Today you are EIGHT!

I know we parents say it every year, but THIS year you are both so grown up.  When I help you get dressed, I can't sit on the floor anymore.  You're too tall.  You have distinct ideas about how you want to dress.  The picture above is the ONLY time you will dress alike this year.  You get frustrated with me when I forget to "sign and return" the things marked "sign and return" by your teacher.  You have had BOYS call the house and ask for you.

We had some new things this year - you really liked our Myrtle Beach trip in April.  You had your first grown up concert, even if it was Barry Manilow.  You went to summer camp at the Y instead of a day care setting.  You have adjusted to a lot of changes at school this year remarkably well.

Things you love right now:

• Gymnastics
• Rubber band bracelets
• Any kind of art
• The "cups song" from Pitch Perfect

Favorite foods:

• Tacos
• Burgers (but not fries?)
• Ice cream
• Buttered noodles

Looking forward to fun times this year,

Your mom

Mommy's a slacker

Did the summer just fly by for anyone else?  It did for us.  The girls finished up camp the end of July, spend a week with grandparents and a couple weeks at home before school was right up again.

For their week at home with me, we called it Camp Mommy.  Each girl picked a day's worth of activities, and I tried to throw in some stuff around town we never got a chance to do because it's more crowded on the weekends.

In no particular order, some of the highlights:

The new Nature Research Center downtown:



Defy Gravity trampoline park:


FIVE hours at the beach out at Jordan Lake:



A day of play at Three Bears Acres:



Professional mani-pedis



We were all ready for school to start.

There was this time at Dance Camp...

The girls spent this week at the Y's dance camp, which is part of their summer sports camp.  So I spent the week driving them out to way west Cary every day.  They were off Thursday for the holiday but back at camp Friday.  It was great because they had an end-of-week performance, and I was able to attend since I was off work.




They did know some of the girls at camp from their elementary school, which was nice.  The group did eight dances for us.





And here's a video.  I had a few camera issues, so I pasted the clips together.



Then today we attended the Children's Matinee of the Brenda Angiel Aerial Dance Company at the American Dance Festival in Durham. The girls really enjoyed the performance and were just dying to get home and try some of the stunts in the backyard.

Luckily they had some activities in the lobby so they forgot all about swinging from ropes by the time we made it home.

Little Inventors

Back in March, Madeleine came home with a flyer from school in her backpack.  It was information about a camp to be held at school during the summer called Camp Invention, and it pretty much decided for me what we'd be doing for child care this summer since I'd have to find other things to work around it.

I saved up a box of recycled materials, and they each took a "take-apart" item to explore and see how it worked.  Maddie had my old desktop computer, and my brother's house flooded last week, so he had a dead one to spare for the cause as well for Lily.

They came home each day super-excited about their activities and wanting to go back the next day.  Lily points out registered trademark symbols *everywhere* we go and tells me what they mean.  They were excited about using real tools.  I've heard a few more big words this week, and I know they'll want to go back next summer.

It was from 9am - 3:30 pm, so I had to enlist my parents to do drop offs and pick ups.  Dad also attended their presentation of their duck launchers on the last day.

Makers

This past weekend we attended the Maker Faire NC at the fairgrounds.  Madeleine has been interested in inventing for years, so I talked it up as a way of seeing what other people are doing.  She has a lot of ideas and ambition, but not so great on the follow through.

Luckily there was space available at the weaving table when we walked up.



That got them started and we were able to take home the looms and project with us to finish.

They were also excited to see the Scrap Exchange booth, but since we'd been up there last weekend it wasn't quite as exciting.



It was very crowded, so we probably only were able to see about 50% of the exhibitors and didn't get to watch any of the combat robots.  Lily did like one of the robots wandering around that had cameras for eyes.   They liked the giant marble contraption in the middle but didn't want to help in construction.  They just kept picking up the dropped marbles.



We did finish our weaving when we got home though!

Performance Highlights

Lily and Maddie had their first grade end-of-year performance today.  I asked them to select which songs were their favorites, and I've posted them here so as not to bore you unnecessarily.  This is their first concert that they were close enough together where I could zoom in and get them both.

These boots were made for stomping

In case you don't know, we have a creek in our yard.  With no fence.  The girls have never wandered near it or messed with it without asking us.  All week Madeleine has asked about going walking in the creek on Saturday, so after helping us weed the side yard they did.



I was unable to find rain boots for Madeleine this year, so she's wearing a women's size 7 garden boot from Target (the smallest they had).



Guess who got deep enough the water went in over the top of her boots?