Bradley's teacher should feel very loved, teacher appreciation week was a couple of weeks ago and Bradley proved once again that he is a darling.
There have been a bunch of end of year birthday parties in Bradley's class and the kid has been living it up. Apparently there is no bigger party than a kindergarten party and parents have been pulling out all the stops. Face painting, glitter tattoos, renting out fancy facilities, Bradley is very much enjoying getting spoiled.
Some seriously impressive face painting here.
And going nuts at the Johnson County Museum. These are some seriously cool party venues.
Second birthday party of the last few weeks - this one at a family fun center with laser tag, bumper cars, a go kart track, ridiculous fair rides, and TONS of video arcades. Bradley keeps asking when we can go back.
Hugging the birthday boy, Scotty. It's rather unfortunate for Bradley Scott that there is another kindergarten boy named Scotty who wears glasses, I don't blame the staff for getting them confused from time to time. Luckily Scotty is a sweetie and doesn't mind a fair amount of serious hugs.
Ridiculous spinny fair ride. I felt sick just watching it. The boys loved it.
And go karts! Bradley was amazing, picked it up instantly!
He also had a pretty great field day, and for the final ten days of school they had themed activities every day. There was a science day, a show and tell day, a PJ day, they know how to finish the school year with a bang in kindergarten.
With Nate.
Decorating egg for egg drop with Noah and Avery.
Another science experiment. Kudos to his teacher for all the great pics.
Dance party day. Bradley's favorite song that he got to request was "We Will Rock You" by Queen. I stopped by and got to observe the hilarity of his favorite little girl in the class trying to dance nicely with him on repeat and Bradley being a great disappointment to her by running around wildly instead of slow dancing. Sorry Lorelei, welcome to guy behavior.
Video of "dancing."
And then pajama day where he got to bring in a stuffed toy and read books to it. So adorable.
Fortunately, despite all the razzle dazzle from the end of the school year we are so ready for lots of time around the house and playtime in the park now that school doesn't take up valuable play time.
If I do one thing with Bradley this summer I want it to be giving him plenty of time to draw and write more stories.
Dinosaur Facts by Bradley and Olivia
We need to work on the actual story line a bit. When in doubt scribbles can double as writing it seems.
But the drawings more than make up for it.
And this last bit - classic.
Bradley also had his belt test at taekwondo a couple weeks ago and was a champ, he was one of the few kids to get a compliment from Master Ko!
He's a yellow belt now and we're very proud of him. He does so well at his classes. He broke his board on his first try at the belt assessment and took the pieces home and decorated them Bradley style. I mean, does it get any cuter than this? The other half is decorated as a very complicated maze.
Patrick has been potty training lately. How cute is he in big kid underwear?
He strips down to go potty and I get to completely re-dress him every time. It's worth it though, Patrick's favorite compliment to give me now when I help him is to tell me, "Mommy, you're a real hero!" and hug me a bunch.
He's getting so big. I can't stand it.
A happy benefit of potty training is he's really happy about his underwear, so when he strips down outside he leaves it on.
Killing ants and building them a house.
These two have been such a duo playing together while Bradley has been gone at school. Although I fear what Patrick is learning from Eleanor. We were walking home from the park yesterday and she said (looking at a little car we were passing by), "I hate that little gazebo car." Me, "WHAT did you just call that car?" Eleanor (little grin on her face), "A gazebo!"
The best insults. Watch out, world.
Playing Pokemon characters together.
Do you see that gleam of joy in Patrick's eyes? He's trying to run into me with his tricycle.
Much cuter picture of Eleanor on her bike.
Barefoot walk in the park. I'm so happy we back on this, it's so pretty!
Speaking of pretty ... I told Eleanor to pose. She is the best.
And the kids are finally getting to put to use the crazy water guns my parents got for us a couple summers ago.
When we don't have time for a full bath at night it's foot bath time. A summertime classic.
