impressionable

When Lily first became a big sister she was five and a half and absolutely loved to wear clothes that matched her sisters. Now of course she wouldn't be caught dead wearing anything remotely close to what Ro wears. Mind you they have polar opposite tastes in clothes so that might have a little something to do with it.

Months back we were in Justice, I can't imagine why as I am not a fan and nor is Lily, when we spotted an outfit geared towards swimmers. Lily thought it was awful but Rosie loved it. She couldn't have the outfit only the top as the shorts were huge on her.

Last week Lily received that outfit for her birthday from one of her close friends on the swim team and oh guess what? It's the best outfit ever! Oh yes it is and she wears it as often as it is clean to swimming which is almost everyday as when we come it is wet and gets thrown straight in the machine. Rosie, who has been wearing her shirt on and off for months to swimming, has been told she can't wear it as the older girls are wearing theirs so she can't.
Ummm, sorry Rosie but I only just got wind of this one and the gig is up and you can wear it.

This was tonight. the 2 amigos...and the sister. 

The back of the shirts say, just add water.

Why didn't Lily like them? Because the lime green letters on the front are aparkly. Who knew Rosie would be a trend setter when it came to fashion, certainly not I.

Lily teaches a class

A couple of weeks ago my friend jenny told me that her daughter refuses to keep bows in her hair. So I asked her if she makes her own bows and lets Danielle choose the ribbons and all the glam for them. She stared at me blankly so I told her to go buy ribbon and clippies and call me when she had them.

Tonight the whole family came over for dinner and Lily taught Auntie Jen how to make hair bows. I cooked, Lily taught Jen, Rosie entertained Danielle, Evan made a project and Ed, god love him took apart a wonky electrical outlet and checked out my ageing front door for me. All told it was a win win situation. The house was absolutely buzzing.

After Jenny would show Danielle a bow she would literally gasp with delight and immediately put it in her hair. She ended up wearing 4 at the same time and I failed to get a photo. Things were nutty.

The table looked like this, Lily isn't a neat crafter and it makes my brain itch.

Holy mess from h*ll Batman.

Who knew it was such a serious business. 

Jen and I used to get the kids together all the time but then we started swimming and we never see anyone anymore :( We decided tonight that we have to get together more often.

The skating chicken

Today was our friend Trevi's 8th birthday party and she had it at an ice skating rink. Since Hollis and her girls are family to us, hey we choose our family, blood does not decide family in either household, Lily forfeited the 2nd part of her swim meet to attend. Trevi is another sister to her and she wasn't about to miss her sisters birthday. (those were her words)

Anyhoo, we all skated and had a great time. Thankfully Rosie is starting to get the hang of it and I am no longer being pulled down on the ice every 5 feet. Lily has mastered the art of going very fast but still has not mastered the art of stopping which is a bit dodgey to say the very least but proves to be hilarious. Her and Anlei took off with another friend and were frequently seen whizzing by.

For reasons that were not made clear to anyone, this particular skating rink has two people dress up in costumes and come out on the ice. One is a chicken and the other a penguin. The both do the Chicken Dance. It is hilarious and all the kids dance with them. Once the dance is over they skate around the ice once and then leave. Odd? yes I do believe it is. As the chicken was making his victory lap Lily, with the speed of a Ferrari, skated in to him and sent him flying. The poor defenceless chicken, span around, wobbled and then went down. Rosie and I just happened to be coming down the home stretch and saw it happen. It was a classic moment. We stopped so as not to fall on top but sadly the penguin didn't see us stop and he ran into us. It was a nasty feathery pile up on the ice.

A great time was had by all. We haven't been able to spend much time with Hollis and the girls due to our swimming schedule and their soccer schedule so just being together with them and the rest of the family was much needed.

Rosie hanging on for dear life

The skating chicken before the incident

Lily and Anlei after the incident. Lily can't even stand up she is laughing so hard

Don't they look concerned? Not so much!

Little Trevi, all the way to the right. I really can't believe she is 8.

Double trouble.

Ahh, Rosie's favourite part of the ice arena, the Manboni. 

Once the party was over the ice was cleared and Rosie suddenly came dashing in to our party room begging for me to come quickly because the Manboni was out there. The what? The MANBONI. I'm guessing that's the same as the Zamboni. She loves watching it polish the ice, I think it is her favourite thing about ice skating.

