Dave's Graduation

Dave graduated from UMKC May 8, 2009 with a Master Degree in Environmental and Urban Geosciences. We are all glad to have Daddy home full time again and I know he is relieved to be done. The graduation ceremony was a lot more emotional for me than I expected it to be. I am so proud of my scientist husband! This is a picture of him and his advisor JJ.

Here we are at graduation.

Dave and his Dad

Jenn, Dave, Tim and Russ. Yay Dave!

My girls!

My girls are so sweet. Emma wanted to take a bath by herself this morning so I put Sammi in for hers first. She could hear Emma singing in the living room and kept pointing. I said, "well holler at her" So Sammi gave it her best shot. "Ehba!" She has just started trying to say Emma this week and it always is Ehba. It cracks me up. She really wanted Emma to get in with her. If Emma is in the tub by herself Sammi comes in and gives her kisses and tries to climb in with her. Sammi is starting to say some words. So far she says, Mama, Dada, bubble, Papa and Emma. She also makes a dog noise (sort of, it is kind of like a growl) and makes an uh-oh type sound. Emma is really in to Scooby Doo and has started talking like SHaggy. She says "like" a lot and says "totally" a lot. She will say something like "I totally want cereal" or "it is like hot in here". It is the funniest thing. She sounds so grown up these days and her expressions when she talks are priceless. She does a lot of hand gesturing. We are very excited that DAve graduates on Friday and have enjoyed DAddy with no homework. Tonight I decided to start on taking down the wallpaper in the kitchen and we got all of the old paper down. I thought it would take longer but with his help it was a breeze. It came off really easy. Of course now I have to look at it until payday to buy paint. Emma is big into planning things too. She comes up with these elaborate explanantions for how we should do things. Today it was "mom, I will buy you a bike helmet for mother's day. Then we can ride together and have a family day on the bikes. NO, Daddy can push Sammi in her car and we can all ride together. but it will be after mother's day. I will get you a bike helmet."

Easter

So my girls are so funny and beautiful that they take my breath away everyday. I wish I could put into words the expressions that they make and the million ways they make us laugh. Samantha is so funny and silly. She is really starting to babble in this alien language. Sometimes she gets so high pitched and is almost like a screech or singing. And she doesn't really say any words but she understands a lot more than I think she should be able to. Last night she put her socks in the hamper when I asked her to. Of course then she got them back out to play with. Her interests are so different than Emma's at that age. She loves the big legos and puts them together then pulls them apart. Today she put two together then put them in a car. In and out they went. She gets really excited over balls. And she hugs and pats everything. She hugs the lego towers and pats it. Yesterday at a playdate our friend Hannah hit Sammi and she looked at her like "oh yeah, watch this" then she hit herself. She loved the plastic Easter eggs and played with them for a half hour at a time.

Emma is so 4. She is trying to find her sense of humor and makes up jokes all the time. They either don't make sense or are just statements. But she just cracks up. She likes to make up nonsense words, too. She likes to rhyme but with her nonsense words. I don't think she can think of a real word to rhyme fast enough so she just makes one up. At least she understands the concept. She has spring fever I think. If I am not telling her to sit on the furniture not jump I am yelling to stop doing flips. She likes to break dance (thanks Zane). It is pretty stinkin funny. She still ends up in our bed almost every night. She loves to snuggle and curls up right next to one of us. Right now it is usually daddy. She makes the most grown up expressions and I love to watch her when she thinks no one else is around. She was peeling a banana this morning and the look on her face was precious. She was concentrating so hard and you could just tell after she got started her mind was wandering. And she is so kind hearted. She loves to share with Sammi and tries to take care of everyone. When I was sick she kept bringing me sips of water.

Sammi wearing Emma's tiara. She already likes to dress up. Where did I get such girly girls?

Samantha loves drinking out of straws. She also loves blowing bubbles and spitting in them, so I was done with my water after this.

St. Patty's Day

Emma with her face paint at the Martin City Parade. She was in the princess of the parade contest with her BFF Ashley.
Emma and Ashley looking super cute by the trash can.
All the kids hanging in the Nau van. This is only 6 of the 11. Waiting for the parade to start.

St. Patrick's Day

We went to the parade on Saturday here in town and it was so sunny and beautiful. It was a lot of fun. Sammi likes to watch the horses and Emma just likes the whole shebang! Emma went to a sleepover at Ashley's (her first sleepover at a friends, sniff,sniff)and we met them Sunday for the Martin City parade. We got there way too early and Emma was a grouch and I wanted to scream. But once the parade got going it was a lot of fun. The kids ran between the parade and the van and we all just chatted it up. There were four families there and between us we had 11 kids, 8 of them 4 years old or under.