Another Wedding!

At the end of February, Catalina and Ava were flower girls in Sarah and John's wedding. This is the fourth wedding the girls have been in so they were old pros! Todd was Sarah's swim coach when she was in middle school. Of course, to him, she will always be 12 years old. But on her wedding day, she was one of the most beautiful brides I have ever seen.

I absolutely loved the girl's dresses!

What a crew they were!

The wedding was a blast. The girls stayed up dancing with us until midnight!

Welcome Brooklyn!

Last year in March, Julie and Scott got married....

...on the beach, in Naples, FL. We couldn't be happier for them.

Until this little one came along! Brooklyn is now 4 months old and has her first tooth. I'm so in love...and I haven't even met her!

She has the most beautiful eyes...

and I can only imagine...the best laugh! Do I really have to wait 3 more months!!??

Girl Scout Cookies!

This little Daisy sold 252 boxes of Girls Scout cookies! She was very motivated by the incentive prizes and really worked hard this year...and her dad worked hard getting his co-workers to buy cookies. I was the cookie mom in her troop and had over 1,000 boxes of cookies in our garage. Luckily, Todd and his dad picked them up and brought them home. The girls helped me separate the orders and double check the boxes. Oh what fun...and we still don't have all of Cat's orders delivered.

Congratulations Catalina! Catalina moved to Team in gymnastics! What does this mean? Cat will practice 3 nights a week for 2 1/2 hours each night. In the Fall, she will compete in meets on the weekends and in the Spring the competition schedule increases. If you know me, you know I am very stressed and nervous about this decision. I question if we are doing the right thing (she is only 6!). She loves the sport and is so dedicated to it. We are fortunate that she is also a solid, motivated student and does not have difficulties keeping up with the school work.

We are really proud of her!

Remember This?

My little Ava is such a smart, funny, creative, social kid...I would not trade her for the world. But this girl is definitely accident prone. She has a difficult time carrying items across the room. The dogs celebrate every time she carries her plate to the garbage because most of the scraps end up on the floor.

Well, here is a little history of Ava's injuries...it all began with the tricycle crash of '08.

We were in Flagstaff 12/08 and Ava headed down a very steep driveway on a tricycle into a bed of river rocks. She was unable to stop! Nobody was around to supervise...we were all packing up to go home. Her face took a beating...she was so little then...only 2 1/2 years old.

Then the wrestling match of 4/10 on our bed. Todd went to slam Catalina with a pillow, Cat got out of the way, and hit Ava. The pillow threw Ava's head into the head board and she needed two staples. BLOOD! She was the only one in the family to meet her deductible for 2010!

Last weekend we walked to the "big park" to play on the exercise bars. Ava was practicing pull overs while Catalina was showing us she could do 5 hip circles in a row. Somehow Ava let go of the bar and did a face plant on the small rocks below. "BLOOD! Do I have to go to the hospital?" she cried. Luckily, it was all bruises and scratches...her knees looked pretty rough too.

She is in a clumsy, awkward stage right now. I think it's because she is growing so fast that her motor planning skills have not caught up. Boy, I love that little bean sprout!

Happy New Year!

I realize I missed blogging the entire month of December! The Merrill's were busy but that is no excuse. I'm going to try and catch you up quickly...(beware...heavy picture post!).

Jingle Bell Rock on Dec. 11th. The girls did a gymnastic performance, frosted cookies and received a medal from Santa. So fun to see them perform!

The Polar Express the evening of Dec. 11th in Williams, AZ. The girls each wrote a letter to Santa this year and gave it to him on the train. They love this tradition...me, I like to drink wine on the train.

They each bought Reindeer ears after the train ride. We headed back to the cabin to eat pizza and stay up late!

Somewhere in between the festivities, the girls and I managed to decorate the tree. Ava only broke two ornaments this year. She cannot hold on the anything without dropping it...the poor girl!

I flew to Wisconsin (brrrrr) on Dec. 17th to surprise Dona for her graduation. It was Mom's birthday so I got to celebrate that too! Ava called to tell me that the time was not going fast and she missed me so much! She knows how to get to me...

Here is Dona after the very long ceremony! I am so proud of her.

We all had a drink together to celebrate!

The girls went to the Nutcracker again this year. As the show began, Ava leaned over and said to me, "I wonder what mouse is going to die this time." It's her favorite part..."When the mouse got dead."

We celebrated Christmas Eve at our house with Dorothy, Bill, Nancy, Thomas and Elena.

Christmas morning finally arrived! Catalina was up from 1am-4am so excited about the presents. Were they on the good list this year? Ava was very worried!

Of course, Catalina was! Here she is with her American Girl Doll.

And Ava was too! She also wanted an American Girl Doll with a wheelchair. She sleeps in her underwear and sometimes does not get dressed for the whole day. Crazy girl!

Veteran's Day Program

The First Graders at Bright Beginnings put on a Veteran's Day program for the parents and vets. Catalina invited her Papa Bill to the Friday afternoon Program.

Catalina performed with a "ribbon" to the song, "Oh Beautiful." Ahhh, this was right up her alley!

She LOVES to sing...

I think her Papa really enjoyed the program. We all were thinking of Papa Tim that day, wishing he could of joined us too!

Halloween

Ava's pre-K class had a special Halloween celebration. They made light up jack-o-lanterns and we read a Halloween book using them in the dark classroom. Everyone dressed up in costumes...except Ava. She did not want to wear her costume or bring it to school, "just in case."

Ava and her jack-o-lantern...getting ready to read.

The class sung "Five Little Pumpkins" to us!

Halloween night...Ava was Ariel again...different costume. She was fine, as long as none of the costume touched her skin. She is wearing long pants under her skirt.

On Halloween Eve, I went to look for Catalina's costume. She was going to be a ladybug (from the Bugz Play last spring in kindergarten). But guess what, I could not find it anywhere! I search and searched and searched. So at 8:30pm, the night before Halloween, I ran to Target and found a Flapper's costume among the leftover Halloween crap. Catalina loved it!

Catalina and Grey (Dracula)

The girls and I made a gingerbread Haunted House. We bought a kit from Williams Sonoma and it was truly a pain in the butt-kick to assemble. They didn't care and ate many sprinkles during my frustration. It really turned out cute!

Happy Halloween!