Ann-Marie's 10th birthday

 Since Ann-Marie's birthday fell on Saturday this year AND it happened to be one of the busiest days of our year.....we decided to celebrate as a family on Friday, the day before her birthday.  She opened her big present from us and the presents from her extended family.  It was apparent that we hit the birthday with no toys as presents.....crafts, gift cards, and anything for her Kindle Fire.

 The menu she chose for her birthday was Cinnamon Rolls for breakfast, Dad's special pasta, broccoli, and sauce for lunch, and spaghetti with shrimp for dinner.

 Ann-Marie wanted a big friend birthday party this year, which she hasn't had since she turned 5.  Since it was a busy day (soccer and track meet day), we planned it for 4 p.m. in the afternoon.  Theme: spa party!  I was so blessed to have my sister-in-law, Maura, come as well as my niece, Meghan, and her friend, Kasey - they ran the spa part of the party by giving facials, manicures and doing hair.  The girls were very pampered!

 Our friends from Maryland were able to come, which always makes our birthday parties even better!

 The cake was fun to make - flip flops with nail polish (marshmallows and tootsie rolls.) It was a big hit!

 Twelve girls were able to make it and had a lot of fun!!!!

Happy Birthday, our dear Ann-Marie!  

track and field 2013

Evan completed his first year of track and field with the Plants and Pillars homeschool athletic organization.  It was the first year of Middle school and High school track, so one month of practice and two meets.  The first meet, Evan participated in the turbo Javelin (above video), shot put, and discus.  The second meet he participated in the discus, shot put, 4x100 relay, and 4x400 relay and received a fourth place ribbon for the 4x400 relay.  Pretty good for never really running a 400 before!

Easter 2013 in pictures

 

Spring break visit to Carnegie Science Center

 We decided to take a week off at Easter and enjoy a "Spring Break."  The weather decided not to cooperate, so a visit to the Carnegie History Museum was in order.  Enjoy our visit in pictures.....

Sports update

One sports season is over and we are quickly into another one.  Evan really enjoys playing sports, but his favorite to play currently is basketball.  He was able to play on two basketball teams - the 4th-6th grade team and the 6th-8th grade team - both a homeschool league that travels to play local private Christian schools.  It was fun seeing him be a leader in the younger team and play his heart out in the older (and much taller) team.  The above pictures are compliments of Alison Agnew - thank you so much for taking such wonderful pictures!

And Ann-Marie had a wonderful gymnastics competition season, continually improving her skills and scores with each meet.  She is now training hard on new skills for next season!

Alec did not participate in any sports over the winter and is looking forward to soccer starting this week.  Evan is participating in track in the month of April, with two track meets this month.  

Kalahari 2013

 Trying to catch up on our family blog pictures....so Ann-Marie's last gymnastics meet of the season was at Kalahari water park, which is always so much fun.  She ended her year on a high note...2nd Overall in her level and age group.  So the rest of the weekend was for family fun!  I'm also posting a video of Darrell riding the Swahili Swirl for the first time.  Enjoy!