2012 Canoe Trip

Well…. I guess that isn’t the correct title for this year’s get together!

 

Despite Aunt Jan being in the hospital, Grandma having Shingles, the worst one day rainfall in 70 years for Pensacola, and a last minute change of plans, we had a blast!

 

We held out on cancelling until the very last minute. Sometimes when it is pouring rain in Pensacola, Pace, and Fort Walton Beach, it is dry as a bone up here in the north end of the county. So we had hoped that the rain would stay away until the afternoon.  After waking up on June 9, 2012 in Jay, Florida and realizing that that was just not a possibility at all; the decision was made to cancel the canoe trip.

 

I believe someone tossed around the phrase ‘let’s just reschedule for another day.’  But since it takes us (the Rushing bunch) a good six months to get one Saturday where we are all available, that was just simply not going to happen.  After realizing that it was that day or never for 2012, we decided to go to Lamberts in Foley, Alabama since only three of the people that were going had ever been there.

 

Our lesson of the day… When you go to a beach town and it is raining, EVERYONE packs into the nearest restaurant and shopping malls! After waiting for a good 45 minutes or more, we were seated; all 18 of us.

 

 

Will is taking the picture. Without him climbing into the booth with the people behind him, he only got half of my face, Angela’s roll, and no Luke. And of course none of the kids were paying attention since they were talking 90 miles an hour.

 

I had hoped that Luke would fall asleep on the car ride and be ready to go when we got there. However, that did not happen. So of course, as soon as we were seated he fell asleep. He took about a 30 minute nap like this…

 

 

The waiters and waitresses came around and played their jokes on everyone by pretending to spill a pitcher of tea, mustard, and a pot of beans on people. I think Parker (from what I am told because I didn’t get to see him) had the best reaction of the day. That honor probably would have gone to Mrs. Brooks had she not seen what they did to Parker and been expecting it.  As far as I know the only person from our group to get pegged in the face with a ‘throwed’ roll was Graci (again… I missed it).

 

When our food came out this is what I ended up with…

 

 

I took the majority of it home with me. For those of you wondering, that is a bread bowl that the salad is in.

 

After dinner, we all braved the flood and went to the outlet mall. We found some really good deals and the guys all stayed outside on the sidewalk with the kids and waited (and waited and waited) patiently (and sometimes not so patiently)!

 

This was the closest we got to a canoe for the day. Although, from what I hear, a canoe is what many people needed that day to get out of the homes and places of business.

 

 

We missed Aunt Debbie, Uncle Bill, Donna, Logan, Kaden, Kelly, Billy, Aunt Judy, Uncle Ron, and anyone else I am forgetting that was unfortunately unable to go with the change of plans.

 

Thanks to the three Rushing families, Mrs. Brooks, Tina, Jamie, and Jennifer for the fun day! Oh, and thanks to the lady that we stopped on the sidewalk to take our picture. She probably thought we were crazy for posing with a mechanical boat.

 

Oh, and a BIG thanks to Grandma, Mrs. Joyce, Aunt Joyce, Joyce or whatever else you refer to her as for the meal AND for sharing her and Mr. Butch’s anniversary with all of us!

Isabelle’s First Piano Recital

Last night May 18, 2012, Isabelle played in her first piano recital. She was nervous but really excited. She objected to the dress and the curtsy, but did very well.  After hearing the other girls, she is very excited about taking more lessons (we were a little tired after a year of lessons).  She plays Love Somebody, Skip to My Lou, and I’m a Little Teapot.

 

 

I asked Anna if she wanted to take lessons next year and she said no because she didn’t want to do the recital. I immediately went back to my dance classes, karate classes, beauty pageants, and pretty much everything else that I did that required me to be the center of attention. I think the only reason I made it through band was because it was a group thing and I was never the only one playing.  I know just how she feels.

 

Here is a picture of Isabelle and her teacher, Mrs. Bondurant.

 

Anna’s 1st Grade Field Trip to the Zoo!

Yesterday, we went to the Gulf Breeze Zoo with Anna’s first grade class. The day was beautiful and perfect for an outdoor field trip. I was pleasantly surprised at how nice, and big, the zoo was after hearing people talk about it. I was not expecting much.

 

Here is Anna at the Gorilla cutout on the boardwalk.

 

Anna and Jazmyn liked the trash cans. Here they are in front of the zebra trash can. Crazy kids.

 

Here is Anna and Jazmyn posing with what looked like a white peacock to me.

 

Here is Anna with the peacock.

 

Anna took this picture. I thought it wasn’t too bad.

 

Jazmyn’s mom, Janey, took this picture of the girls. I don’t know if food was on this window or what, but that bear sat there for the longest time licking and clawing at the window. Luke just giggled hysterically when I put him in front of it. If you can’t tell, that is Anna and Jazmyn in the window.

