Ivy: Most often called Iverson these days...a nickname given to her by none other than the king of giving nicknames, Uncle Brian. She has one more week of school and then it's onto half day kindergarten for this girl in the fall! She's pretty excited. Right now she's involved in a lot..more than I planned, but it just kind of worked out this way. With her school getting out a month before Max and Mya, it will be good to have things to do during the day. She has art class, gymnastics, dance, ice skating lessons and soccer! Her soccer is a little bit of a joke, so we go when we can make it and skip when we can't:) She is pretty funny these days....her favorite pop is ginger "oil." We were stopped at a red light on our way to church and she told Chris to go through it. He said the light was red and she said, "I know, but there's no one coming!" We could be in trouble with this one. She also calls saliva "suck" which I think is hilarious. She'll hand me a balloon that she blew up for me to tie and say.."I wiped off my suck." Also, last week I bought bread that had seeds in it and she refused to eat it because she thought the birds might try to fly into her mouth to get the seeds. She was dead serious. The biggest news is that we are no longer having to sit in her room while she falls asleep. Only about 4.5 years late on that one.
Mya: She is loving life right now! 2nd grade is going really well for her. Just finished her spelling tests for the year and she got them all right the entire year. She has been going on tons of field trips and has the most wonderful teacher and friends in her class. She is also doing soccer right now for the first time since she was 3 or 4. She is on an all girls U8 team and is doing really well! We had no idea going into the first game, but she is very aggressive (she's on the ground more than any other kid on the field) and just knows what to do and where to be. She's still in gymnastics, but isn't going as often, which has been a great change of pace. She is losing lots of teeth these days, but doesn't like the idea of a tooth fairy coming into her room so she doesn't put her teeth under her pillow! Our tooth fairy may rank up there in the worst ever (she forgets a lot of the time) so it's great that she doesn't even care about the money.
Max: He is having a busy month as well! He has soccer games two nights a week and is doing really well. He loves playing and working on new things. I wish he had a better team/coach, but there's not much I can do about it if I don't volunteer to coach! We are 5 games in and the coach has no idea what the kids' names are except his own and is on his phone most of the time anyway. Max has his guitar performance tonight and then his piano recital in a few weeks. He was in chess club on Fridays over the lunch hour at school this year and had a tournament this past Sunday. He got 3rd place for his group and was very pleased to get a medal after watching his sister get lots of medals in gymnastics this year!
Chloe: She is going strong! She has been going to soccer games with us and is loving all the attention she gets. Lately we've been able to walk her without a leash if there aren't many other people out and about. She loves the weather where she can just lay in the sun all afternoon!
Beth: I can't believe today is May 17th. April and May have flown by! I just got home Sunday from a girls weekend in Chicago with some Dubuque friends. One of my friends has an apartment there so we stayed at her apartment, went to a Cubs game, did some tourist stuff and just hung out. Super fun time and I'm thankful Chris was able to take some work off and stay here and take care of our schedule! It was a busy few days for him for sure. I've been helping with lots of field trips, put together a few pages in the school yearbook, planning summer travel, and just trying to get everyone to where they need to be on time! I got a new bike for Mother's Day so we've been doing some bike riding around the neighborhood which has been fun.
Chris: Like I said..he was super dad last weekend with everything we had to do. 3 soccer pictures, 1 soccer game, 2 gymnastics practices, and 3 birthday parties. It was a little nuts! He has a big few weeks coming up at work..June 8th the John Deere corporate jet comes to town to do their annual visit. Between work and our evening commitments, he plays with the kids as much as he can and tries to get to golf league when it works!
In other family news...my sister and her new babe are doing really well! Alexa Louise was born on May 2nd. She is darling and big sis Quinn is doing well too! We are all anxious for them to get home, but they have lots to do before then. Adding a second child is stressful, moving across the world is stressful, finishing up a job and saying goodbye to people who have been your family for 3 years is stressful and she and Tony are doing all of that at the same time! I tell her all the time...if they can do this, they can do anything.
At pretty much the exact time Lexi was born, our goddaughter and niece Olivia was celebrating her first communion! Bummed we couldn't be there, but she was so beautiful...I had to include a pic!
