Tom Petty Concert

She's a good girl, loves her mama,

loves Jesus, and America too...

She's a good girl, crazy 'bout Elvis,

loves horses and her boyfriend too...

by Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers

Yeah, I was free fallin' at the Tom Petty concert last Wednesday night. Genelle and Kirk invited me and another friend Christie and I went! Troy stayed behind to watch the kiddos...thanks honey! It was so much fun. We had great seats and a great time. I sang loud and those songs brought back ALOT of memories!

Needless to say, things have changed in the concert world. For starters I didn't come home smelling like smoke, but the funniest thing was instead of people holding up their lighters, they open their cell phones instead! I just found it halarious! Of course you coud tell who were the "old folk"... they were the very few that had their lighters. There were a few who hadn't made it out of the '80's hair stage. Check the pic. Good times....

SECOND grade?... really?

You know when you have kids you don't ever think of them as actually getting big. You get pregnant and think baby, baby, baby for the next 9 months. Then you think sleep, sleep, sleep after they're born;) But really, you don't think of them as one day being kids. You want them to be productive, well adjusted, confident, etc... grown ups. But there's a lot of stuff that happens between the baby/toddler/preschool to grown ups and that's pretty much the hardest part. The kid stage. The stage where you so desperately want to pick their friends, keep them safe, keep their heart from getting broken, teach them that God is REAL not just some "thing" up "there" that you should believe in because it's a good thing for you to have faith and religion. It's a really hard stage for me. It's not really b/c I don't want them to grow up, because I think watching them grow is so much fun. They say funny stuff and have such a sweet look on life.

I guess it's the closing of one stage to the next that's hard on me. Knowing that I won't have it back and hoping that I made an impact on them... a good one:) I try desperately to take it all in and remember it, but I'm not sure I'm doing a good job of it. It really does just fly by. My prayer today is that God will continue to pour out his mercy and erase any of the stupid stuff I did that could cause them to go into therapy. I know He will. He is good and has been good to me and our family.

Here's my very most favorite 2nd grader in the whole wide world on the first day!

Medieval Times

The boys had a guys night out last night. Troy took Duncan to Medieval Times. Duncan was SO excited and got dressed appropriately for the event. I found this costume and he was happy to wear it. As most of you know, Duncan loves to dress up! So far, he said his favorite part was the swords breaking when the guys fought, the sparks, getting to hold are REAL sword, and the big horses. Of course, he commented on the food and ate like a king, literally.

End of Summer...Bummer

Well, this is our last week of summer. Although it's still "really" summer, school starts the 25th. It's been a busy last few weeks. I took the kids bowling with some friends, had a friend sleepover, Savannah went to sleepover with a friend, school shopping, Duncan practicing riding his bike without training wheels and not running off the sidewalk, VBS, Kendall's wearing big girl panties...etc. We still have one more thing to do before Monday that was on our "Oh, we'll do that this summer" list... go to JUMPTOWN! Whoo hoo..still trying to get myself excited about that one.

It was tax free weekend in TX and Savannah and I had fun shopping for her clothes. She has such an opinion now. Thankfully clothes haven't been a struggle and it was a fun time. Yes, I know it will change. But it was fun to see her decide on what she likes and why.

We also went to the American Girl store. Savannah has saved her money for two years! Her Daddy is very proud of her saving ability. The girl will pass up all candy aisles, icees and whatever else for her American Girl doll she's been wanting. The shortest version of the story is that Troy and I bought her the Samantha doll last Christmas. I love that doll. Savannah and I read the Samantha series books together, watched the movie, bawled when we read and watched the movie and just fell in love with her. I didn't want Santa to get any credit for getting her the doll, so we got it for her. So since Savannah didn't have to buy the doll I thought for sure she'd just get lots of accessories to go with it. Oh no, she wants an orphanage she says. Seriously, she did. So she's finally got enough money to get the next AG.

Samantha, Savannah and I went to eat at the Bistro as a part of Savannah's birthday in July. Aunt Deanna gave her a gift card to the store and there you have it... Savannah's perfect day. Eating lunch at the bistro with her doll and having money to spend. Well, it took her over an hour to decide which doll to get. She finally decided on Mia, the girl of the year. It was a great time together. My girl's growing up so fast I just can't stand it. She's changing SO much. She's not little anymore. I'm so proud of her!


Duncan continues to be my little man. He's so much like Troy. He is so sweet and so helpful. He cleaned the entire playroom without being asked the other day and it was a WRECK! He starts with LEGOS and he will build towers and such, then goes to Lincoln Logs, to army men, to his castle and pirates. We have to take a picture of the finale before he tears it down and goes to the next toy. I've added some pics of his creations. The last picture is an example of what I find around the house. An Army man in my drawer pull pointing his gun at me is just a few of the many joys of having my boy. It was hard to get that dude outta there too!

Kendall is potty training and doing great! She thinks she's big. I called her Baby the other day, and she said, "I not a baby, I Kenall!" She sees other kids her size and is so rude! She puts her hand up like STOP! It's so funny, and so embarrassing at the same time. She's just a mess. But we are all crazy about her. I took these pictures after church last week. She just wanted to jump off the porch Kendall style... one, two, tree..ready guys? GO! But I managed to get her to hang around her chair and get a few cute ones. She KNOWS how badly I want THE shot and will act silly like nobodies business. I think they show her personality.

Please pray for us all as we start the school schedule. It's hard to get back into the routine and we all miss Savannah during the day. Duncan is going to school longer this year. I know it'll take him a while to get into it. We meet Savannah's teacher on Friday. Pray for the best one for her. We have had two amazing teachers the first two years, let's pray it continues!

