Conversation with Maylen

I am so far behind on posting, but I had to add this conversation because one day I will want her to remember this!

Maylen "when I grow up, I am never cleaning the house." A: "so are you going to live in filth?" M: "no, my kids are going to do all the cleaning." A: "oh, so that means that you should do all the cleaning at our house, b/c one day your kids are going to do all the cleaning! I like that." M: "Noooo!!! Never mind. I'm never having kids so they won't clean!" LOL

"My Big Backyard" at the Botanic Gardens

There is a new exhibit at the Botanic Gardens called "My Big Backyard". It was so much fun for the girls. They have several playhouses or forts for the kids to play in. There was also a miniature clothesline with a washboard and bucket that the girls liked. They also had fun playing in the huge playhouse, dressing the wooden dolls, and playing in the "rain storm" which was created by sprinklers that sprayed off of a tin roof after sounds of thunder. We were there about 3 hours and they were exhausted by the time we left. This is definitely an activity that we'll do again.

August - Maylen starts school

It is so hard for me to believe that Maylen is old enough for Kindergarten! It still catches me by surprise. I know she is academically ready, but it just flew by so fast. We enrolled her into Harding Academy, a Christian school that seems to be a great academic fit for her. I think she'll do great this year, and she'll be provided with lots of venues to grow- mentally, spiritually, physically. Harding has required uniforms and Maylen is very excited about these uniforms. I'm glad in a way for them too. I have feared that once she was around other kids, she may be influenced as to what she would want to wear. So far, she has been excited every night about putting out the uniform that she will wear the next day. And she was especially excited that Kit could have a matching uniform, too!



Maylen had her "Meet the Teacher" night, and she got to tour her classroom. The night before school started we had a special dinner for her. My sister helped Maylen make a special school cake, I decorated the table in Harding colors, and "going to school" books. I hope to make this a tradition in our family.



Maylen's first day of school



Maylen and "Miss" Tracy



Maylen with Tessa, her friend from Mother's Day Out



William took Maylen to school on Friday, since he had the day off. She was excited that her daddy was taking her to school.



Maylen really likes her new backpack that I monogrammed for her. She's even got a lunch bag to match.

Our 10th Wedding Anniversary

On July 17th we celebrated our 10th Wedding Anniversary. William gave me flowers, a sweet card, a necklace and bracelet, and we went to dinner at Encore. The dinner was really amazing- French and very creatively displayed on our plates. Our tradition for every anniversary is to either take a trip together or to buy something that we want for the house, rather than give individual gifts. So we bought a 42" LCD TV. It was William's idea for sure, but it's been nice to watch movies on a much better and bigger tv.



About a week after we got the tv there were some terrible tornadoes in our area. It was a bit humorous to hear the girls say they were worried that the new tv would be damaged. Haha

JULY - VBS and more events from our summer.

July was a busy month for us. We had Vacation Bible School at Independent. I taught Maylen's class. The theme was Pirate Island. We were picked as one of the favorites for the room decorations by the 5th grade class and pictures of our room were posted in the VBS paper. The week was long and exhausting, but I think the kids had a great time, and most importantly learned some great bible verses and Bible stories.







William and I went to an "Around the World Birthday Bash" at the Harriman's. We were supposed to dress in costumes from different parts of the world. I dresses in a Chinese Kimono and William was a Caribbean Pirate. It was pretty funny to see the costumes of everyone and was a very fun party.



Morgan Harriman, Rachel Russ, me, Chrissy Smith


Here are a couple more of my favorite photos that I took.





Maylen had her first sewing project. She's been wanting to have a matching outfit for American Girl doll. So I made her a pillowcase dress, and she made Kit's dress. She really enjoyed being able to use the sewing machine for the first time. I'm so proud of her!

June Events: 4th of July and Pearson Family Gathering

We celebrated the 4th of July by attending Bellevue's Independence Day Celebration (which is actually held at the end of June). I've posted some pictures below.



My cousin Matthew, his wife Genna, and their kids, Abby and Noah came to visit us and we hosted a dinner for them. Here are a few pictures of the cousins playing.




Here are a few more of my favorite pictures that we've taken.

Our Summer: The Beach

It's been a long time since my last post. I have been neglecting to post pictures of the summer, and now that I'm so far behind it makes it a little more difficult to remember what all has happened.
We officially started our summer with a vacation to the beach. Adeline and Maylen had a great time playing with their cousins on the beach. It was definitely a fun trip for the girls-- not so much for me. Here are a few pictures of our trip.

