Wednesday, May 10, 2017

Deacon turns 7!

Deacon. Deacy. Deacy Doo. Deacers. Jett. Deacy Jett. Sweet boy!
This boy is 7!
Poor Deacon's birthday got a bit overshadowed this year. Lynzi came into town to do a fundraiser for Tyson's EFY mission trip to Peru this summer and I was babysitting her kids the night of Deacon's birthday. So we had pizza and ice cream cake and a promise of going to Wahooz that weekend! (Which we did and we all had fun!) You'll have to trust me on that because I didn't actually get any pictures of Deacon there.  He's the kind of kid that when we go to a place like that will go off and have an adventure without needing anyone to watch him. He can have fun totally by himself. He wanted to go on the "XD Dark Ride" but no one else did so he waited in line by himself for 15 minutes and then did it all alone! He's just totally like that!









Deacon has totally hit a stubborn phase. This is him NOT wanting to get Easter pictures taken. For the longest time, he would just go along with what everyone else said and just do as he was told but lately, if he doesn't agree or doesn't want to do it, you better WATCH OUT.  He'll never get mean or violent just completely stubborn. One day he decided he didn't want to go to school. It took the secretary, the teacher and finally the school counselor to convince him to finally go inside. It was horrible! So the next time I decided I'd tell him he could either stay home and stare at the wall ALL DAY or go to school. Well, he stared at the wall ALL DAY. We took a break when I decided making him do school papers was a better route but he was happy as a clam, so we went back to the wall. He finally broke down at 3:15! It was nuts!





But he really is such a happy sweetheart kid. He's a homebody though. While Piper is up for anything, Deacon pretty much wants to stay home and play with friends or play electronics or games. We forced him to take a ski lesson this winter and he wasn't happy about it but in the end admitted he liked it. He also likes going to tumbling classes at the gym when I can get him there!
He's still a smart little cookie! I sure love this boy!




 Not wanting to take his ski lesson....
 He's a bit of a mamma's boy and I love it!

Piper turns 5!





Piper. Pip. Piper Diaper. Pippy. Pippa. Pipa Dipe. Love this girl!

This wasn't her friend party year but we took her "Miracle friend" (That's more than a BFF) Raygen Kendall to Chuck-E. Cheese. And since her brother is also Deacon's BFF we took him too and Brighton took her friend Autumn.

I love the friendship these two little girls have! They play as often as they can and they have so much fun together! They used to get into A LOT of trouble but I think we've finally got them under control. It's fun to listen to them have little quarrels and then work it out themselves. 





Piper is a ball of personality! She's always the one trying to make everyone laugh, making funny faces and voices... but I'm not gonna lie, the girl has a slightly dark side too! She's always had a bit of a mean streak when it comes to Brighton. She and Deacon were so close before Deacon went off to first grade that she gets a little combative when it comes to getting his time and attention. We're working on it! She LOVES to dance, loves preschool and anything outside, especially SNOW! She's the kid that's up for ANYTHING. If someone is doing something (even going to Walmart) she wants to go! She's always looking for an adventure. She tried skiing this winter and loved it!


 Oh, and she doesn't like wearing clothes. She's in her underwear like 50% of the time.

If she's stuck at home she'll either be asking "what can I do?" or watching YouTube Kids! That's Piper!

Viva la Mexico!

Mexico was amazing! When Aaron and I took our huge 2-week trip to the Yucatan Peninsula a couple years ago I kept mental notes on all the fun places I knew the kids would love. So this year we decided to take the kids! We opened it up to my family and my parents said YES!
For the first week we stayed at a giant resort called Vidanta right on the beach near Playa del Carmen. This is us waiting for a shuttle because the resort was that big.
This was the beach right in front of the resort. It was fun but there were rocks in the water which made for some snorkeling but no fun waves to play in.

 On day 3 we took the Ferry to Cozumel to visit the orphanages. We packed a giant suitcase full of stuff for the kids but when we got there the director wouldn't let us give it to the kids directly. :( We also couldn't really even interact with the kids like we did last time. My kids were really disappointed! And so we were but at least we did some good!

 One of the absolute highlights was going to the Adventure Park Xcaret! There was so much to do and see! There was a little water park area, ropes course, underground cave tubing, shows, snorkeling, a bay, an aquarium, and at the end a huge stadium show about the History of Mexico. It was a full day but the kids LOVED it!







The Cirque du Solei show was inside our resort, so we splurged and took the kids to see it. It was also super duper cool.

 After our week at the resort we took the Ferry to Isla Mujeres. This is the very tip of the island.


 We rented golf carts and that's how we got around all three days!
 The highlight of Isla Mujeres was the Dolphin Discovery! Brighton and I interacted with dolphins and it was AMAZING! The whole area was so fun to spend the day by the pool, in the hammocks with unlimited food and drinks! We really lounged around that day and felt spoiled!

























Brighton also LOVED the turtle farm. She's obsessed with sea turtles!


















The beach in Isla. It was gorgeous!


I also really enjoyed walking down the little main street of Isla, shopping, eating marquesitas and people watching!
 We had SO many amazing pics, these are just the tip of the iceburg!  The kids are already asking when can we go back!?









Brighton is 10!

In January Brighton turned 10! Double digits! She's really starting to feel like a "tween." The beautiful thing about this phase is that she's fun to hang out with (like a teen) and relates to adults really well (better than I ever did!) But she's still a LITTLE girl. I'll still catch her role playing games with her stuffed animals, playing with baby dolls and writing notes to her fairy. But I'll also catch her posing in the mirror and texting her friends on my phone. Unlike a lot of girls her age, she's in no hurry to grow up. She's not boy crazy and so far she hasn't asked for any social media accounts. She does like to wear makeup but only a little bit. She actually told me she's annoyed that her dance teacher talks about boys because "I'm only 10! I'm not ready for that." :)  She's a total goof ball. Her and her friends at school have made up all these "bad words" you're not supposed to say like "cheese" (chez) Beans (benz)... they have a whole list. I think she's kind of the leader of the silly girls at school.  She's not like the "popular" leader that girls want to be around so as not to get on their bad side, but she is well-liked at school. At school they did a project where they all wrote something about everyone in the class and most everyone wrote something about how funny she is! Maybe she'll go for my dream job of being a comedy writer when she grows up.  For her birthday I wanted to take her to breakfast somewhere fun but all she wanted was a toasted bagel!


Then we took the kids up in the mountains to go to a super fun tubing hill!

It was her year for a friend party so we invited 15 girls to come to her SPA party!

 We did pedicures, facials, musical manicures and the girls had a BLAST!



I love my silly girl and I hope her "goofball island" never dies!