Although the two boys are their own incredible duo. Can you believe this swing? They don't get tired of it, they do this for hours every day if they have the free time.
Park bench time together. Favorite jumping spot.
Also, the Pokemon obsession lives on. Bradley is reciting the Team Rocket bit here, with a little help from Patrick. The dynamic here is so excellent.
Patrick has been getting a lot of play dates with little friends and you'd think he'd be more cheerful about things, but sometimes I withhold snacks from him. It's cute in theory, but it's actually a bit of an issue that he will go into a screaming fit of rage if he can't eat literally all the candy or all of the fruit snacks. There's nothing like a child screaming at you with candy goo running down his chin and a fistful of candy in his hand but it's NOT enough, NOT enough he says! We've had to make a few less than graceful park exits lately.
Fortunately he turned this particular one around with the help of his good friends Mabel and Peter and a pile of goldfish they took turns pouring water on.
For the last couple weeks of school the kids had a popsicle pretty much every day when they got home from school. It got hot fast!
A rare instance of all three riding the swing like you're supposed to. I guess this how you're supposed to do it. I really don't know anymore.
This is what I've grown accustomed to.
I keep sending Nathan pictures of me with unconscious children and when he asks where Meg is I have to send a follow-up picture. Because she is always there. Kitty loves naptime.
Patrick officially doesn't have to nap anymore but I keep having quiet reading time for me and the little boy in the master bedroom and this keeps happening.
Can you stand it? Oh, and look, there's Meg.
I guess maybe he still naps.
Often I go and find Eleanor like this after a Patrick naptime. I love that she has put on tap shoes for this particular occasion.
This is how Patrick sleeps every night.
And I check on the kids before going to bed every night and it seems I had locked Meg in with Eleanor but fortunately neither one seemed to mind too much and made the best of the situation.
Nathan and I got a cool kid date night a few weeks ago to celebrate our seventh anniversary. We went to see Whose Line is It Anyway at the Midland Theatre. Very fancy venue, lots of fun to see the show.
We had a blast and we're very cute.
Soon after was Eleanor's preschool graduation, which was beyond adorable.
They had adorable little songs they sang before Eleanor got to walk across the stage to get her diploma.
Family pictures! We even got her flowers because we're classy like that.
This came out of Eleanor's preschool memory book that we took home that day. You can skim through reading it, the most important part is the final line that is ALL Eleanor. Thanks for keeping things real, little girl.
Eleanor is really into slang and is a valley girl out of the valley. She says "like" and "oh my gosh!" constantly. To the point that our neighbor girl commented on it when we saw her for a few minutes the other day. Because the more excited Eleanor is, the more she turns to cool kid slang. She's not just ready for kindergarten, she's ready for middle school and beyond. She's already far cooler than I ever was.
And maybe sweeter. She and her daddy have been getting some amazing cuddle time lately, both at bedtime and especially when Eleanor first wakes up in the morning. She runs into our bed and snuggles up with her daddy while the boys and I head out to cause chaos downstairs.
The sweet girl had her dance recital last weekend and while she was beyond excited to dance on stage, things took a turn for her when she had to put on makeup for the dress rehearsal.
She was NOT into it and complained a lot. I thought it was fairly ridiculous they were requiring a four year old to wear mascara, blush, and lipstick (only one of which I personally own) so we boycotted the makeup for the main performance and Eleanor was happy and no one at the dance studio commented on it so we were fine.
Her performance was beyond adorable. Her favorite part was the daddy daughter dance she got to do with Nathan. I only got pictures and video from the rehearsal.
It was very annoying to have someone in front of the most adorable daddy/daughter duo but I did my best in this video. They were so cute together.
And the performance from just Eleanor's class was just darling. Although Eleanor needs to stop asking if she can wear this dress to church or to playdates. No idea where she can wear it again, I guess just another dance class.
Many thanks to my friend Lindsay who sat in the front row with a good camera for the performance. And we're very proud of Eleanor and her friends Ava and Greenlee for sneaking their way to the front of the crowd of little girls. Made for great pictures!
