Emma turns six!

Six years ago we embarked on this amazing journey of parenthood.  It's hard to believe that our oldest now counts her age on two hands!!

Happy SIXTH birthday to our sweet, sassy, strong willed, creative, kind, inquisitive, social butterfly, determined, brown eyed girl!!  Emma counted down the days until her birthday for over month and is beyond thrilled to finally be six :)  She is now 46" tall (63rd percentile) and weighs 53 lbs (84th perc).  She wears size 13/1 shoes and size 6X clothes.  Several months ago we even made the swap from the baby area to the "big girls" section.  She definitely has an opinion on clothing and is not a fan of blue jeans or panty hose.  

Emma loves school!  She enjoys the routine, interacting with the other students, learning new things and rotating classroom duties.  She has adjusted pretty well to the early mornings but it has definitely been a little more of a challenge to get her motivated after having the whole week of Thanksgiving off ;)

She continues to impress us with her remarkable memory, reasoning and reading skills.  Although they haven't yet started working on this much at school, she often reads entire sight word books to us at bedtime.  

She had lots of firsts this past year including her first sleepover, kayak ride, home run and report card. For the first time ever she also had homework, caught her first fish, went roller skating and successfully mastered the monkey bars!

Favorites:

Color: Pink

Number: Eight (because it starts with an 'E' like my name!)

Friend: Alyssa
TV show: Martha on PBS

Day: Wednesday (because we have pizza in the lunch room!)

Outfit: My shirt with the sparkly numbers

Activity:art

Restaurant: Burger King

Food: shrimp

Drink: root beer

Store: Target

Month: Easter ;)

Thing about school: Centers
What are you good at: handstands

After dance class (on Tuesday) Emma chose to dine and celebrate her big day at our new local pizza place, Pizzaolis!  They even surprised us with a fancy chocolate smore pizza baked in their brick oven!  Yum :)

We are looking forward to her party this weekend.  Stay tuned!

Christmas Parade

 This weekend we welcomed December by attending our very first Trinity parade.....led by Big Texas Heat, of course ;)

The main street (hwy 19) was completely closed down and citizens crowded the area.  Even the firetrucks were decked out in lights!

It was Emma's first time to participate in a parade and she had the BEST time!!  She was so sweet to save a special handful of candy to throw at her favorite little brother when she found him.  Melt my heart.

There were plenty of festive entries but we are proud to report that the Jillian's Dance Center float won best overall!

Besties and fellow coach's kids Elizabeth, Emma and Vivian

Thanksgiving/Owen's first Aggie game

Happy (very belated!) Thanksgiving from the Smiths.  Yep, this is definitely the best family photo that was taken that day.  The kids were not in the photo taking mood and Jarrod had a massive sinus infection.   

It was soooooo nice that Jarrod and the kids had off all week from school.  We soaked up those nine days the best way we knew how.  We stayed up late, slept in late, drove into town for ice cream after dark, relaxed, and enjoyed having Jarrod around again!  We spent part of the break back "home" in central Texas.  Oh how it was good to be back.  We visited with lots of family, did some Christmas shopping, enjoyed a date night and ate way too much.  It was delightful.  Ohhh how hard it has been returning to our early mornings and regimented school schedule.  How long 'til Christmas?!?

On our way back to east Texas we made a stop in Aggieland.  Jarrod was excited to take both kids to a game.  His first all season and Owen's first time ever.  I dropped them off a few hours early so that the kids could enjoy the fun zone area (bouncy houses, face painting, etc).  They seemed to have a grand time, even though Owen slept through the game ;)

A little man of (a few) more words

Here is a short collection of the recent verbal growth I have witnessed in Owen.  You may recall the speech delay concerns we have had and this list helps me track his progress.  We have been delighted to hear new words, phrases and repetition lately!  Owen is developing such a fun and spunky personality :)

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On Fridays I usually wear the same fitted bright orange shirt with TIGERS across the front in rhinestones.  As soon as Owen sees me wearing it this is our conversation:

Owen: "Mama, why you wear dat shirt?"

Me: "Why do you think?"

Owen: "Eees game day?"

Me: "Yes!"

Owen: "Yaaaay!  Fubol game today!"

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Upon picking Owen up from school one day he showed me some Thanksgiving artwork he had made.

