Sweet 16!!!!!

Hello blog-o-sphere friends!! :-)  Where has the time gone?!?  I can't believe it is almost August.  I'm going to try to play catch up.  It will take awhile, bear with me.  It has been an exciting year and busy, thus why I haven't blogged! 

So, on January 4th Amelia, my princess, turned 16!!!  YIKES!  I threw her a SURPRISE sleep over birthday party!  Yep, we got her good!  One of her friends helped me plan it and with technology today we got in touch we several friends.  School didn't start back until the 7th,  and we were so happy that we could have a big ol' celebration!

Amelia has friends that range in age from 12 to 21!!  I know that is quite a range,  unfortunately her boyfriend was out of town and couldn't make the eat/dance part of the festivities but one of her best guy friends did! 

I catered in On The Border for some good eats, some family friends were here and we had a B-L-A-S-T!!

Here are some pics of the evening!

Amelia received a special delivery!  Alex sent her flowers!

AJ and Bailey help me decorate for the party!  Yes, AJ is standing on a step stool on top of the pool table!  NOT my idea, this was Doc's! OI!!!

Taelor and Kelly

Amelia is in a little bit of shock!

 Taelor, Amelia, Bailey, Xavier~ who did not stay for the sleepover!!!!

 Now that's a cake!!!  I told the bakery what the plates looked like that I had purchased and this is what they came up with!  LOVE it!!!!!

 I made cupcakes, Amelia requested them!  She didn't know about the cake!!!  It was icing overload!
I sent food home with whom ever would take it.

 Happy Birthday to.......

                                                                                                                 .......You!

 Getting a group picture with Dangling decor is not an easy task!!!!
Xavier, Amelia, MacKenzie, Ashley  back row
Taelor, Elyssa, Bailey, and KJ front row.

Present time!

 Dance Party!!!!!

This cracks me up!  How can Bailey dance and talk on the phone??!

phone pic

 Late night shenanigans!  We played Apples to Apples, the girls did prank calls to freinds, and then just laughed!

phone pic

phone pic

The morning AFTER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!   Crepes, a Funk breakfast favorite!

phone pic

All in all I think Amelia had a great 16th birthday!  Now, I have 2 years to plan for AJ!  Hmmm, what to do for a boy????



Cozyfler

School SPIRIT Days!!!

Every school has spirit days to my knowledge. But it seems to me that they have gotten a lot more fun since I was in school back in the dark ages!! When Chris and Tyler were in elementary everything was always 50's day and crazy sock day. Even when Amelia was in Kinder it was 50's.


 But middle school the last 3 years and high school are really with 'IT'!!! Now we have Nerd Day, Crazy Hair Day, Generation Day, Would You Still Be My Friend If I Wore.... Day, Hippie Day, Mis-Matched Day, Twin Day, etc! Further more my kids are 'brave' enough to wear wild and crazy things to school!

 Would you still be my friend if I wore.......?     In this case....Star Wars Pod Racing Geek Helmet!!!

 Crazy Hair Day ~ 3, count 'em THREE wigs!!!!  Yes, AJ wore a Dorthy wig, a Punk Rock wig, and a Light Up Yeti wig from Animal Kingdom!!  This is sure to make the yearbook!!!

 Nerd Day!  Have you seen all the CRAZY DUCK TAPE out when 'back to school' supplies are out in August?  I think my kids keep them in business!!!  If wearing 3 homemade hair bows is not nerdy, a homemade bow tie, and necktie, the glasses, then I don't know what is!!!!

 This is Tourist Day!!!  Can you tell Amelia takes after her Mom?!!!  Look closely at the EARS.  Sorry, it was 7:55am, I'm still asleep!   But these are the new GLOW EARS! Disney T, Ears, camera, lanyard, with room key, and lanyard for school ID.  I think she passed for a Tourist!! Oh and a Backpack!

AJ decided to go against years of tradition and NOT be Star Wars for Halloween!!  WOW, I was in shock.  Well, it paid off!  The school had Generations Day!  How Cool!  I told him he could be past or future!!!  He decided to be past and be Original  TREK ~ I raise my kids so well!


Do your schools have crazy spirit days? Do your kids dress up? Seems like I'm always digging around to find something for AJ or Amelia so the can dress up for school! Usually the night before! Most of the time they have to pay $1 ~ this is raising money for United Way.

Please tell me what kind of special days your schools have.  If you are a teacher, do you dress up??

Cozyflier

Legacy Play Village

10 years ago the community got together and built an awesome play park for our kids. It took a lot of volunteer man hours and planning and our village is a really cool place. I was so excited when Lubbock decided to build one because I was familiar with the concept from Enid, OK. Enid had built one in their town and my two oldest sons enjoyed playing in that park when they were little. My grandmother use to live in Enid, OK!!! Anyway, last week AJ had some friends over and we drove out to Legacy Play Village. It is now 10 yrs old. Wow, how time flies! I thought I'd share pictures of our fun.

 We might be open for business!

 Get us out of here!

 This place is huge!  Look up at the Right side of the pic, thr protruding angle, there is a face in the mesh!

 We are up at the top level!! 

 Chuga Chuga Choo Choo!!!!!

 Wagons Ho!   Hunter, Amelia, and AJ!

 Hunter, AJ, and Treavor.

 My 'little' angel!

My baby!!

 We've got muscle!

 Whee!!!  Round and round we go!

 Who's KING of this Rock??!!??

Do you have a play village in your town? This park is wonderful. There are many picnic tables. Lots of swings and areas for the kids to play and use their imagination. Slides and bars to let energy be burned off. Happy Summer! Cozyflier

2012 Recognition Ceremonies

Well school is out and I'm trying to catch up! The end of May is always busy, I'm sure all moms know what I'm talking about! So, I'm just now getting to posting about recognition. I think most of Texas does this, but I'm sure about the rest of the country. The kids are recognized for excelling in school and given award certificates. Here in Lubbock they have done this since Kindergarten. Now, I'm not saying this is good or bad, I just know that with my 25 yr old that by the time he got to HS graduation he didn't want to go to the ceremony! And he was an honor graduate. Chris is graduating from Texas Tech in August and he absolutely will NOT go through a ceremony for me! So, I enjoy these little things while I can! So what do you think? Are we rewarding are kids with mediocrity and getting them use awards, or do they deserve awards for being good citizens in school, and being 'outstanding' in math, science, history, etc? Are we setting them up for failure later in life? I'm just curious on your views! Amelia has dyslexia and central auditory processing hearing loss. She works EXTREMELY hard during the school year. We are very PROUD of her. She maintains A's and usually gets 1 or 2 B's. We think that is exceptional. AJ gets straight A's without much effort. They both have very high IQ's, just like there older brothers. I'm not bragging, just stating facts. Are we setting the kids up to expect rewards for normal behavior that we expect? I'll get off my soapbox and post pictures from the recognition ceremony that our school does to RECOGNIZE the kids for sports, scholarship, citizenship, service to the school, and such.

Irons Cougars

AJ made a haul!  6 awards!

Amelia did well!

Mrs. Christian, Asst. Principal, Amelia, Mr. Caserez Principal

Amelia and her boyfriend Alex

OK, that is a wrap on recognition!! Cozyflier