Playing Catch Up

Once again I am playing catch up on the events in the Chavez house due to a broken camera. But Best Buy has come through again and now I have yet another new camera. So without further ado, here are the recent happenings.

She is her father's daughter
Amelia and Philip have started playing Streetfighter together. He always lets her win and she nevers passes up the opportunity to run it in that she is better at a video game then he is.



All about the accessories
Here is Amelia ready to go for the day. She needs a necklace, bracelet, keys, sunglasses, and, of course a megaphone (just in case people can't hear her). That was her concern, not mine, believe me.


Roller Derby
Last night I got to go to roller derby with the ladies that I work with for a Mom's Night Out. We have been trying to go once a month just for a little break and a chance to chat since most of us work from home now. It was so much fun. I was suprised how much I liked it. I am definetely going again!

Soccer

Amelia is done with indoor soccer. She did really great this season and improved a lot. She loves to be the goalie the best. She was really excited because our coach arranged for trophies for the kids in addition to the YMCA medals. She loved her trophy so much, she slept with it for a week in her bed, at least now it is able to sit on her nightstand instead.

Amelia's Last Day of School
Amelia had her last day of school on the 13th. They got to have an ice cream social. She was a little sad that she has to take such a long break from school. She really loved school this year and I just know that next year when she goes to the Pre-K program 4 days a week she is going to thrive.

She is the only child I know that can look mad while eating a cupcake.

Traditions

I always like to see the traditions that I had when I was a little girl get passed down to my little girl. Things like Madeline books and Peppy the Penguin are things that Amelia has adopted as her own. Another thing that I know the Mills' reading this will appreciate are pancake critters. I know you all remember, the little tiny drips that fall on the griddle between the pancakes and you just let them cook on one side before eating them. Amelia loves the pancake critters. I remember my mom always giving us the critters and am happy Amelia likes it as much as I did.

We Are In Trouble

Well we always knew that Amelia was too clever for her own good and now we have proof. She and I were going to play Candyland today so I told her to get the board ready while I folded the laundry. We started playing and miraculously every turn she got she pulled a character card from the pile, causing her to basically skip the whole board and win in about 6 turns. The little cheat stacked the deck on me. I obviously figured it out pretty quickly but I thought it was funny. She took a lot of brain-power to figure out how to stack it in her favor. I always thought that when she was 16 I would know the tricks that she would try to pull because I pulled a good deal when I was young but now I am pretty sure that she will come up with new ones and outsmart me frequently. But, to be honest, that is one of the qualities I love about Amelia, her ability to come up with and execute a plan. She is my little master manipulator and I love her for it.

A Million Updates

Ok, so I realize that I have been pretty lazy about keeping everyone updated with the happenings in the Chavez house. We have been so busy (and I have been so tired) that this is just one of the things that fell through the cracks. Luckily, everyone is fed and wearing clean clothes, I count that as a success. Anyway, here is the most of the activities for the last month.

Soccer
We signed Amelia up for indoor soccer at the YMCA. She really enjoys playing. Her favorite though is to be the goalie, she is really quite a good goalie and for the half of the game she was the goalie (on the first game) she didn't let in a single goal! She has really improved this season and will get right in the action and take the ball away and run it towards her goal. We have really enjoyed watching her play.


Goalie Throw


Good Stop Amelia!


A Little Distracted

Ready Now!

Mookie's Birthday
Mookie is the monkey puppet at Amelia's school that comes out to play every Thursday. Mookie thinks he is a real monkey so you can never tell him that he is only a puppet. The kids have made Mookie a house, food and all sorts of other stuff. For a field trip the class got to go to Ariel's Gymnastics and have a birthday party for Mookie. It was really a fun time, Amelia's favorite part was the rope swing. She did really well on the balance beam and also loved the rings.

Helping to blow out Mookie's candles

A Balancing Act

She is Tarazan

Just climbing

The rings

Jesus

Everday when we leave Amelia's school she asks to get her picture taken with the Jesus statue at the front of the church. I never have my camera though. Amelia was pleasantly surprised when I remembered it one day

The Denver Zoo

Recently on a warm, and very rare non-windy, day we venture to the Denver Zoo with our friends, Kathryn, Alessandra, and Marco. It was a perfect day to go, and everyone else in Denver had the same idea. We got one of the last 5 parking spaces in the whole place! It was a great time. Although 6 hours later, when we left, I felt every bit of the 6 1/2 months pregnant that I was then. I was tired for the next 2 days. Thank goodness I work at home, I really needed that extra hour of sleep that night.

Riding the carousel

Amelia and Alessandra

She chose to ride the Tapir

Mother's Day Tea

Amelia's school hosted a Mother's Day Tea. The kids sang a couple of songs and told us their new Bible verse. Then we all sat down for lunch and even got presents. We got a heart pin, jewelry box and a little card. The best part was the card, it had a list of "I love my Mommy because". Amelia's list was - "She helps me color. She says if it snows at the end of a school day, she will take me swimming. She reads me Madeline books. She gives me hugs and kisses." Needless to say I was teary-eyed after I read that. Everyday I remember how lucky I am to be the Mommy to such a wonderful little girl and now how blessed I am to have another little girl on the way. There is no better job in the world, that is for sure!

Standing with her friends

Getting ready

My beautiful present, probably the best Mother's Day present I have gotten so far.


Amelia's List
I have been trying to get Amelia to work on her writing. She really has been fighting me on it so we have just let it go for now. Amelia only will do things when she is ready but then she just takes off and there is no turning back. Today she had set up a veternarian office and wanted to make a list of her patients so she would know who to call next. She asked me to spell the words and she wrote them all by herself. I am pretty proud of the way she was determined to do it and I think it came out well for it being her first solo writing attempt. The list reads: Tree, Puppy, Frog, Bear, Love.