Gotta Brag Just a Little......

Okay, bear with me here.  I am having one of those proud momma moments and I wanted to share it.  If it is going to make you sick or you just don't want to hear about how amazing my kids are then go ahead and stop reading now, I promise it won't hurt my feelings!

Last night we got to watch our baby girl be inducted into the National Junior Honor Society.  I sat there listening last night during the ceremony and got to thinking about how incredible it is that we have two girls who both were nominated and selected for this honor.  To become a member you must be nominated based on your G.P.A.  I am honestly so proud of how hard both of my girls work in school.  There is no way their father or myself would have been nominated with the grades we got in junior high!  After being nominated, the students have to write an essay about leadership and fill out an application listing their extracurricular activities and community service hours.  Again...how did I end up with amazing kids that give of their time and energies and love doing it.  I am so amazed every day at what wonderful young women they are and I am so excitcd to watch them grow and mature. 

 Lindsey and her friend Maddie were both selelcted for NJHS.

 

Caity was inducted last year and this year her friends Baylee and Meg joined her.

I think it is only fair that I tell you that Mark needs to get the credit for they way they are turning out.  He is an amazing dad.  He spends crazy amounts of quality time with them, works tirelessly to make sure they are confident, selfless, and that they know how much they are loved by their earthly father as well as their Heavenly Father.  He is without a doubt the better half of our parenting duo and they would not be turning out this way without him.  So, I would just like to publicly say that I think my girls are pretty amazing and I think that my husband is too. 
Okay, I am done now.  Bragging over.

Hollywood Vibe Dance Nationals

Our family recently went to Las Vegas for "Hollywood Vibe" Dance Nationals, where the girls competed their solos and group numbers and participated in a 3-day dance workshop, taught by professional dancers such as Kent Boyd, Ade Obayomi, and Liz Martinez! We left Thursday afternoon and got back yesterday evening. We stayed at the Santa Fe Hotel and Casino. The actual competition took place at the Aliante Hotel and Casino. Scoring went from least to greatest; Copper, bronze, silver, high silver, gold, high gold, platinum.
Results:
Caity's solo (So Much Better): Gold
Lindsey's solo (A Mother's Prayer): High Gold
Group dance (Dreams): High Gold
Group dance (Butterfly): Gold 

Another School Year Over.....

It was very hard to say goodbye to this school year for a number of reasons.
Reason #1: I had such an amazing class. I had 24 of the kindest, sweetest, hardest working students. I am really going to miss this class.
Reason #2: This was one of the best school years Caity has had in a long time! Everyone had warned me about 6th grade and I went into the year a little scared. I was told that it would be a rough year for her, the girls would get mean and catty and Caity would develop "6th grade attitude." I am happy to report that none of that happened! This was an incredible year for her. She grew up so much and is such a responsible and confident girl! She won the speech contest at school, took 4th in the district speech contest, and was on Student Council this year. She ended the year with 4.0 GPA! If the girls got mean and catty this year I never heard about it and she never let it bother her. She has such a strong sense of who she is and is so incredibly confident in herself, I love that about her!
Reason #3: My girls are growing up too fast. I now officially have a 6th grader and one in junior high.
Reason #4: I had to say goodbye to a good friend and co-worker who is moving out of state. I hate that things are changing so much at school.

It still doesn't seem like school is really over. Maybe it's this crazy weather. It's hard to say goodbye, but I am looking forward to spending lots of time with my family this summer!

Lindsey's New Room

This post is mostly for the benefit of my mom and sisters! For Christmas this year, Lindsey asked to have her room re-done. Her old room was adorable but she was definitly outgrowing it. She wanted a much more grown up looking room. She decided on hot pink, black, and zebra striped. She received the bedding and a lot of decorative items (thank you Memere!) for Christmas. After the holiday we started thinking about replacing her furniture. Mark told me that as soon as I got rid of the old furntiure we would look at new stuff. I took some pictures, listed it on our church's website, and it was gone in about 4 days! I think Mark was shocked at how quickly it happened! We ended up finding the perfect bed and dresser for her! The bed has a trundle so we now have a place for friends to sleep when they spend the night! I repainted and we replaced the carpet while we were waiting for the new furniture. It is still not quite finished, we still need to add a few small touches, but she loves her new room. The trundle has come in very handy! Despite the fact that we ended up also getting Caity a new dresser, desk, floors, and bedding for her room, Caity has slept on the trundle bed in Lindsey's room every night since we got it!

Our Big, Exciting Weekend!

The excitement began on Friday morning. Caity was a participant in the school's Patriotic Speech Contest. All 6th graders at our school are required to write a speech on a patriotic theme. They then give their speech in front of their class. The two 6th grade Language Arts teachers then got together to decide which 6th graders would compete in the school contest. There were 14 6th graders chosen. They had to give a speech that was at least 2 minutes long. Caity walked up to deliver her speech without any notecards! She had worked hard to memorize the entire speech. She was extremely confident and poised and made eye contact with everyone in the audience. When she was finished an older gentleman sitting next to me nudged me and said, "Can you believe that little girl...she just did that whole thing without one single notecard!" It was pretty impressive. The winners were announced beginning with the 5th place finisher. When they got to third place and Caity's name still had not been called, her proud Papa turned around and said, "she won the whole thing!" Sure enough, our Caity is the school champion for the speech contest. On May 5th, she will compete in the district competition at the district office!

The next morning we were off to our first dance competition of the season. The girls both performed with their dance team in "Fame," and they each competed a solo. This would be Caity's first season competing a solo and she was very nervous! The team did great placing 7th overall in the junior division. Both girls did amazing jobs on their solo performances. They are what their dad likes to call "gamers!" Caity finished 7th out of 24 girls in her category. Not bad for her first try! Lindsey was in a more difficult category since this is her second year competing a solo. She won her age division and came close to making the top 10 out of all the soloists in her category! They are now working hard for their next competition in April. The next one will be the whole weekend and they will take classes from master teachers too. It should be fun!



The "Fame" girls!

Lindsey's trophy for her jazz solo.

Caity's trophy for her musical theater solo.

Proud Mama!

The 6th grade Speech contest winner!!!!!

Tis' The Season!

Basketball season that is! Liberty Basketball is in full swing. Mark's team got off to a rough start with lots of injuries but everyone is healing and should be back soon. My winter wardrobe continues to be dominated by red and black clothing. When I shop it seems to always be about what I can wear to games! I had a tshirt specially made this year that has his logo in bling! It is completely obnoxious but I love it! This next week will be a busy one with 3 home games. Friday's will be especially fun becuase the girls' dance team is performing at half-time!

Sorry Mom!

First off I must apologize to my mother and all of my other non-facebook family members. I always forget to update my blog because it is so easy just to post short updates on facebook. So, this one is for you mom!

The girls danced last weekend at Glendale Glitters. They debuted their new competition routine to "Fame." The first try was an absolute mess! The older girls went on stage to set up the chairs they use in the routine and they set them up backwards. The girls went on stage to perform and had absolutely no idea what to do. Their teacher and I were standing side stage yelling at them to turn the chairs around. I guess they never heard us because the music started and they started dancing. Unfortunately the messed up props threw them off completely and the dance was a disaster. They performed their next 2 danes beautifully and then at the end of the show their teacher went out on stage, explained the "technical difficulties," and let them perform Fame again! I tried to upload the video of them dancing but the file is too big. Mom, if you can get on Gene's facebook and go to my profile you can see it! They both still LOVE dance and both have solos this competition season. Lindsey's is a jazz number this year and Caity is musical theater...of course!