An update from Mexico Beach

The princess in Apalachicola (and I apologize profusely to any Apalachicolans who are offended by my poor spelling! LOL!)
She has him wrapped around her little finger and he KNOWS it! : )
Brotherly love

My new boyfriend

Can you see the family resemblance?? This is what you get when the two of them are asked to pose for pictures!

I don't know WHAT it is about this picture that I love so much but hey I'm the mom so I guess simply seeing my babies walking hand in hand is enough.

Shrimp Gumbo, Shrimp Etouffe, Shrimp Creole.......

Adorable as always!

Apalachicola is SUCH quaint little town. Wish we could have spent more time there!

This is what Olivia thought of the singer at Sharkey's in Panama City Beach. Yeah he was THAT bad! The food wasn't much better!

Marching to the beat of a different drum.

Fun in the sun.

How sassy is she??

My apologies for the untouched straight out of the camera pics. Too busy doing beach stuff and not enough time for photoshop! LOL! We are in Mexico Beach again this year and it is as beautiful as ever. The weather has been hot but wonderful. Practically not a cloud in the sky! This is definitely one of our favorite beaches. We spent an afternoon in PCB playing miniature golf and stuff and the crowds, traffic, tourist traps reminded me why I hate it there so much. One afternoon on the Redneck Riviera was more than enough!

Happy Birthday Olivia

I don't know WHAT this was but she obviously loved it! LOL!
Webkinz of course
And MORE Webkinz!

And even MORE Webkinz!

And the grand finale...........the Mia doll that she has wanted for a YEAR and thought that she wasn't getting because she was the limited edition doll of the year LAST YEAR! : ) Lots of Mia stuff to go with her also!

Posting pictures a little bit late of the princess's 7th birthday. Since she had ALREADY had a trip to Disney AND was leaving for a trip to the beach the very next morning, the birthday celebration was very low-key this year. I STILL can't believe she is already SEVEN! When and HOW did that happen so fast! It seems like just yesterday that I was bringing her home from the hospital and now she is a seven year old SECOND GRADER!! I can't take it! My baby is growing up too fast.

One More Day

Only one more day until school is out. This has quite possibly been the longest, most difficult school year I've had since I started teaching and that, my friends, is saying A LOT because I've worked in some "interesting" schools. A student made a list of things he would miss and not miss about middle school I thought I would make a list of my own.

Things I will miss this summer:
My friends......you know who you ar
A few students who have brightened my day consistently all year long

WOW! That was a really short list!

Things I will NOT miss:
Being bullied
People who do not have the ability to see the big picture
No discipline
Pointless assignments
Lines in the hallway
Phone numbers that are not accurate
Parents who are unsupportive
Teachers who are negative
Nosy people
Lines in the hallway
People who don't know how to pick their battles
Complaining

There is more but that's enough for now. : )

First Grade Awards Day

Look Mom!!
Olivia won the "Miss Encyclopedia" award. Is that Mrs. H's polite way of saying she's a know it all?? LOL!

Today was Olivia's first grade awards day. She was THRILLED to get the award and medal for all A's all year!! She is SUCH a smart cookie!! First grade has been a tough adjustment for her but she is so tenacious that she has grown and learned SO much! I know that with her eagerness to learn and her sweet spirit she can accomplish ANYTHING she sets her mind to!

The Magic of Disney

We surprised the princess with a weekend at Disney World. Her response when I told her we were going was priceless! She literally looked around the car as if to say "where's the camera?" or "is anyone else hearing this?" Needless to say she was NOT upset about missing ballet on Saturday!

Pluto was a little weird and kept going nose to nose with the princess.
She mastered chopsticks when we lunched at Nine Dragons in Epcot's world Showcase.
She was actually quite dangerous with them!
Sneaky too!!
She HAD to have a full Chinese ensemble to do pictures in China! LOL!

She is a precious little China doll!

Mulan was a definite hit!

As was Snow White...........although she did think she SOUNDED like Giselle!

How she has grown!! I took a picture in this same spot on her first visit to Disney when she was 2 and her head didn't even come up to the edge of the fence!

How cute is she??

My favorite Nemo character and my favorite princess!

Day two began with a wonderful character breakfast at the Disney Hilton. Those Mickey waffles were DELISH!!

Pluto is SO silly!!

Minnie's house was awesome BUT she definitely needs some AC installed!! Come on Mickey help her out!! We all KNOW you can afford it!

Mickey's house on the other hand was a MESS!! Now we know why Minnie wont marry him!

We took a spin on the teacups!

Met Pocahontas

Went to the Conservation Station and in general just had a blast!! We didn't get to stay long enough to do everything we wanted to but that's okay! There is always next time!! Olivia wanted to do Hollywood Studios and of course the "HELL" of Presidents!! LOL!! That's the Bush administration right??

Final Parent Observation of the Year

She's a happy ballerina!

A sassy one too!

Miss Erin is always on the look out!!

Beginning the barre.

Well today was Olivia's LAST parent observation for the 08-09 ballet school year. We were both very excited since the girls VERY recently began on the barre!! Its a little sad also though since she is moving up from pre-ballet and going into intro to ballet with the "big girls." I am very proud to see how much she is learning and loving ballet BUT it's just another reminder that she is growing up SO very fast! I guess I am just having a mommy moment and feeling like she is going to be grown so soon and I'm JUST not ready for it quite yet.

Recital 2009

Here's Olivia! Ready to go to her recital!

Backstage just waiting to go on stage!
The star of the show! Well in MY opinion anyway!!
Olivia and a very proud Gangan!

Olivia and Miss Erin

Olivia and some of the girls!

The GRAND FINALE!!

Take a bow girls!