Just the Facts please.

52.5 inches tall

61 pounds

11 pounds more than when you turned 8.

39th percentile for weight. You skinny little thing.

Above are the stats of our dear Conleigh Grace who celebrated birthday #9 earlier this month.

Dear Conleigh,

We love you so very much.  You are definitely a first born and like to give parental advice to your younger siblings.  You are very independent and march to your own drummer.  You like your alone time and are careful in your choices. Competitive sports do not interest you but you recently began a tumbling class and you seem to like it.  You have also been taking piano for over six months. Your interest seems to be waning, but I really hope you'll stick with it. You have such musical talent. 

You love to have mommy/Conleigh time. For your birthday, we went to see the

Circque de Soleil show, Quidam.  You are a fine arts girl through and through and loved the show.

You get along well with adults and tend to like to participate in those conversations.   You also still like to do art, painting mostly.

Your hair is so long now.  You are sensitive to mommy's mood and try to be a pleaser.

Third grade has been a challenge. You have no trouble understanding the assignments, but your interest in completing them is less than stellar.  Math comes easily to you. Punctuation and spelling take a little more work.  Grace and Katie are still your best friends.

I am very thankful to be your mom. I love to hug and kiss your sweet face. I like to roll your hair in my hand. I love to listen to you tell me about things that you have learned. You are a treasure beyond words.

Love,

Mom

Campin'

We enjoyed our eighth trip to the HEB Foundation camp this past weekend.

God is so present at this amazing camp. The setting is beautiful on the Frio river.

The children are independent enough now that we aren't having to hover over them. It is a really relaxing place. The food is good, the activities are available and the company is wonderful. We are thankful for such a wonderful church community.

Alex was in the Gaga pit all weekend. He was the winner quite often too.  His calves were sore from dodging the ball all weekend.

Nothing could be finer than to smolder your marshmallow for the ultimate s'more!

Conleigh was covered as far as not getting pinched for St. Patrick's Day.  Here she was using bacon on a homemade fishing stick and feeding the many small fishies.  I remember the very first year we went to camp. Conleigh was one, and she stayed in this same location the whole weekend throwing tiny rocks into the water.

It's not called the Frio for nothin'.  Brr. The girls couldn't convince themselves to get all the way in.  Alex jumped straight in and then straight out. I think the cold water knocked the breath out of him.

This is the part of the river that we drive our cars through to get to camp.  

 

 

 

Cold Fun!

Conleigh with her third grade friends, Alex and Meghan.

Campbell and her posse dancing during worship on Sunday morning.

A beautiful setting just calls for the kids to dance.

It was confirmed by other ladies in our cabin that I was the snorer of the group, and my beloved husband video taped me sleeping in the van on the way home with my mouth wide open snoring away.  Lovely.

The pot at the end of the Rainbow

Look what I made out of this?

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

We are at our church retreat this weekend enjoying the beautiful south Texas hill country.

Paint

While the girls painted birdhouses,

the boy painted a pinewood derby car.

Fun at the Main Event - Ring My Bell

I've been kind of proud to say I haven't spent time at the Main Event.  Who knows why. Before today, I had only walked Alex into a birthday party there one time.  Main Event is right across the freeway from our house. It is convenient but I also knew it was a money sucker.

Headed for the bell.



Monkey!



Free spirit.



Determined.



Yes, we spent some cash, but we had a really good time too.  The children and I met up with Campbell's friend Jessie and her mom there this morning.  We did rock climbing for an hour. I didn't think I could do it, but I did! Yay! The kids were amazing and really jammed.  Going in the morning was also key. We almost had the wall to ourselves.  After our hour, we headed for the bowling alley. Bowling + pizza. What could be better?
Conleigh had a piano lesson mid-afternoon, so we split. But, we had plans to re-meet at 3:00 for our rock climbing reservation. Good thing we had a reservation. It was crowded by then. We definitely got our moneys worth today and I think the kids will be sleeping extra good tonight. Oh, and we fit in a round of glo-golf too. Geez. I'm tired!

First weekend of spring break. It's a wrap.

Rain.  That pretty much sums up the weather of the weekend. However, it was absolutely glorious to not have to get up for soccer on Saturday morning.  Peter went and bought a new computer. I swear, our computers go ka-poot way too often.
The girls wanted to jump in the puddles. So they did.  Water was cold. Didn't last too long.

By afternoon, the crew was going a little stir crazy. Campbell's friend Jessica called to check on a playtime. Thus, Alex needed a playmate. Thus, Conleigh wanted some friends to play with as well. Conleigh's choice friends couldn't play, so she and I went and investigated an estate sale. Score! Holy cow, this house was amazing...It was right on Lake Austin off Mount Bonnell road.  I mean, right on the lake. Not looking down on the lake, but walk out your back door onto your dock and get in your boat, right on the lake.
The sale was basically dolls, dolls and more dolls.  Crazy amount of dolls. The owner even had a 'museum room' that was all glassed in and had dolls and dolls. We saw Princess Diana and Prince Charles, Rhett, and Scarlett, Liberace, and hundreds and hundreds more. No joke.  She had a collection of Madame Alexander dolls. When we were there late in the day (on the second day of the sale), there were about 85 dolls left that were in the 14inch tall catagory (I promised I never knew this much, which isn't very much) about these dolls).  Conleigh was browsing. She was thinking about spending some of her birthday money. She looked at the gobs of Barbies that were still boxed. I suggested the 'museum room' again. As we looked at the dolls, a worker came and taped a window, ~all sold~. Gaah!
I asked this other woman standing there if she bought them. Yes, she did. She asked Conleigh if there was one she wanted.  Conleigh being herself, backed off, "oh no, I'm fine." The woman persisted and finally I got Conleigh to consider it.  She chose Scarlett O'Hara. Conleigh was so happy!  She was beaming.  I then told the woman about my five year old daughter and could I pick one more? Of course. She was so nice.  I didn't know the difference between any of them, so I picked a pretty one. The man with her said that was one of the first ladies.  Okay.  We learned that we chose Harriet Ford for Campbell.  Know who she was? 
It was a very fun outing for Conleigh & me. Rain or no rain. Great mom & daughter time. The crew met up again and decided to go to RC Fowlers for wings at dinnertime. We then did a couple of errands and came on home.
Saturday night Campbell came to our room about 1:30 with her ear and throat hurting. She was really aching. So come morning, she and I head to the urgent care clinic, and Peter and Conleigh and Alex head to church.  Diagnosis: bad ear infection. I'm so glad it was only that. They did the strep swab also and thankfully, it was negative.

Last night we hosted Mrs. Ready and her husband for Daddy's famous hamburgers. Long overdue, they came and we enjoyed a fun evening. The kids loved showing her life in our house. It was an honor to have them here. Mrs. Ready was Conleigh's first grade teacher and is now helping Alex with his reading. 
Signing off...

Thinking of Poppie

The seeds we planted last spring finally bloomed a flower! We called my grandpa Poppie. I'm so happy to think of him today with this beautiful flower in bloom.