 

I think these birds were sleeping. They were pretty!

 

Anna as a raccoon!

 

Anna, the tiger!

 

Anna with the giraffes. She took this picture for her sister. She refused to feed them.

 

Here are some of the kids in Anna’s class trying to feed the giraffe. You’ll notice that Anna is in the back not holding up her hand.  Because the kids were so short, the giraffe had to stick its tongue out about six inches to get the food from their hands. It was so gross! I really don’t blame Anna.

 

Anna and her sheep. She loved looking at the lambs.

She was willing to feed the llama from the cup.

 

These Siamang Monkeys were really showing out for everyone in the afternoon. We could hear them from all over the zoo.  The kids were laughing and hollering at them. It was quite a sight. Luke, however, was shaking and ended up pulling his sun shade down so that he didn’t have to look at them. They were about six feet away and were extremely loud. We watched them for a long time. At the end of the video, you can hear Luke try to imitate the sound of the monkeys.

 

 

 

It was a wonderful day! Hopefully she’ll have some great memories!

 

Oh, and I just have to say that I will NEVER AGAIN go into a bird house to feed birds!

Easter 2012

This year for Easter we decided to go to Nana’s house instead of making everyone drive to our house for the day. It worked out nicely since Sarah is on couch-rest while she tries to keep Charliegh from making an early appearance. We had a great time with all of the family able to make it (except the Bailey’s that live in Seattle).

 

The food was delicious, the company was good (and by that I mean we all got along), and the kids had a great time.  Nana had around 400 eggs for five kids; so there was plenty to go around and for the Daddies and Mommies to steal from.

 

Here is a picture of the kids chasing around the bubbles that were in some of the eggs.

 

Connor digs through the eggs looking for something good. And his daddy is no doubt looking for some candy.

 

Here is Anna showing off a pink egg. I am not sure why.

 

Riley is pretty good at hunting eggs.

 

Isabelle is helping Connor get some eggs out of the tree. She is always the big sister.

 

Luke picked up some eggs, but he was too busy looking out for ants. He knows they hurt and made sure he told everyone about the ants that he found.

 

Isabelle liked hunting eggs at Nana’s house because there was actually places to hide/find them instead of them just being thrown out into the yard like we have to do at our house and the church.

 

Before lunch we had a chance to take some photos. Here is Nana and Paw.

 

I think I already posted this to Facebook, but here it is again. Our family in our matching oranges this year. Luke’s tie was the same color as the girls dresses even though you can’t see it.

 

Here is Anna with her Easter basket (what was left by the time church rolled around). We had tried earlier to take a picture but she would not cooperate. Cried the whole time so we took these right before we went to church.

Here is Isabelle with her basket.

 

Here is Luke with his basket. By this point I had removed the candy so that the church clothes weren’t ruined. He just wanted to play with Daddy’s flashlight.

 

Instead of buying store dye this year, I made it with my cake icing dyes. They turned out better than I expected.

 

Last weekend we had the church’s Egg Hunt and here are a few pics from that day.  Luke found a few eggs.

 

Isabelle,  Jada, and Skylar go through their eggs.

 

Isabelle and Anna  show off their finds.

 

Mrs. Vivian, who normally runs from the cameras, was willing to take pictures with my kids this weekend. I had to share these. They love their Sissy!

Love this picture!

 

And here is my favorite picture of the Season. My beautiful babies. 

I hope everyone had as good of a time as we had this weekend celebrating Jesus’ Resurrection.  Please don’t forget that He Lives!

Luke’s Candy High

I have to say that even though I am not proud of this, we decided to just let the kids pig out on their Easter candy while we were at Nana’s house for the Easter weekend.  We got there Sunday after church and stayed until Monday afternoon (so really only 24 hours). But never-the-less, we allowed it. Then when we came home Monday evening we had a quick pizza before bath and bed time. During our meal (while Luke was still riding high from the candy) we tried to have a discussion about what  Luke’s name was, where he lived, and what are his parent’s names. This is the result of that conversation. Please keep in mind that though I know his attitude isn’t the greatest in this video we were giving him a little leniency because WE allowed the sugar high.  You’ll be glad to know that all of the Easter candy has been confiscated and is now being rationed (well, all of it except what their daddy is eating).

 

Luke's Favorite Show

Last night after the girls were in the bed, Luke was in a very active mood.  I guess he is just not use to being able to talk so much since the girls usually interrupt.  We started asking him various questions and he started talking about "Jake and the Neverland Pirates,"  one of his favorite shows.  He was talking so much that I decided to record a video.







Don't ask for a translation because I am not sure I could translate.  Perhaps Kate could provide a translation in the comments???

I just thought I would share it because Christmas was our last blog post.