3rd Grade!!!

3rd grade has begun....and in full force.  

This year seemed more natural (for lack of a better word).  Erik and I made a comment that this year just seemed easy starting off the year.  No stresses about all those things you stress about.  I have learned that we are just like all the other parents...confused and worried we are messing something up most of the time and doing everything last minute.  And, this whole school thing is just becoming part of what we do.  We are really getting used to the school , teachers, and parents so it's all just easy.  I feel like I don't have a million questions every day.  Plus, Elaina is comfortable there and knows what is going on and can verbalize to us what that is way better than in years past.  All part of growing up - Elaina and us, ha!

Now on to pictures.....  let's compare this year to last year, shall we?  I have never done this before

                                                                            3rd grade                                                                                          

 2nd grade

Wowza!!! A year definitely makes a world of difference.  Her face shape is completely different....plus she is taller for sure.

Now to some more 1st day of 3rd grade pictures

Elaina has always wanted a picture of her backpacks.  This year she was adamant that we find one with a lunchbox that attaches to it so she didn't have to carry 2 things.  Smart.  The dog with the huge glasses on.....well, she likes it :)

Sassy much?

Elaina got Mrs. McAfee who we are a fan of so far.

End of summer

A few more pictures to round out the rest of the summer....

Elaina went to camp with Grace Church this year.   She and her friend, Katherine, went together.  I was out of town when they left so Katherine's mom dropped them off.  Here they are before boarding the bus.  

Cheer started towards the end of the summer...after each. and. every. practice.....we must take a picture on the rock.

Elaina got a late b-day present from her best friend, Kaitilyn, who moved to Mississippi.

Katherine spent the night one night.  They made breakfast for us when we woke up.  This is a favorite thing for Elaina and her friends to do.  We love it, naturally.

The weekeend before school started (mine and Erik's b-day weekend) we decided to go for one final summer hoo-raw.  Elaina has been wanting to go back to the Wilderness of the Smokies.  So, that is what we did.  We took her friend, Kaelyn.  We all had a great time.  This time Elaina was able to ride all the rides.  It's been more than 2 years since we went last time.

This picture cracks me up.  It's hard to tell but Elaina is COMPLETELY hogging the bed.  Poor Kaelyn...she is on the edge of her bed.  Had to take a picture.

Elaina lost her 4th tooth just before school started.  She lost #3 and #4 close to each other as evidenced by the 2 gaps in her bottom set of chompers

And...we got Elaina a bunk bed.  Our neighbors who are moving were selling it for a great deal so we go it.  Elaina loves it.  She sleeps on the top bunk.  I love that the bottom is a futon where all her millions of stuffed animals can live rather than all over her floor :)

20th High School Reunion

This past summer marked the 20th year that I have been out of high school!  The thought of that is hard to grasp but, it's true.  I have been out of high school 20 years.  There- I said it!  Now, let's move on.

My best friend, Lisa, and I decided several months before the reunion that we would go together.  There were moments when we both wanted to convince each other not to but we stuck to it.  And, we are both glad we did.  I did not go to my 10 year reunion so I decided I needed to check out #20.  It was WAY better than I expected.  From talking to people there that went to the 10 year reunion, they even said that the 20 year one is way less stressful.  Apparently this one was less about "where everyone was in life" and more about catching up and reminiscing about old times.  It was so great!

Beforehand, a few old cronies came over for a pre-reunion drink.  My best friend who I have known since 1st grade, Lisa came.  She still lives here so I see her often.  My friend, Kara, who I have known since 2nd grade was there (she is from out of town and it had been more than 10 years since I saw her).  And, Shannon, who I know from high school came.  Shannon did not go to the reunion - she was one that went to the 10 year and hated it so she opted out of the 20 year.  We told her she missed out.

Anyways...all that babble to say, I was glad I went and connected with old friends.  Will I go to another one?  Only time will tell.  But, at least I can say I have been to one.

Now on to pictures.

A picture of us taking a selfie

Shannon, Kara, Lisa, and me

Enikka, Kara, and me.  Enikka was a friend we knew since grade school

Me and Kara

Lisa, me and Amanda

Everyone from our class who came....pretty decent turn out.  

Elaina 's birthday party

As usual, we had a party for Elaina's 8th birthday.  Elaina is really into her sleepovers so that is what we had.  5 of her little girl friends came over to celebrate.

The theme of this party was Shopkins.  Elaina is VERY much into these things.  She has been into them for a while but the past 6 months these little toys have taken off and you can hardly find them.  Anyway....beside the point.  She loves any sort of "blind bag" really.  Anything where you get a bag that you can't see through and you get a "surprise" when you open it.  They come in all different types of toys.  Anyway, you try to collect all of them in each set.  For a while she LOVED to watch YouTube videos of people opening them.  Literally that is all they do.  You don't even see their faces, just their hands opening up blind bag after blind bag.  She has even done a few videos of her own.  Maybe one day we will post one.

My point, we had Shopkins and lots of different types of blind bags for this party.  We did a scavenger hunt where the girls collected stuff at each spot.  We also had a punchboard where they got shopkins and other blind bag stuff.

Okay, enough talk....on to pictures.

Here is the punchboard.  My friend, Marta, cut out the holes with her super fancy laser cutter that she uses for her business, C is for Cardboard.  We covered each hole with tissue paper.  Then, we hot glued solo cups to the back.  The holes were the perfect size to have a solo cup cover it.  

Our friends, Carl and Sabrina, did the cake again.  As usual, they knocked it out of the park.  Elaina added 8 of her favorite Shopkins to the top.  She chose to line them up in alphabetical order.  Love the orderly kid that she is!

I saw an idea on Pinterest.  I took Shopkins that Elaina already had and put party food out on the table that matched that Shopkins.  Each Shopkin was next to that food.  Then printed out a picture of that Shopkins and put it on the bowl.  

The Birthday girl

The little baskets that the Shopkins come in were the weights for the balloons

Sabrina and Carl made a box for the cake to go in.  It was made to look like the little Shopkins baskets.  It was super cute.  This box as turned into her Shopkins storage box so it has turned out to be super helpful in keeping all her Shopkins in one place.

The girls made their own "shopping bags" before the scavenger hunt

Scavenger hunt pictures...

Punchboard pictures....They had so much fun doing this

The last thing we did was an Oreo eating/guessing game.  Keeping in line with the YouTube videos Elaina loves to watch, she loves to watch these kids eat different types of food while blind folded.  One of them is an Oreo eating contest.  So, each child got a mask and we gave them all different types of Oreos to try to guess which one.  It was super fun to do.  Who doesn't love eating Oreos??

Love these sweet girls!  Elaina, Katherine, Tatum, Laurel, and Madison

Here they are opening their blind bags and Shopkins.  They traded and played with them.  They had fun doing this.

Last, each child made their own cup that looked like "Little Sipper" Shopkins.  It's a little red cup with an umbrella hat, straw, and cute face on it.

They turned out like so.....they drank their milk out of them while eating cake and Oreos.

Then, 4 of the 5 of them spent the night.  The next morning we went swimming for a couple of hours.  Then, the parents came to pick them up.  It was a very fun time.  Elaina has some really sweet friends