Birthday party fun

Today we had the wonderful joy of celebrating Emma Song's 2nd birthday. Emma is my friend Pam's little girl and baby sister to Adam and Noah. Unfortunately Lilipop is feeling under the weather so she stayed home with Dad and I went with Rosie. I received a text from Lily after an hour asking me to please come home, so I did. Lily lives life to the fullest so when she goes down she goes down hard so when I got that text I knew she must have really been feeling dreadful so I didn't hesitate in excusing myself and leaving there and then.

The party was wonderful and Rosie had so much fun. I did to. I just love to watch Emma as she has the most amazing facial expressions and she just makes me giggle. She is a wild child too and is afraid of NOTHING. Child just throws herself into life full tilt....literally. This makes getting a photo of her very, very hard. 

And the party begins And the birthday girl starts moving

Boing

Isn't she lovely?

Rosie in the spinning bucket. It span her pretty fast.

Smiley girl loves this place

Wow, so many bubbles

This ball pit was a huge hit.

THe birthday girl and her family

Isn't that the most beautiful cake? It was delicous

So much fun for all these little ones. Happy birthday Emma.

Mama's play date

 Yesterday me and some of my Mama friends had a play date. The kids all probably think it centred around them and that is fine, let them think that, all good parents let their kids think they come first, bwa ha ha ha ha. My friends Lori and Grace and I all met up at the beach. Lori and her familia are staying there for a few days and they invited us all up/down/across town to spend the day with them.

The kids played in the water and on the sand for hours and were dragged back to land only to eat. These kids don't see each other very often and they have quite a difference in their ages but that didn't seem to matter at all yesterday. I think the fact that all of our kiddies can swim and swim so well keeps them on an even playing field. Aged 5 or 10, it just doesn't matter as they can all hold their own in the water and can play together.

I made a decision to be loser camera mother as this was our play date and not theirs. I left all cameras behind. I also knew that the others would have their or at the very least their phones and would be snapping photos and I would be able to snag them.

I had such a lovely time, it was so relaxing and calming. Ladies, thank you. I left there feeling refreshed. And Marc, what a guy you are, all that girlie chatter and not a word, just that great sense of humour.

All photos below are not mine, I do not have the rights to them, they are all stolen cos I am a slacker!

The Hot Mama's.  Gawd did I really write that.

Lily and Ethan found a crab in the ocean and caught it in a bucket.

Lily, Ethan, Katie Starr, Rosie, Natalie and Liam.......the fun makers

They had such a great time on OUR play date.

Friendships and play dates brought to you by the miracle of adoption and blogging. Lori pointed out yesterday that we have been friends now for 10 years. Her and I met at a Half the Sky walk a Thon 10 years ago. Zoinks.

Horses and friends

Since I knew Kelly would be at the party yesterday I took our bathing suits with us figuring we would probably end up swimming....somewhere. I had no idea that we would end up at her sister-in-law's stables but it was so much more fun than swimming and if you don't believe me, ask the kids.

I haven't seen much of Kelly this summer which is a shame but Lily is a lot like me and sadly her and Kellys' daughter are no longer clicking and if Lily doesn't click she doesn't want to play, so to speak. I have given her no choice on a few occasions and explained that anything less than polite, kind behaviour will not be acceptable but I can't make the kid spend her whole summer with a child she doesn't enjoy being around. I'm not sure what happened because a year ago they clicked, not the best of friends but Lily would play with her and Julia is a lovely little girl. Just putting it down to different personalities.

Yesterday afternoon they got on fine. They both worked and I think that helped. They washed horses, mucked barns, cough cough, fed horses, did other things to horses and generally had a fabulous time. Sadly they weren't able to ride as we had had a storm the day before that rivalled few that went before it and everywhere was flooded but that didn't stop them having a blast.

When Kelly gave me the address of the farm I knew it was pretty far south but I had no idea how far south until we set out. It was way way down in the really rural part of Miami. As we approached the place Lily said, "wow Mummy this is like the country it's cool here". Yes it is Lilipop, yes it is. We even spotted an old style country store with an old fashioned gas pump and the girls squealed with delight as we passed a field of Texas Longhorns and if truth be told, I did too. I should have pulled over to take a photo but the GPS was hollering directions and I didn't want to miss my turn.

As soon as we arrived the lady who owns the stables was going to feed her homing/racing pigeons and asked the kids if they wanted to go along. Silly question. Just as we were about to follow Kelly said, "I forgot to tell you there are 2 dogs here". I nearly grabbed both girls and ran for the car but then I spotted one, a black lab so I quickly stuttered and stammered, what is the other one? and she said, "a yellow lab" so I breathed a huge sigh of relief and followed along with the black lab close behind. Rosie and Hannah the dog became best friends and went to see the pigeons. Hannah, Rosie and I decided Pigeons were for the birds (damn I am funny) so we stayed outside but everyone else went inside with them.....eewwww.