Me: "Owen, I love it!  Is this for Christmas (jokingly)?"

Owen: "No Keys-mas time yet (pause)....Omost!"

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We ran into Huntsville to grab lunch one day.  Owen is still a VERY finicky eater so we always just share our meal with him.  While enjoying french fries Owen clearly blurts out "Mmmm, delllllicious!"  His tongue got stuck on the 'L' but it was very clear how he felt :)

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We constantly face challenges with Owen at the dinner table.  Often he simply doesn't eat.  Here is how the conversation often goes:

Jarrod:  "Buddy, you better eat your food or you will be hungry later."

Owen:  "No me hooongry (while dramatically folding arms on chest and giving a mean face)"

Jarrod:  "Do you want to be like the football boys?"

Owen:  "Yeah!  Me get beeg and strong (showing muscles and proceeding to try a few bites)"

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Owen:  "Ees cold oww-kide today?"

Me:  "Yes, you need your jacket."

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Most days as soon as Jarrod returns home from work:

Owen: "Daddy, you bring home Ipad?"

Daddy: "Take turns with your sister."

Owen: "Me pay Ipad five more meenutes, fweeze?"

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This day goes down in history....on 11/15 Owen counted to ten on his own!  Music to my ears :)  We were picking Emma up from school and he hopped from tiger paw to tiger paw on the sidewalk counting:

"One, boo, tree, pour, pibe, seax, sesen, eight, nigh, teen!"

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Generally speaking, Emma and Owen get along quite well.  She is super proud that he is talking so well now.  He thinks a lot of her and enjoys when she notices his progress.

Emma: "Wow buddy, good job!"

Owen: "Emma, you nice!"

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My attempt at nap time one day:

Me:  "Owen, it's time to lay down and close your eyes."

Owen: (Lifting a curtain to look outside) "Yook, ees no nark oww-kide!"

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Driving in the car after the district wide pep rally:

Owen: "Why dat skew bus go dat way and dat one go dat way?"

Me: "One is taking kids to a different school."

Owen: "Uh oh -- dat skew bus go da wrong way mama."

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Since turning three Owen has started testing his boundaries a lot more! He also finds himself in time out more often :)

Me: "Owen, please don't turn on the TV."

Owen: "I wee-yuhl turn eet on and gotch (watch) my bows (shows) on tee-wee! (TV)"

Our mini cheerleader / Playoff bound!

Last week Emma attended her first Tiger mini cheer camp!  She was excited to cheer with the older girls during the first full half of the game on Friday :)

A new sweet Kindergarten friend, Emily:

Her favorite cheer was called "Tiger Rumble"!

It's a TIGER TOUCHDOWN!!!!

So happy that the Tigers WON their last regular season game (16-8) securing 3rd place in district!!  This is the first time in almost a decade that Trinity has made the playoffs :)

So proud of our Coach Daddy, his coaching staff and players!  They have made great strides this year and we are excited to follow them into playoffs this week!!

**TRINITY VS GODLEY FRI 11/16 @7:30PM at TEMPLE WILDCAT STADIUM**

Happy 33rd Birthday!!

Jarrod shared his 33rd birthday with Election day!  He and I actually got to go to breakfast kid-free :)

The kids pretty much wrapped (and unwrapped!) his gifts :)  His closet is now officially full of Under Armor clothing!

We narrowed our list down to ten top things we love about our birthday boy and attached them to balloons. (Thanks Pinterest!)  Emma loves eating with him and Owen loves throwing the football with him :)

We are sooooo thankful for the best daddy and husband in the world!!

Brunch with Santa

So we had a busy weekend!  Between the parade and game we took the kids to Brunch with Santa at the Jr League Deck the Halls event.

The kids loved creating a keepsake to take home.  I will cherish them forever and ever :)

Santa's elves came by our table to say hello!

Story time before Santa's grand arrival

Whenever there is music and a dance floor you know where these two can be found :)  Owen even asked an elf to dance (I think he wants an extra nice gift)!

Emma insisted on a photo with "the" Mrs. Claus

After standing in line for what seemed like forever it was finally our turn!!

Both kids asked for Ipads.  Later that day Owen asked Emma where Santa was.  She replied that he was back at the North Pole working on their Ipads :)

Let the holiday season begin!