A Day of CHEER!

I just made my first video using FlipShare. All my new tech tools are pretty cool.

The latest adventure!

I have a wonderful student teacher right now who is also a cheerleading coach at McNary. Her cheerleaders were having a cheer camp today and Kailyn got to participate. She was one of the youngest kids there. She was a little overwhelmed, but eventually got into the swing of things.

Tuck and roll.

Learning their special routine.

Part of the routine included a "sassy" pose. That is what they were calling it anyway. Kailyn would not do it. I asked her later why she just stood there on that part and she said it was because she was not "sassy"! So cute!

The final pyramid cheer and stunt!

Kailyn wanted to type her own message:
123456789010kailyn emmy78910987654321 rodli1234567890019875654321z

It has been too long....

6 months to be more accurate! I am a blogging failure! Life has been running away with our family. So much has happened over the last 6 months. Here is a brief run down of the main events thus far....

The majority for the fall brought about a new adventure for our family. I could say an adventure for me but really I could not have done it without the support of my family, and my teaching buddies at work. On November 7th I had gastric by pass surgery. That whole story of how and why and then the preparation could fill a bunch of blogs. Ask me sometime if you want to hear the story. Anyway I was out of work for 3 1/2 weeks and then life continued to move on. So far I am down around 80 pounds. Some of that weight was pre-surgery. I feel good and learn new things about my self and my journey all the time. And no...I am not ready to post before and after picture. Maybe with more time. :)

Kailyn is now about 1/2 way through her first year of Kindergarten. We have decided that she is going to repeat next year but will move to public school. She is academically and probably social ready to move on to 1st grade but she is so small and would still be 5 until April. Some kids start 1st grade at 6 almost 7. It does not make sense to have her always be 1 or 2 years younger than her classmates.

In December Kailyn was able to be a part of the large church Christmas production. She got to sing and dance along with a group of kids. Aunt Kelly, Uncle Ben, and Mimi (my mom) were also in the play. She looked like a cross between Shirley Temple and Laura Ingalls Wilder. She earned the "show stealer" award.

December continued to be an exiting month for our whole family. We were happy to celebrate the birth of Emmaline Elizabeth on December 28th. Kelly and Ben had their first child. I have enjoyed reliving the early days with an infant through my new niece. I think I can safely say that I have the most beautiful niece. One of the most wonderful experiences is watching Kailyn with Emmy. She is so proud and not jealous at all. She does not want to let Emmy out of her site. When it was time to return to school after Christmas break she begged me to let her stay with Kelly and Emmy. She promised not to bother anyone and said she would be really helpful to Kelly. She would hold Emmy so Kelly could get a shower. She cried when I said she had to go to school. Enjoy some photos of the new loving relationship between cousins.

The first time Kailyn and Emmy met.

Still in love!

Kailyn 4 3/4 with Emmy 3 weeks

Her latest passion is tap dancing. She started classes in January and can not be more thrilled. Her goal in life is to be the next "Annie". It is very fun to see eight 4-6 year olds try to tap all together without knocking each other over.

She takes her tap very seriously! Her teacher is amazing and has such patience!

There are many other things I could mention...Great Wolf Lodge at Thanksgiving, Christmas Tree hunting, my brother Ronnie's return from Afganistan and then visit to Oregon, numberous school programs for Kailyn, a very successful auction fundraiser for our Outdoor School Program, the stress of state testing for all teachers, the joys of having a great student teacher, new bikes and great biking adventures, surprise trip to the beach and finding a glass globe in the foam filled surf, and more.

Here's to the rest of 2010!

I will try to update before another six months pass. Really....I mean it. :)

Back to work with Awesome Technology!

Today was my first day back at work. Sad but exciting all the same! I have to return to work earlier than normal because our school received a VERY large grant to be used for technology. Unfortunately we are still waiting for our teacher and classroom computers, so today we talked about the grant and THEN...got to play with our new Flip video cameras. They encouraged us to play around with it and try it out. So of course the first thing I did was record Kailyn. I have wanted to record her reading for some time now. Here is the first attempt with the camera. It was so easy to use! A USB drive flips out of the top and it plugs straight into the computer. So EASY!

"Tomorrow, Tomorrow, I love ya Tomorrow..."

So lately Kailyn has had an obsession with the movie Annie! I loved it as a child and still love it. I thought nothing of sitting down with her one day to watch it. If you know Kailyn, you will know that she talks her way through everything, all day long. Annie was no exception. I was asked a question about every little thing about the movie. The tough scrutiny made me aware of a few things that I did not previously know or remember about the movie.

Here are some of the interesting topics Kailyn and I covered.

1. What is an orphan? Where are their parents? Why don't they want their kids? Why are they all girls? Where are the boys? Why is Ms. Hannigan so mean? These questions were all during the first 5 minutes of the movie! :)

2. Some of the vocabulary I needed to explain: pig droppings, smidge, drunk, billiard ball, Bolsheviks, lavalier, Punjab (who she was calling Pumba for awhile), millionaire, mikey pen, "blow it out your ol' wazoo", and more.

3. She has taken to repeating one liners from the show, such as the line Ms. Hannigan says near the beginning of the movie "gotta go bathroom". She also sings "no one cares for you a smidge, when your in an or-phan-age, It's a hard knock life!"

4. Now that she has watched it about 5 times she likes to tell me everything that is going to happen and all her favorite parts.

Just a little insight to my daily life lately with my own little "Annie". I have actually banned the movie for awhile because I was going a little crazy.

Disneyland - we went, we saw, we concurred!

We arrived in Anaheim around 10 am on Monday. We checked into our hotel and then walked to Disney. We thought we were taking the fastest route possible, but we were actually making the journey extra long. Kailyn was a little whiny but still excited for Disneyland. After we made it to the gates we quickly found where the strollers were located and off we went.

After a brief trip down mainstreet, we headed to the castle! Kailyn was wide eyed as she took in everything that was going on. There were people everywhere and strollers a plenty! The very first ride we took Kailyn on was the teacups because there was NO LINE! Everywhere we went there was a line but this time it was almost immediately onto the teacups. Mark got the cup turning and Kailyn did not want to stop.

Next we waited in line for "It's a small world!" It was so great that we were a group of 12. There were many rides that we could all go on together and often took up the whole boat! Kailyn loved this ride and obviously so did the whole family!
Here are some more pictures from our first day in Disneyland!

The beginning of our California vacation adventure!

We finally made it to California after driving...forever...at least according to the kids. We left Salem at 8:45pm Friday night and made it into Bakersfield at 11:30am on Saturday. After jumping in the pool and taking a nap, we went to get my sister-in-law Heather from the airport. Unfortunately Uncle Ronnie is in Afganistan doing a wonderful thing for our country! We will miss him on our vacation adventure! We went to our Aunt Sharon's house for a wonderful BBQ and visiting with family. The kids got a chance to run around and play while the adults could catch up. Kailyn made a wonderful new friend. A King Charles spaniel that was only 4 months old. It was a wonderful dog and Kailyn was very taken with her. I wonder how long it will be until we will be asked for one. Today we went to Church with our extended family then on an adventure to Target and then back to the hotel for more swimming. So far the trip has been great. Tomorrow we head out very early for Disney land. Kailyn is beyond excited and ready to meet a princess. Check back in a couple days and I will post more pictures and stories of our adventure!