FIVE!!!!

Gavin turned the big 5 years old today!!!! So hard for me to believe!!! (maybe I felt the same way when Brooklyn and Blake turned 5...) I really have noticed lately how much he's starting to look older. Gavin has always been my little sidekick and I think I'm in denial that he'll be starting kindergarten in a little over 6 months. *sigh* I've told him several times recently that I want to package him up and have him stay 4 forever, but he just didn't listen to me!!Today was a preschool day, so we took for Dunkin Donut munchkins to share with his class. Gavin chose to go to lunch at Chick-fil-A so we invited Spencer, his cousin-slash-bestfriend, to come along. They had a grand time playing in the playplace while Kristin and I chatted away.
The rest of the day was kinda typical. Matt had to work in Yuma so I knew it would be a late night. I got to work on Gavin's cake and general cleanup. When I asked Gavin what he wanted to dinner, he said PIZZA!!! So I said, easy enough, and picked up the phone for Pizza Hut delivery! We ate real quick and got down to birthday business. Poor guy had been waiting ALL DAY LONG for his presents!!! I loved his facial expressions each time he opened a gift~

Then Daddy brought out this one.....

After gifts, we did cake. Of course there is a story behind the cake. I'm pretty sure I gave the story behind the cake TWO years ago when he requested the same kinda of cake- a "CARROT" cake. No, it's not really a carrot cake inside, he just wants a carrot decoration on it like the ones he sees at the grocery store!!! LOL!

Proof that it is indeed chocolate cake inside....
(completely homemade, cake and frosting, and SO delicious!!!!)

Gavin is really just the sweetest kid around. Most days. ;) He comes up with the funniest things sometimes! His laugh makes me laugh. He is tender-hearted and one of the things I love is when he's trying to be brave when he's upset, gets a pouty lip and it trying to keep himself from bursting into tears. Those times I just have to pick him up and hold him for a minute. ♥ Gavin gets away with a lot (Matt reminds me of this frequently) but I'm really trying to be better about sticking to my word with him.

He loves Bakugan, Pokemon, and Star Wars. He likes to play with Legos and play the Wii, specifically Lego Star Wars. He is a pretty good eater with his favorites (I just asked him) being cheese crisps and pizza. Don't think that's all we ever eat, though. haha! He also loves most ANY fruit; strawberries, blueberries, oranges, grapefruit, cantaloupe, bananas, grapes, apples, pears, pineapple, but NOT watermelon. He'll eat MOST veggies with his faves being carrots, cucumbers, sugar snap peas (raw) and broccoli. His favorite cereal is Cinnamon Life, but would always prefer "hot oatmeal," as he calls it cooked on the stove, or pancakes. He calls his swirly cow-lick on the front of his head his "squirrel" and every time I cut his hair, he makes sure that I don't cut his "squirrel" off. ;) He'll stay in his pjs all day long unless I make him change. Gavin still loves music and I'm amazed at how quickly he picks up lyrics to songs on the radio.

He's having his very first friend birthday party this weekend and he's SO so excited about that!

Some pics from Gavin's birth until now...

Such a BIG boy!!! Happy Birthday, Gavin!!! We love you so much!

{5 yr stats}
weight- 36.8 lbs 21st %ile
height- 43 in 52nd %ile

Fun with the letter M

It was my turn again to teach for our preschool co-op this week. I was bound and determined to chill out a little bit and go about things much more simply this time around. I always find such a huge amount of fun things to do that I can't control myself, but I actually really enjoyed our time this week instead of shoving the kids out the door at 11:30am! LOL!

The letter M was great fun! Tuesday, we did three things:

~Learned about Monkeys!!

We acted like monkeys jumping on the bed while we sang that song. I read a book called Too Many Monkeys that was really cute! We moved up to the table to make paper plate monkey masks. The kids colored the back of the plate with brown and/or black crayons, then glued on the eyes, ears and nose & mouth pieces I had pre-cut.

For snack, they had 1/2 a banana and peanut butter crackers. Hannah being silly with her snack.Then I let the kids have "recess." They did some MONKEYING around on the swingset. :)~ Explored with Magnets!!

I made each of the kids a magnet stick by gluing a round magnet to the end of a craft stick. I provided a tray with a variety of items and asked them to pick an object that they thought would stick to their magnet. They loved doing this!!! Then I brought out some wooden Thomas trains and had them try to repel the trains across the table by putting the magnet wrong sides together. Lastly, I let them play with Magnadoodles and Magformers.

~ Counted with M&Ms!!

I gave each child an M&M graph that I made and a cup with 20 M&Ms in it. First, they sorted the M&Ms into colors, then they graphed them. We went around the table and I asked each kid which color of M&Ms they had the most of, then the least of. Who knew math could be so fun??!!

Today (Thursday), our activities were centered around three books~ If You Give a Moose a Muffin by Laura Numeroff, The Marshmallow Incident by Judi Barrett and The Mitten by Jan Brett. Yes, once again, the children's book NUT comes out in me!!!

Here's how the agenda went:

- sang Do You Know the Muffin Man

- read the book If You Give a Moose a Muffin

- moved to the table to practice writing our letter M's

- had "recess" in the backyard then came in for a snack of muffins, milk and mandarin oranges. the kids gobbled the muffins up and I bet they didn't even realize how healthy they were!

This dude loves preschool too!

- read The Marshmallow Incident- glued colored mini marshmallows on a capital and lowercase M template.

- read The Mitten

- kids "needled" (as one of the girls referred to it as) their own paper mitten then colored and cut out the animals to tuck into their mitten, just like in the story.

I think it's safe to say that everyone had a good time!! Only two more times of teaching before preschool is over!

HAPPY New Year {2011}

I'm gonna back up a few nights first....

Since we were hosting a party at our house on New Years Eve, we decided to do a mini celebration with the kids the night before with cousins at Derek & Kristin's house. Fireworks are now legal in Arizona (not anything that shoots into the air) and it's been so WEIRD seeing firework stands on corners everywhere! We bought up the motherload and had a blast (no pun intended) lighting them off with the kids. Preston was absolutely terrified of all the noise. He was fine to watch from afar. haha! Matt finally coerced him to hold a sparkler, but my camera battery had just died, darn.

Daddy helping Brooklyn light a firework!My chicken self. Look how far I was standing away from the thing as I was trying to light it!Hot chocolate!

Like I mentioned before, we had a couples party at our house on New Years Eve. The theme was "There's an APP for that" and everyone brought an APPetizer to share. ;) We had 7 couples here and it was so fun! We bought Just Dance 2 for the Wii and tried it out for the first time. It was a RIOT watching some of those guys bust a move!

Above: Rocky Tuner, Matt
Below: Preston Strebeck, Rocky Turner, Craig Connolly

We did a little Guitar Hero too, then the guys went outside to light off more fireworks while the girls stayed cozy warm and watched from inside. Funny to see how fireworks turn them into little pyro boys!!

We counted down to the New Year (thanks Carson Daly) then kissed our sweeties and cheered to the upcoming year with sparkling cider. I look totally exhausted in this picture. 'Cause I was.

Here's the group, minus one couple who had to jet out early.

2010 was a pretty good year for us. When I look back, I can't think of anything really negative. We've been really, really blessed, especially with Matt's job. I know we are lucky to be employed by a company that treats us so well and has encouraged Matt's growth in his profession. He works hard to provide a living for our family and he does such a good job. We are looking forward to even more excitement and fun in 2011!!