The Hospital

I was at the new Norton Kosiar Children's Hospital (thank goodness they built one only two miles away from my house) three times during the last 10 days of August.

It all began when I decided that my kids needed to be a little more independent and told Ben he could fix himself something for dinner before cross country practice. A can of refried beans, a can opener and five stitches later was visit # 1 at the hospital. Kosair was great because it was close, nice, clean and had absolutely NO WAIT. Huge bonus!!!

I was actually bragging about the new hospital to my friends just minutes before visit #2 occurred. This was an experience I will never forget, mostly because I am so grateful for the guidance of the spirit and the love of not only wonderful friends, but a compassionate Heavenly Father.

After that. . .I decided I never want to go back to that hospital again.

A few days later however came visit #3. Rusty and I were just finishing dinner out when Ben called me, and frantically said "Molly swallowed a magnetic marble." DAMN!!! (oh, did I just write that?) I called the doctor and of course she told me to go to the hospital. Seven hundred dollars (out of pocket) later, not only did we find the marble, but found out Molly never goes poo (she's going to LOVE this post in a few years:). You can see the mounds of poo in the x-ray. No wonder she had been so lethargic and GROUCHY!!! I was attributing it to all day kindergarten. A week of constant Miralax in her water and Molly was a new girl (btw, I made Rusty fish the marble out of the toilet when it finally came out). Ahhhhhh the joys of parenting.

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Swim Team 2010

2010 was Molly's first year on the swim team.

Rusty thought I was crazy to register her since he had witnessed her two months earlier, during spring break, unable to even get in the pool without a floaty or me holding her. But I was not about to let that deter my goal of having Molly be a proud member of the Glen Oaks Swim Team. I really wanted her to learn to swim, and another HUGE deciding factor was our swim teams policy: pay for three kids and the fourth one is free. I am all about getting something free.

Therefore, I went on the hunt to find someone to teach Molly swim lessons three times a week during the month of May so that she would be able to "pass" the tryout and swim the length of the pool by June 1, 2010. After paying a small fortune for intense private lessons, she was accepted as a Glen Oaks Gator. In hind sight, I wonder if the swim lessons were worth the free swim team season.

Our swim team does a lot of fun things throughout the season (these enticements are the only way I am able to convince Meg to swim. . .that, and promising her she only has to go to practice two times a week with one of the practices being the "fun practice". . .I'm just picking my battles:). They have a pirate swim meet where everyone dresses up like pirates, we have an Amazing Race party which ends with a pudding drop, and a great awards banquet right before championships (see pictures below).

Most improved for the 11-12 year old girls.

Molly Turns 5

We love having cousin Abbie and Grandma Thompson here to help us celebrate.

Mason is Molly AND Meg's friend. Mason asked that I take this picture of him and Meg. Too cute!!!

Another homemade and awesome cake made and decorated by Rusty. This one is actually cupcakes that we could pull off. Molly insisted on a bear cake to go with her "Bear theme" (her words not mine). She wanted a Build a Bear birthday for about a year. Molly is a girl who knows what she wants and rarely is swayed. No idea where she gets this trait, but I foresee problems with her and I in the future (in the near future:).

It was only about 102 degrees out. . .perfect playing on the trampoline weather (with 10 kids on the tramp at one time). I was afraid we were going to have heat stroke. Send your kids to my house.

The Dance Recital

Because of the amount of little girls that take dance at our dance school, there are four recitals in one weekend. Molly's class for example, as well as three other 4/5 year old classes, all had the same costumes and same dance. Therefore, each of these 4/5 year old classes danced at only one of the four recital times. The older girls in our dance school have less classes and because of this, Meg got to dance in all four recitals. I am proud and happy to say I attended every one of them! This wasn't the plan, and I was only planning on watching her in the first two (one where Molly also preformed), but I just LOVE watching Meg dance and couldn't resist.

This Jazz dance was to an older song called "Black Bird."

Sisters. . .ahhhhh

This age is the BEST to watch dance. They watch each other to see what they are supposed to be doing, and usual the dancer they are watching isn't watching the teacher and therefore, preforming the wrong step.

As you can see all three dancers are doing something different.

Now they've got it!

Tuckered out after rehearsal.

A second wind!

Every dancer must have flowers after the recital.

After looking at ALL those parents/grandparents/aunts, etc. with flowers to give their dancer, I had wished I had set up a shop outside the auditorium $$$$.

It was a great weekend with Meg and Molly's Grandma Thompson, Grandma Kathy, Aunt and Uncle, and Great Grandma (Grammi) all attending.