Happy Birthday Hailey!

Hailey turned 5! She wanted to have a water trampoline party with her friends, and that is exactly what we did :)

 Hailey also wanted to have a water balloon fight. Early that morning, she told me her whole goal was to get me wet with a water balloon. Somehow, all the water balloons kept bouncing, so even when the kids hit me with them, they would bounce off and pop in the grass. Imagine Hailey's happiness when she got me with the VERY LAST water balloon :)

The crew :)

We had pink cupcakes (strawberry flavor?) since she wanted to save her birthday cake for her actual birthday.

Good friends always help you open your presents :)

We finished off with a dance party - those kids sure have some sweet moves!

On her birthday, Ken brought her flowers when he got home from work. Hailey was so excited to have her very own flowers.

The request this year - a crown cake. Here is my valiant effort

Ready for cake!

This girl is the sweetest, happiest five year old girl you will ever meet. She takes care of everyone, is a loyal friend, has a great sense of humor, and loves to cuddle up in my lap. It's hard to believe how fast the time has flown by, and I'm so happy she brings some spunky pink into our boy filled family :)

March Madness

Prepare yourself for a bunch of random pictures from the rest of March:  

One week for playgroup we took a trip to the stables - Colby was fascinated with all the horses.

We had to say good bye to Genevieve, who was off to a new post. The kids will miss climbing all over her!

Will's favorite way to unwind. And Tyler, photobombing.

Some mornings you just need ice-cream at 10 am!

We had our annual pi day celebration with the Garricks - Abby and I made the chicken pot pies, Abby made the chocolate pie, and Ken made his famous blueberry apple pie.

The perfect weather meant lots of opportunities for beach days - my favorite. This particular day, none of the kids trusted me enough to go out on the paddle board with me - they all wanted to go with Jess instead!

Jesper was brave enough to go with me - and we didn't even end up falling in :)

These two kept pretending they were going to take a nap...

Hailey, perfecting her technique!

I was finally able to convince my kids to go out with me.

With a move looming in the near future, I catch myself appreciating even more our after school days, playing with the neighbors, building lego creations, and any given day, having about 9 kids bouncing on the trampoline in the backyard and tearing through the house :)

This little ham is 18 months old and able to go to nursery during the last 2 hours of church. Unfortunately for us, he's decided he'd rather not go, and screams until someone brings him to us.

We had a 2 week long spring break which we spent in paradise - here! The weather was amazing, and our days were full with long days at the beach and the water park, playing with huge groups of neighborhood kids and other friends, and long afternoons at the park. Spring break has made it hard to even want to finish out the school year - we're ready for summer!

We also did some intensive swim lessons every day for the first part of spring break - every kid except Colby. Owen was so excited to start taking lessons - he still asks to take them almost every day!

Ken and the boys and some friends went to a car show and loved it. They got to see some crazy driving, lots of fun cars, and write on a Ferrari.

We kicked off spring break with a kite beach BBQ. Look at all those kites attached to brave people (Jess and Dan are out there somewhere!)

Crab hunting is an important pastime for those who are not kiting.

Ken was the BBQ master

Someone had to keep the little people from touching the BBQ. Good job Whit!

Marshmallow roasting - this activity is always more exciting than you think it will be - some small child is always about to step in/fall in/sit in/touch the fire. We all escaped unscathed (unless you're counting the mini heart attacks the adults had trying to prevent the before-mentioned activities...)

No fire? No problem! I'll just put this roasting stick through my foot! 

How old do you think the kids will be before they realize it is a bad idea to take a marshmallow out of the fire and immediately try to take it off the roasting stick with their mouth? We'll let you know when we find out!

The Great Storm of 2016

After much deliberating, we've decided we no longer want our patio table. Its free of charge to whoever wants it, first come first serve. We're even throwing in a bottle of Elmer's glue to help out with what would surely be a great family activity - a 5,000 piece puzzle :)

March 9: I guess I should back up - we got some rain in Abu Dhabi, which is always exciting since it happens so infrequently.

On the first day of rain, the kids had a half day at school, and since it was pouring when they stepped off the bus, they jumped out and made the most of it!

At 4am, Ken and I were woken up by the craziest noise, which we soon realized was HAIL bouncing off the metal pipes on top of the villa. I tried to get some pictures (I know, not super amazing quality...) Unfortunately, Colby wasn't as impressed and only knew something was disturbing his beauty rest, so he took quite a bit of time to go back to sleep :(

Will heard the commotion and wanted to touch the hail ("since it is almost like snow mom!")

We saved a few pieces to show to the kids at preschool the next day, since it was my week to teach. Will also got a second gift - we received a text right then informing us that school would be canceled for the day!!

The next day the sky was dark and we got some rain, but things were going on as usual. As I was finishing up teaching preschool, I noticed the clouds were growing black and the rain was really coming down. Sensing a perfect teaching opportunity, I told the kids to gather round the window to watch the storm. Unfortunately, it was one of THOSE moments - you know, the ones that look good in your head, but translate into something completely different in real life… At that moment, the wind picked up (60 mph is what I hear it hit), the sky opened up, and the world outside went crazy. Trees were snapping in half, the wind caught the umbrella on our table, and as the umbrella tapped the table, BOOM, glass exploded everywhere. Kids were crying, Colby and Owen were trying to climb my back, the umbrella was on the loose - complete pandemonium. I'll probably get voted off the preschool team for traumatizing all those poor kids, and every time Owen feels a little gust of wind now, he freaks out. It was the most exciting weather I've seen in my 3 years here!

The tree in our front yard didn't fare so well. 4 windows had water poring through the caulking, and my kitchen and one bathroom flooded. These villas were not built to withstand water! The kids got the next day off school as well, just in case of more rain. It turned out to be a beautifully sunny day, which we spent at the park :)

The table got the worst of it though. Any takers?!