The Belly Shot

This is me and Kiwi, halfway through, on Mother's Day. Most of the girls have gotten to feel him kick, and sometimes we can even see my belly move.

Violet hasn't felt him kick yet, and she seems to be humoring me. She puts her hand on my belly for a second, then takes it off and says, "I felt him kick" (even though he didn't) and gives me an indulgent look: I know you're crazy, Mommy, but I'll play along. One day I asked her, "Is the baby in Mommy's tummy real or pretend?" She looked relieved and answered, "Pretend!"

Violet Octavia is 3!!

Violet had a lovely birthday. She dressed up in her Halloween pirate costume and played with balloons and ate Disney Princesses birthday cake. What more could a three-year-old ask for? How about a Baby Alive boy baby that shoots pee all the way across the room after you feed him his bottle? Good practice for the major change coming at her this year.

Twilight Obsessed

Eve and her friends got to go to a Twilight convention and meet some of the stars of Twilight. Her friend, Katherine (on the far right) invited five of her best friends to go to celebrate her birthday. This is Eve's favorite actor from the movie, Kellan Lutz, who played Emmett. That's Eve's friend Hayley on the far left. That's Eve to Kellan's left, looking like it's the happiest day of her life. Well, according to Eve, it was. In fact, all the girls said the same thing.

To be very honest, I'm just glad Katherine's mom took them so I didn't have to go. ;)

Give me a Z-O-E! (Two dots over the E!)

Zoe got her cheerleading uniform today. Isn't she adorable? It's finally starting to hit me that my baby is going to be in high school next year. Where did the time go?

Sophia and the Bee

Last night all ten of us headed down to the elementary school for the spelling bee to determine which of the fifteen top spellers in the 4th and 5th grade is the best speller in the school.

The bee was conducted a bit differently than I've ever seen before. Each speller stood at the mike and spelled his or her word, then sat back down. After the round, the judges told the kids which ones misspelled their words and had to leave the stage. Sophia survived round 1, correctly spelling "wary," but six students were booted off following round 1.

Sophia misspelled "benign" in round 2. She had absolutely no idea, and there was no way she could've sounded it out. Altogether, five more students left the stage after round 2.

Rounds 3 and 4 ended with none of the four children left correctly spelling their words. Finally in round 5, two students misspelled their words, and the other two correctly spelled theirs. In rounds 6 and 7, neither of the finalists correctly spelled the words, but in round 8, we finally got a winner!

Sophia, I'm sure, was a little disappointed, but she didn't show it, and, of course, we're completely proud of her for making it to the top fifteen out of two hundred students. That's nothing to scoff at.