Ahhhhh! I want to blog this summer, but it won't download any pictures.  It keeps saying that the connection to the server failed.  Any suggestions?

Loosing Teeth

Do you see that front tooth sticking out?  She has been working on that thing for weeks. 

Hattie is only about 3 weeks from being 8 and she had only officially lost 2 teeth on her own.

She has been so excited about this one.  Well on Father's Day, Eric tied dental floss to the tooth, tied the other end to a door knob and then slammed the door.  Her tooth flew out!

Here she is at our Father's Day lunch showing everyone her cute smile.  She totally has an adorable lisp right now.  She is snoozing in her bed hoping the tooth fairy remember all the teeth the dentist pulled last October.  It was anywhere from 2-4 teeth.  Her poor bottom teeth had no room, so he went ahead and pulled a bunch.  He didn't give us those teeth for her pillow.  Hattie is hoping for that money tonight.  She even wrote the tooth fairy a letter, "toothfairy I hope you have a good day my name is Hattie".  I totally took a picture of it before she put her pillow on top.  I'll have to add that picture later.



A Spa Day

Hattie's Spa is open for business!

This child has a gift and it is pampering.  This penny spa or free spa (if you are broke) is quite a delight.  She even has real cucumbers for your eyes.  She has been trying to sneak those into her room all week.  She succeeded today.   

Here I am relaxing after a foot rub and hand massage.  My eyes are refreshed from the cucumbers.

Before me, they had only been using one towel, but as Hattie said, "Mommy is huge."  Thanks Hattie.





My favorite part



 Then it was Eric's turn.

Lydda likes to get some Daddy loves. 

One of those cucumbers fell behind the bed. 

It took Hattie quite a while to clean off the dust and spiderwebs.  She then placed it back on Eric's eye.  It was awesome!

I will be visiting the spa again tomorrow.  I may scrounge around for a penny this time.  Hattie only requires it if you are not broke.  She didn't believe me when I said I was broke.  She also took on an employee, Emogene. She works for a penny a day.  They added an exercise routine to the spa.  I am excited about exercising at the spa. 

Have a blessed week!      



Goodbye Tall Makers

This is a farewell to much loved boots.  These were Hattie's constant companion for a LONG time.

She had them since she was five.  She is now seven.  They were a size 9.5.  They were a little big when I bought them, but I got them for a steal.  Hattie fell in love with them immediately.  They made her feel just a little bit taller.  I remember returning from a trip to Dallas without them and frantically calling my sister for her to search for them.  She found them weeks later.  Hattie was so relieved to be reunited with her boots.  Her Aunt Kristi told her she would take her to get her ears pierced if she gave up the battered boots. Hattie declined.  Those battered boots haven't fit her for a while, but we couldn't convince her of that.  She continued to wear them (without socks).  She finally told me after church a month ago that they hurt her feet.  We knew those favorite boots had to be given up.  Today, I donated them.  I know they are beat up.  They may be thrown in the trash by the thrift shop, but I just couldn't throw them away.  I hid them in the bottom of a bag of shoes, snuck the bag out of the van while she unknowingly sat in the back, and then placed them in front of the thrift shop.  Then my heart couldn't take it and I asked her to get out of the van.  I told her what was in the bag.  She looked at me, shrugged, and said "Ok."  So, bye, bye boots.  I will continue to scour eBay looking for a bigger size to see that joy on her face.