She had a blast and was adorable. What more can you ask from a dance class for 3-5 year olds?
We were so happy Grandma Colleen and Kerry made the drive out to see the show!
Backstage with Daddy. Eleanor was so cute!
And fun story, I forgot to get her flowers for this particular performance so Nathan ran over to a nearby nursery and got her this potted plant. It's actually even better than cut flowers, Colleen planted it in our backyard so Eleanor's recital flowers get to live on! (Until I kill them from neglect. I better tell a kid to water them, I'm sure that would be a popular chore.)
The kids got a little cozy time at our house with Grandma Colleen and Kerry before we carted them off to the next adventure, a Cub Scout picnic for Bradley!
Can you see how proud that boy in the middle is?
Patrick had a reasonably excellent time at Cub Scouts, they had games with prizes if you won and he kept running over to show me his latest prize. At one point I asked him, "Are you really winning all these?" and he cheerfully responded, "I am pretending to win!" and then ran off and grabbed another slap bracelet. Five slap bracelets and a bouncy ball later, he practiced very well.
And these photos are what I get when I tell Patrick to give me a nice smile.
And back home to plant Eleanor's flowers. So cute, such delighted kids.
I doubt Grandma Colleen has ever had such excellent help planting flowers.
We've gotten in a few Deanna Rose trips lately. Eleanor is my photo champion and was happy to pose in front of some pretty flowers we found there.
But immediately afterwards she compensated by climbing a dangerous tall thing.
Guess who was eager to be led astray. Literally no other children climbed these things.
Posing as flowers with our friend Gavin.
The next trip was more sedate and Eleanor didn't manage to emerge from wagon and snacks for at least 20 minutes. We got a fair amount of commentary from other moms saying that things looked "rough" for the kids.
But then we found baby goats to love. We're really happy Patrick doesn't smooch the goats anymore, although the love remains.
Eleanor had a goat chew on her dress and throw up on it a little and she handled it far better than I would have. Super gross.
I got Eleanor a mermaid kickboard to use at the pool this summer. Best purchase ever.
The kids can't ditch me fast enough when we go swimming. Can you find the Nathan foot in this photo?
He gets so many cool daddy points for doing this on repeat with the kids. They love it so much.
Eleanor has gotten into "grooming" the kitties lately with a little brush she found in the kitty bin. They love it so much ...
We went to the library this past week to pick out our free books to kick off the summer reading program. So much excitement, so many Pokemon books.
They had a fairly impressive cardboard sculpture display that we got to check out too.
Helping our neighbor Addison ride her bike. She is way too nice with our kids.
Although it has to be nice to know you can just walk next door and have a crowd of children heaping adoration upon you.
We got a new bubble machine to start the summer off right!
And here are the pictures from Bradley's last day of kindergarten. Patrick wanted to cuddle with Bradley during the kindergarten awards and Bradley was more than happy to oblige.
Bradley got to walk down the yellow carpet when it was his turn to be honored.
Guess who got Most Creative? I was so proud!
Mostly I'm glad she didn't mention how he steals any art supplies not locked away whenever he is given the opportunity.
Video of the whole thing. Bradley is such a dear and he had a wonderful year of kindergarten.
Snow cones at the all school picnic at the end of the school day. They had bouncy houses and I brought a lunch that was almost completely ignored by the children, it was excellent times.
At home afterward reading a Pokemon anthology together. Sweet kids.
Everyone likes to read with Patrick.
And our two Stanley Wildcats, incoming K and 1st grade, posing with our new yard sign that they are both ridiculously excited about. We live in such a nice little neighborhood with a nice little school, I'm so glad the kids are getting such a sweet childhood experience here.
Although we may have to work on our appreciation of nature. Out of the blue at lunch the other day Eleanor started screaming at the birds to be quiet. I mean, the particular birds she was annoyed with were squawking in kind of an annoying manner. But oh my - what does one do with this?
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