friends

We went to the neighborhood pool this morning with our sweet friends, the R family. Everyone had a great time...especially Allia and Richie! They swam together non-stop for about 2 hours! Allia was so exhausted by the time we left that she had a total meltdown. (Sorry R family!) Here are some photos...









Our cute little Godson was swimming all over in those floaties! Way to go, Andrew!




And here are my attempts at a group photo...pretty tough with all these little ones!

A little change

I have decided to officially make this blog our family scrapbook now that blog book printing is easily available. I am having trouble keeping this up along with a separate scrapbook. Just the idea of doing this relieves stress for me! So, this will probably mean more photos in the posts and hopefully a little more frequent posting. But does anyone know if you can do a private post somehow? I want to put in those cute naked baby photos, but not necessarily for everyone to see! I don't want to have to remember to add them to the blog book at the end of the year! Thanks. :-)

The girls

And here is a photo of Tia Nana with the girls since we didn't get any of her at the pool yesterday!

Swimming fun

We went with our guest for the weekend, Tia Nana, to the pool where the girls had swim lessons as a special treat. We had so much fun! Gloria was thrilled to get to swim this time. Allia was tall enough to go down the big water slides, and she was so brave. What a great time!

Mowing joy

Notice that Austin is smiling while he mows....

Strange behavior. I don't think I have ever seen this before. It probably has to do with the fact that Manah and Pawpaw bought him a self-propelled mower for a Father's Day/birthday gift! It sure makes mowing this huge lawn a little easier. His words after his first use, "Where has this thing been all of my life?!" Thanks, Pawpaw and Manah!

Manah and Pawpaw...

thanks for the letters. Gloria really enjoyed hers, especially the stickers.


Austin, on the other hand, wishes you would send less stickers. ;-)


This game is contageous!


Don't worry...Daddy got her back!

Last day of swim lessons

They both passed their levels! Yay! Daddy was able to come watch, and we all really enjoyed seeing him in the middle of the day too. But BOY is it hot today!!! 102 degrees right now and getting hotter!

And the faithful spectator who wanted her picture taken too. Poor baby...she wanted in the water so badly! Me too, Gloria!


And here is a video of Allia swimming. You can see Mariana in her group in the background.

Like father, like daughter

Well, it turns out that our Allia is a "really good swimmer." Her teacher's words, not just mine! They recommended today that I enroll her in another session in the more advanced class which usually has a minimum age of 6! They said she is doing so great that they really think she would benefit from advancing early. Daddy was SO proud of his little swimmer (for those who don't know, he is/was a swimmer himself!)


And the other girls...just because they are cute!


Bobbing for diving rings on the steps

Little hams

I took out the camera to take a photo of Mariana in her all-pink outfit that she picked out by herself. Suddenly I had 3 girls posing for photos!

She teachers vs. He teachers

We had a little mishap at swim lessons today. They messed up grouping the kiddos yesterday (a "screamer" in the "swimmer" group, etc.). So today they announced that they had rearranged the groups and assigned new teachers to some of the children. Mariana happened to be one of them, and she was assigned to a male teacher ("he teacher") instead of a female teacher ("she teacher") like yesterday. She burst into tears, ran to me, and refused to get in the water. Argh.

So after sitting through 1/2 the lesson trying to talk her into joining, I went to talk with the lady in charge of the teacher assignments. She reassigned Mariana to a she teacher and Mariana happily joined in the lesson.

I had several conversations with her about this after the lesson and finally got to the bottom of the issue! At the end of one conversation, she blurted out, "I like she teachers, but he teachers are scary because they are naked."

HA! I burst out laughing. The men in her life (Daddy, Pawpaw, Lito) do not go without shirts! She was weirded out by the fact that the male teachers were half naked! Good for her! Once she told me that, I didn't feel so bad requesting a new assignment! I think that is a great reason to want a she teacher!

Swim time!

We finished ballet camp, had a nice weekend with Pawpaw and Manah, and now we have our 2 weeks of swim lessons. Whew! Lots of fun!

A visit to the pool with Pawpaw and Manah




And our first day of swim lessons. Both girls did great!

Last day of Ballet

Today was the girls' last day of ballet, and they did a little performance for us (myself, Gloria, Pawpaw and Manah were in attendance). I wish I could post the video, but it is long and huge!

Getting ready. Allia was a line leader.









Allia did an awesome job! She was smiling, knew her moves...just absolutely too cute! Mariana...well, did you notice she was not in the photos of the dance? She chickened out. Poor baby. Too much pressure for her. So here is where she spent her "recital" time.


It took trophy time to get her out of Manah's lap! And boy she jumped up quickly!

Day 3!

We had a photo session this morning since they both requested 2 buns in their hair. Gloria even wore some ballet shoes so she could be in the pictures!











And a few pictures from the end of today. I got there a little early and caught them playing dress up.


Picking stickers at the end of class. Their teacher even let the younger siblings come in for a bit. So you can see Gloria picking a sticker too!


Favorite part of today: Unanimously dress up. "Especially because we got to play with new stuff today" (aka props...the big bouquet, star wand and tiara Allia has with the wedding dress!)

*Side note: Notice the increased frequency of blogging? Well, besides lots going on this week I am also experiencing a return of energy that comes with entering the 2nd trimester Yay! Still feeling icky some of the time but at least I have more energy!