Six Flags

Savannah and I went to Six Flags yesterday. Yes, it was a 500 degrees, but we went. She read 10 hours or something and got a ticket through school and it was about to expire. Thankfully we have dear friends that live in Arlington that were nice enough to brave the Texas heat with us. They live minutes from the park and have season passes. I consider The Griffis family as a part of what we call out "Texas Family." They were some of the first people we met at our church and we went to playgroups together when our firstborns were just babies. There's just something to be said about those friendships you make when you first have kids. Even then, Savannah and Taylor were crazy about each other and things haven't changed much! Taylor is one of my favorite friends of Savannah. She's such a fun kid! They both were just so much fun to watch! Jenna and I rode the Shock Wave with them and it was a blast. Jenna was screaming, "I'm too old for this!" That made me wonder.... how old were my parents when they'd wake us up at 5am. and drive from LA for a day of fun at Six Flags? I don't remember them riding the rides, but my dad always dared me to ride the scariest ones... and of course, I did. Which brings me to my next thought. What WILL they come up with next? Is the Shock Wave not scary enough anymore? Apparently not! The Titan, Texas Giant, Mr. Freeze, Superman... have all replaced the Judge Roy Scream and Shock Wave days I remember. But what will there be when my kids take their kids to Six Flags? Seriously, how can they get scarier? I can see it now.. "Please enter the rocket powered capsule as we shoot you one million feet into the air, then hold on tight as you are shot out into the clouds only to have to reach and grab onto the wire and swing 5,000 cubic feet to the red dot to which will slam you back into the place you are standing right now... HAVE FUN!" Well, it just scares me thinking about it. But for now, we had a great time and my kids are too short for the "big stuff" and my girl thinks I'm a rockstar for riding the Shock Wave! Thanks to the Griffis girlies for hanging with us. It was a ball!

The Circus

We love the Circus. We got our tickets for a Saturday night show, with the PureNRG concert following just for Savannah. We knew it would be a crazy night with getting home so late(midnight), but decided to go for it. PureNRG is her new favorite group and they are so awesome! They are a Christian group and do back flips and dance... they're amazing! Our good friends The Langstons went with us. Their girls LOVE PureNRG too. Well... anyway I always get myself worked up over this stuff. First I made sure everyone knew that since we were going to be out nearly all night(by our standards) that we WERE taking a family nap, meaning everyone in the family WILL take a nap! This was serious business. No nap, maybe no cotton candy. YIKES! I was so stressed about getting everyone one down AT THE SAME TIME I couldn't sleep a wink. Savannah did give it her best try, but ended up being quiet the whole time.. but never actually dozing. We eventually make it down there. We all walked up to Victory Plaza, which is quite incredible... get out the tickets, hand them over, and proceed to walk in. THEN they ask to check the bag. Well, we had a little problemo with that considering it weighed a ton b/c of all the candy I had stuffed in it. And I do mean the mother load. My kids LOVE candy and by golly I was gonna let'em eat some serious candy while at the circus! There was just one little problem. That was the fact that they had a gazillion signs stating NO OUTSIDE DRINK OR FOOD ! Surely, they wouldn't search an innocent diaper bag that thoroughly? Would they? I've snuck outside stuff in before, but never this much... would they really take it all away? Sure enough they did! Oh heavens, I can't even begin to tell you how much they proceeded to pull out of my bag! The line was being held up ya'll, over candy! It's not like we were takin in beer or other paraphernalia! I personally think the lady that dug it all out was just tickled to death about finding it. I can picture her sitting around talking about her big bust! Another big security man was staring a hole through me with utter shame in his eyes as he waved that dumb metal detector wand thingy around. He has "I wanna be a real Police" syndrome, I'm sure of it. I tried to stare him down and say with my eyes, "DO you know how much more candy I get at the dollar store than I ever could here!" I ended up being lead to the "office" where they took all my candy... ALL my ring pops, ALL of it I tell you to be held until the show was over. I was horrified, embarrassed and mad all at the same time! After I walked out of the "office" I held a finger up to Troy as to say, "I just need a moment to myself" and walked into the bathroom as fast as lightning. Or so I thought. Seems as Duncan walks that fast too when he sees his mama's upset. Before I even knew it he was in the stall asking, "Mama, why'd they take all our candy?" All I could say was, "Cause it was against the rules baby." I burst into tears and it was just ridiculous. Seriously, I was crying over Milk Duds for heaven sakes! Duncan was like, "It's OK Mama, we can still get cotton candy." So I sucked it up, wiped my tears, stood up tall and said, "That's right Duncan, we sure can!" Let's go enjoy the circus! So out we marched and all was fine. After we found our seats we decided on starting out with some popcorn and coke, so Duncan said he'd go with me. We had to wait a while in line and Duncan was being so funny asking cute questions and just being his sweet little self. But the last question was the best. He said loud and clear, "Mama, did you know it was against the law to put ALL that candy in the bag?" Ahhh yes... the innocence of a child. I just told him that I wasn't completely sure. They didn't however, take our glow sticks which were a huge hit! Kendall waved her's the entire show! Check out Duncan's serious face while watching. My friend that went with us said that she hoped he wasn't getting any ideas about the dare devil tricks!

The show was amazing. Bello was the star of the show and he's awesome! He even stayed for the PureNRG concert afterwards and gave a small testimony saying that he had a lot of things; toys, possessions, but the one thing he was most proud of was his relationship with God. Very Cool Clown that Bello fellow. Savannah and her friends had their picture made with the group after the concert and got autographs. It was a lot of fun and the ride home was great. The Dallas skyline was all lit up and the kids loved it!