Last album of first grade artwork

Here is the last album of artwork for 1st grade. We have so enjoyed seeing all of Jacob's creations this year and are looking forward to what 2nd grade will bring!

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Swiper ride - KI video

We love watching the kids on the Swiper ride. Watching their little faces and hearing their laughs so warms our hearts. Kids bring such joy to parents. It's so much fun for us to watch them having fun. Makes us look forward to a whole summer full of fun!

1st Kings Island visit of the summer

We went to Kings Island today for the first time this season. The kids were super excited. Jacob rode the Avatar and the log flume for the first time and loved both. Emily rode the Little Bill roller coaster with her brother. She looked so big on there without riding with a parent. Having a pass is GREAT - we were able to go up for a few hours in the evening and there wasn't a crowd. The kids got to ride everything, in kiddyland that is.

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Jacob's Last Birthday Event at Chuck E Cheese

Aunt Tonya & Uncle Matt sent Jacob a gift card to Chuck E Cheese for his birthday. It was the last event to celebrate his birthday - seems birthdays always get spread out over a few days. More fun that way! The kids (and the parents!) had a great time playing games and eating pizza. Lots of laughs. And all for $1. Can't beat that.

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Jacob is 7 !!!!!!!!

Well, Jacob is 7 and I can hardly believe it. Where have the last 7 years gone??? They have flown by! Jacob has grown into such a special and sweet boy. He is very smart and is very caring. He still loves to cuddle and give hugs - I'm relishing every second of this because I know before too long this might go away. He is very active in playing sports. He loves to make us laugh and has such a contagious little giggle. He loves to play with his sister and his puppy. Happy birthday my sweet little boy!

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Here is Jacob telling his class about his "Star of the Week" poster. Each kid makes a poster the week of their birthday and it hangs on a bulletin board in the class all week. Then on the Friday of that week the child gets about a half-hour party. Part of the party is explaining their poster and telling everyone about the pictures. Jacob and I had a lot of fun making the poster together.

Another part of the party is that each child gets to pick out their favorite book and read it to the class. Jacob choose "May I please have another cookie?" He did a great job reading!!! He has come such a long way with his reading since the start of the school year.

Last but not least, the class sings happy birthday to each child. Jacob got to stand on a bench next to the teacher while the class sang the song cha-cha-cha version. As you can tell from Jacob's face he didn't care too much for being the center of attention. He told me on the ride home from school that "he was shy" that's why he wasn't smiling.

This video is from Jacob's family party. The theme was Star Wars and when opening his card from us he decided he was going to read in a Yoda voice. He is too funny! I was glad I had my camera rolling for this one. He is also opening the gift from us. As you can tell he was pretty excited about getting his very own Nintendo DS!

Jacob's wonderful creations from May

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

Vacation videos - Destin, Florida, May 2009

This was so ideal for the beach. Water had washed up onto the shore and created a huge puddle. The kids were so content to play and splash around in it. It also allowed Mommy & Daddy to relax in their beach chairs with a good book and still be able to keep a eye on the kids and not have to worry about them being swept away by a wave. As you can see, they loved it!

This was at The Track - a fun place to go with kids on vacation. They have putt-putt, arcade games, go karts, bumper cars, all that fun stuff you usually only do on vacation. They have a little go kart track for kids. Jacob rode this last year but this was Emily's first time. They both did great. Emily was cautious and would bump into the wall every now and then. Jacob did pretty well and was very sure of himself. Too bad driving won't be this contained for them in about ten years when they are able to get out on the real road!

I love dolphins!! They are probably my favorite animal. The kids got very excited about seeing dolphins while we were on the dolphin cruise. Jacob told us all week long that when he grows up he wants to work with and save the dolphins! Here was my first attempt at catching them on film.

Next sighting. We all loved watching them swim and jump the waves. They are beautiful animals.

This was a pod of dolphins close to shore. They were swimming right with the waves. The captain said that he saw a baby with its Mommy in this group.

This is my favorite dolphin sighting video. Look how close they are to shore! We could see so much of them because of the water being so shallow. We've been on about three dolphin cruises now within the past couple of years and this was by far the best one. We saw more dolphins on this cruise than all of the others combined. On the last morning of our trip we were looking out on our balcony and saw dolphins this close to shore.

The kids LOVED the water and the waves. It was so much fun to watch them run in the waves and splash around. They are both little water babies! Scott liked to walk around and look for small fish and crabs. We had an absolutely wonderful time in Destin this year!