A Great Surprise

We had such a great day today. Aside from the light cleaning, which is hated by all, but necessary (gritted teeth), we went to the library. The whole van, excluding me, was very upset about all the stops I was making before going to the library.  Don't you just love it when you are delayed by a post office stop, lunch break, and potty break by a 3 year old that has convinced you that she is going to teetee on herself, so an apologetic yogurt shop stop without buying anything, all leads to greatness at the library. We showed up just minutes after a guitar playing children's author had started her performance. It was such a pleasant addition to our already highly anticipated library stop. I should hear no more complaints about my other stops from the back of the van the next time we venture out of the house.  The girls loved singing along, and I had a moment of brilliance while answering a question for the whole room. Do you know why Louisiana families eat read beans and rice on Monday? Well I did, and I enlightened many other moms. It is because Monday was always laundry day. Spending all day outside washing clothes by hand, meant you needed to cook something that didn't need lots of attention and could cook all day. Voila, red beans and rice. I had to thank my husband. He has so much useless information rattling in his brain and he sometimes shares it with me. So for our library visit, I felt like a smarty pants and the girls danced and sang.  I think the girls enjoyed their day. I forgot my camera and my phone didn't cooperate to take pictures. I am including pictures from our library visit last week.

She loves to read even when she gets frustrated with a word.  She just keeps on going and has great comprehension.  Woohoo!



Amazing!  I took a picture of her in her book section.  She usually spends her time in the chapter book section with her sisters.  It is very hard for me to convince her she needs picture books.



Do you see the nice stack of chapter books she brought me?  Thankfully I am a nice mommy and the librarian doesn't completely hate us.  I put all of them back.



Emogene loves to read.  It has rubbed off on Hattie, and I love hearing about her stories.

She loves mysteries and keeps the librarian running around finding more for her.



This is what Lydda would rather spend her time doing.  She asks me "What your name?" about 10 times a day.  She likes to write and draw and she wants me to make her L.  She then gets aggrivated if I just make an L.  She then tells me all of her other letters.  She can write an L and likes making them with any objects she can find.  

Chick had to come with us.  She is the latest must have.

Have a blessed week!!!

Ooh!  I had to mention, we went back to that yogurt shop later in the day.  I couldn't stand using their bathroom without buying anything.  We all enjoyed a waffle cone.  It was the end to a great day.

I Touched a Snake Today

I like to read chapter books to my class and then we have an activity to celebrate the end of it.  My all time favorite read aloud book is "We Can't All Be Rattlesnakes" by Patrick Jennings.  Emogene read it first and started reading it to us in the car and I was hooked.  It is an awesome accompaniment for Science too. 
To help us celebrate, a 3rd grader brought his snake, Bruce, for our "party."   Each student walked up to touch Bruce and got a picture with him and colored an award that said, "I touched a snake today!"  I only had one student that colored the ,"I almost touched a snake today!" award.  And although I was on the verge of a heart attack the whole time, I was the one that held Bruce while 20 students and a couple of adults came by to touch him.  We then made snakes out of clay and measured them. We completed a bar graph to record the lengths of our snakes.  After school, Emogene and Hattie got to enjoy one of the perks of being the daughter of a teacher.  They got one-on-one time with Bruce.  I am so glad I have a NO SNAKE policy at the house.  Eric keeps trying but I haven't wavered on it.  Surprisingly the girls really don't want one.  Yay!

Eric told me I already blogged about this.  Oops!  Sorry.  I had already typed too much to erase it.  I just couldn't.  I hope you enjoyed reading about it again.

It has been too long since I have blogged.  Our days have flown by as we finished another year of school.  Lydda is growing like a bad weed.  I cannot believe how tall she is getting.  Some of her 3t clothes are too short.  This is new for me.  Emogene and Hattie always wore the same size as their age or less.  Lydda is going to be a giant:).  Hattie finished second grade and left me sad and feeling like a little bit of me will be missing next year.  It was an unbelievable joy to have her in my class all year and see her smiling and sometimes pouty face.  Emogene finished 4th grade at the top of her class.  She works hard to do her best, and I am very proud of her.  She is sad to leave her friends for the summer and spend her days with her boring family.  She dreads the cleaning part the most.  I will try and make summer fun and memorable with some cleaning sprinkled in.  I will definitely blog about our last couple of months with pictures included when my computer starts cooperating with me.  I hope all of you have a great summer and treasure the joys it brings.