Last week of Mother's Day Out

Where did the time go? How did it go by so fast. I think time has somehow sped up since having kids. My precious first daughter, Maylen had her last Mother's Day Out Spring Musical and very last day of Mother's Day Out this week. And I'm a so emotional about it all! It just seems like days ago that I took her on our first outing of her life to Panara Bread when she was less than 2 weeks old and a lady stopped me to ask me how old she was. I remember the lady telling me that the time goes by so fast and it would be hard to remember her being that little. Well, she was right-- it does go by so fast. I also remember taking Maylen to her very first day of Mother's Day Out and then shedding some tears that I had taken my daughter to be cared for by someone else for the day. Now 3 years later and many special memories, and so many things learned and accomplished, Maylen is ready for school! I am so emotional about how fast it has gone, how much she has grown, how our lives will never be the same. I am already missing the time when she'll be at home and we'll all get up and have cereal together and talk about what we want to do that day. I'll miss the playdates with preschool friends and quiet afternoon naps. I'll miss her sweet friendships with the other girls at school and how precious they treat each other. I'll miss sleeping-in until 8:00 and then being in pajamas for an hour. I'll miss that she can't just be my little girl at home thinking that I know everything in life that she needs to learn. I'll miss her going to MDO and being so proud of the coloring pages and finger painting that she has done. I'll miss just knowing that she will be with me and not have to go off to school. We often tease her and tell her not to grow as she pretends to grow right before our eyes by standing as tall as she can and then up to her tip-toes. I love her so much and wish that I could just freeze time for a little while to enjoy her.

Here's Adeline singing with her group. I'm so glad she has another 2 years at Trinity MDO. It's such a wonderful preschool!



Maylen with her age group on the top left corner.



Maylen with some of her wonderful friends that she made and became so close to while at Trinity. Ellie, Riley, Bella, Maylen, Ava, Lindsey, and Finley



Crazy faces.



Sweet friends: Riley, Lindsey, Finley, Maylen



Maylen, Ava, and Abigail -- Abigail was the first little girl that she would come home talking about when they were only 2 1/2.



Adeline is such a sweet girl, and still my baby.



Walking up the side walk in their Ice Cream dresses for Ice Cream Day.



Adeline was so pooped when I went to get her that afternoon.

Maylen's Dance Recital

Maylen had her dance recital on Saturday with a tap, jazz, and ballet numbers. The girls were adorable in their tutus preforming their routines! I wanted to post the pictures right away from Maylen's dance recital and hope to soon upload the video. I was SO proud of how well she did, especially since I knew she was nervous and it is a real stretch for her to get up on stage in front of people. I kept telling her how proud I was. It was just too cute!



Maylen kept her eyes fixed on Miss Tammy the whole time. She wanted to make sure she followed the steps (and I think it made the audience disappear).



"I can mash potato, and do the twist"



Maylen took dance with some of her favorite girls from MDO (Riley, Bella, Maylen, ?, Ava)







Adeline, or course, wore her ballet costume to the recital too! She wanted so badly to be up there with the bigger girls dancing. She did attempt to run to the stage a couples time and start dancing. I had to finally take her to the back. Adeline and Maylen are so different when it comes to being the center of attention!



At the end of the show I let the girls dance around on the stage. I didn't know if I would ever get Adeline off of the stage. She had paid close attention and was trying out all the new moves!



Maylen's friends from Dance and MDO (Ava, Maylen, Riley, and Adeline)

Mother's Day with my girls

For Mother's Day, William gave me a very sweet card that he had made and some flowers. He also made me brunch with crepes (per my request). The girls both made me gifts in Mother's Day Out and gave me cards with their pictures. While we were waiting to eat, I read books to the girls.



Adeline wore the dress that was mine when I was 3! My mom said she saved a lot of the dresses that she made, but so far this is the only dress that she found that was mine.

Spring Flowers and Little Girls

It's been a while since I have updated. It seems that life is just too busy to update more than once a month lately. This spring I was so please with how the hard work that I (and William) have put into the yard and flowers has paid off. We had a beautiful spring in Memphis this year. Before we got the notorious April showers, we had really nice weather and the azaleas, dogwoods, and roses were all in bloom at once, which made for such nice drives around town. I managed to take a few pictures of this prior to what felt like 2 weeks of non-stop rain. I think it rained-- no, poured everyday!

This is a cutting from our rose bush. I don't know what variety it is, but the blooms are a large peach color.



Adeline was standing in front of some of the azaleas and climbing rose bush. (I pruned the large rose bushes along the back fence quite a bit the last two years which has produced more blooms this spring than the previous 4 years combined).



Gotta love little girls being sweet when taking pictures!









Evie, my niece, came to play with the girls one day. They were so cute in their princess costumes and holding their look-alike dolls.



I couldn't resist taking this picture of the girls one night before bed. They were giggling and telling each other something silly when I found them.