Inside the pigeon coop

Lily hand feeding a a racing pigeon

Rosie touching one that Chris bought out for her .

Ro and Hannah. Hannah has part of a fence post in her mouth. all day it was either this or an avocado, always something.

From there we went to visit the horses and the kiddies all went their separate ways feeding, washing and exercising them. The youngest two Jacob and Rosie didn't want to much to do with them. Rosie was happy playing with Hannah and Jacob was happy climbing trees. He then taught Rosie how to climb trees so they picked avocados together.

This girl needs a dog but this Mama doesn't.

Really friendly Mama with her foal.

Star

Moonshine going absolutely full gallup because Gabby had just bought out a mare. It was so beautiful to watch him run.

LIly: Roxie you are so tiny I can sleep on you.

thank you  for my bath now I will roll in the wet sand

Poor little pony got the longest bath in the world

Hey Grandpa, look at the size of this wheel barrow!

Jacob made a swing but Rosie wouldn't touch it because it was "eewwy"

jacob and Rosie pick avocados

By the time we left, after what was meant to be a brief visit, they were filthy, tired and starving. I stopped on the way home and picked up Chinese food and I have never seen either of my girls eat so much food so quickly. The fact that I made them get clean, and I mean really clean, before I let them near the food, made them really cross because they were starving. It was really a fabutastic day and we will be hard pushed to have another as great here in Miami any time soon.

Can we do this again and again

Today the girls and I were all excited cos it was their friends' Evan and Danielle's birthday party. We spent as much time as we possibly could keeping busy until the very last second and then we hopped into the car and headed over to their house. I was excited because we were going to see the movie, A Dolphin Tale and I haven't seen it yet.

Evan turned 8 and Danielle turned 3. Good grief this is amazing to me. We always mark special milestones with Jen, Ed and their kidlets and to see baby (cough cough) Danielle turn 3 just makes my brain itch.

Since Jenny and I have been friends for close to 15 years or something nuts like that we now have a lot of mutual friends so I of course didn't see one second of the movie cos I was talking, the whole time, big surprise. Oh and if I wasn't talking I was eating cake cos really I don't think it's just for kids. I am probably the only adult at kids parties who openly fights for a piece of cake and makes it quite obvious that I don't want a small slice cos I am NOT on a diet. Why does every female on the planet claim to be on a diet when it comes to eating cake? I seriously don't get it.

As much as I loved the party and the cake ( hey it was really good) the icing on the cake was seeing Danny, Ellen and Mikkel again and of course meeting Chynna. I had no idea they were going to be there and it was such a fabulous surprise. Lily and Chynna got on like a house on fire. She is the cutest little thing and so full of personality. Her and Mikkel are like peas and carrots they just belong together it is the sweetest thing to see. He isn't much bigger than her but he has her back already. Oh my gawd, be still my heart. He takes his role as big brother s.e.r.i.o.u.s.l.y. and she watches out for him too.

Party animals

Princess Danielle.

Somebody tooting her own horn

Looky .......how cute are these 2 little ones, and my big one. 

Lily adored her........it isn't hard.

cuteness x 2 

singing happy birthday 

And then a friend came over to me and said, do you think Lily and Rosie would like to ride horses this afternoon? And I said, really? Why yes I know they would, so we hightailed it home and Lily got changed and I will post photos of the rest of what has been a truly fabutastic day, tomorrow. Oh and why are there no photos of Evan? Have you tried to take a photo of an 8 yr old boy on his birthday at his party while he's all hopped up on soda, cake and ice cream lately? No, I didn't think so. I have some but he's nothing but a blurrrrrrrrrr.

Back in the pool

Kelly sent me a text this afternoon, just one word: Pool? I sent just one back: Yes. We had a feels like temp today of 105 degrees. The pool felt really good. It took a few minutes to convince Rosie that the pool would be a lot more fun that a bike ride but she finally agreed once we stepped outside. Luckily she is a fast learner when it comes to some things.

Someone takes her water guns very seriously

Jacob, he is such a great little chap

triple chicken fight

CANNONBALL.......sadly the splash is pathetic.

I wonder sometimes what exactly goes on inside Rosies head. 

Rosie's been practising her Royal wave 

noodle fun

I am really going to miss these laid back days once you know what starts. We got a message from there today saying that the kids have a meet and greet with their new principal on Friday morning which must mean that it is looming just around the corner. ARGHHHHHH.