First Day of School

I can't believe it is actually here, and I can't believe that I am so calm as I sit here typing this! ;o) We started the day off getting Syd to 6th grade at the new middle school! She was such a grown up about it all and didn't even let us walk her into the building!

An hour later, we dropped off Hayley to her 2nd grade class and Emyley to her Kindergarten class. Hayley has a teacher who is new to Minshew this year, and she seems so nice and fun. She also had a couple of kids from her 1st grade class in this class, so I know she will be fine.

Emyley was lucky enough to get the Kinder teacher who Hayley had two years ago! And her best friend, Nathan, is in the same class!! Of course, my friend, Joni & I are beside ourselves with joy!! LOL!!

And, now I sit here updating the blog in my totally silent, cartoon-free house! Whew! Wonder what I'll have for lunch......

Back to School with new 'dos!

Yep, the Mullen Darlings have new 'dos.....again! I had to take them in for their back to school cuts, and they each decided to get a new style. They are almost identical to each other, but they each have their own little twist.

So last Thursday night was Back to School/Meet the Teacher Night and we got to meet the girls' new teachers and visit their classrooms. And the PTA spent the evening selling memberships and spirit wear. It was a great night for all of us! Although, I think my family would like for me to re-think this whole Treasurer thing, as we were one of the last families to leave the building that night! Oh, and thanks to my hubby for helping out so much!! The ladies were all grateful!

Look Out.....Exploding Soda!!!

Yesterday, some PTA ladies and I went up to the school to clean out the PTA closet. This closet houses all sorts of good PTA stuff, including soda. Well, in the process of moving things around, 3 cans of soda dropped and 2 of them actually exploded! Luckily, I was not in the splash zone, so I just helped clean things up and didn't think any more about it. Well, for me, most weird things happen in 3s....I am weird, I know. So, did I drop a soda and get splashed? No, but a soda fell in my fridge this morning and my fridge got splashed! Anyway, I guess that is what happened as this is what I found when I opened the door this morning to get my Diet Pepsi......

Luckily, I had the fridge turned down, so the splash was actually icee slush and was easy to clean up...sheesh! No more, please!!! ;o)

Another New School & Picture Day!

Since moving to McKinney and Sydney starting her school career, we have opened 2 new elementary schools! Amazing, right?!? Well, the tradition continues (and stops) as this year, we open the new middle school! CRAZY! Wednesday was schedule pickup day, and we finally got a peek inside the new school. I have to admit to being pretty nervous about this whole middle school idea, as I remember how kids act (especially girls) at this time in their lives. But after being inside the school, and walking Syd's schedule through with her (all of her classes are in the same hallway), I am feeling more mellow about it all (Syd is too). I will continue to be on alert, though, as I know there are going to be issues! It should be an interesting journey to say the least! ;o)

One very cool thing about schedule pickup day, was they also took the students' pictures! Yep, picture day has already come and gone, for Syd anyway! YAY! I loved this, as Syd was able to wear something really nice and take a great picture.

Going to Pops

Friday afternoon we took off to my parents house to spend the rest of the weekend. They are redoing their kitchen, and my dad had installed part of the cabinets. It looks really, really good! We visited Ken's Pizza for my favorite Pepperoni & Mushroom Thin Crust pizza with Alpine Dressing on the side. Then we went to the new Super Wal-Mart that opened there in March. I did not feel like I was in Chandler any longer when I walked in! It was nuts!

Saturday, we made plans to go to Okla City so I could visit a store called Gordman's that my mom loves, loves, loves! It was a really cool store, and if I had lots of spare money, I would have brought home tons of my favorite country and americana decor! We stopped by Mimi's Cafe for a late lunch/brunch and then headed to a couple of other stores before heading back home.

My dad decided to bypass the Turnpike and take Route 66 home from the city. He kept trying to describe this new restaurant/tourist spot in Arcadia called Pops. Nothing prepared us for the real thing, though! It is essentially a gas station, convenient store and restaurant (think Target snack bar) with a pop bottle theme that is a huge tourist trap. They have thousands of pop bottles all over the store and had some interesting flavors that you could buy: Route 66 Root Beer, Round Barn Root Beer, Outlaw Orange Creme, Route 66 Black Cherry and Jack Black's Orange Stash to name a few. We were very surprised by the number of people crammed into this little space...it was very amusing to me!

Sunday, we headed back home and picked Chloe up from her vacation. Now, we just have to get back into the routine of things before school starts up in two weeks!

Tubin' Sumo Style

....continued from previous post/movie

The plan for Friday morning was to take the boat out on the lake and do some swimming and tubin'. The kids had a blast and Bill & Steve loved trying out their latest toy.....the Sumo Tube (my camera ran out of battery juice before I could get Uncle Steve captured in the tube...bummer)!

I do want to give a huge thank you to Steve and Keri for opening their home to us! We had an awesome time and can't wait to do it again! Thanks!!!

Enjoy the videos!

Grace & Sydney:

Gunter & Hayley:

Emyley & Uncle Steve

Bill Sumo-Tubin'

Gavin Stanley

Of course, I took tons of pictures and video of little baby Gavin. He was 5 weeks old when we went to visit and such a cutie!! Grace and Gunter (big sis and bro) have adjusted pretty well it seems, and their little dog, Charlie has become quite the protector! So, enjoy this video from SHE productions!

On the Road Again....Oklahoma Here We Come!!

For those who remember our Lousiana posts, I mentioned that my brother & sister-in-law, Steve & Keri, had a baby boy named Gavin on July 1st as we were driving home. They live in Missouri, so obviously we had yet to see the baby. We decided we needed to set aside a couple of days to drive up there and hang out, meet the baby, etc. They were so excited to have us come and invited us to meet them at their lake house in Oklahoma. Who could pass that up?

You know how I am with plans, and of course this time was no exception....all of our plans were changed many, many times! LOL! Getting ready just seemed to take so long this time around. Just getting out of the house was a chore, and we started out 3 hours behind schedule! ugh! But we got the puppy to her vacation spot, the cat settled in the house (she stayed home this time), the stuff all loaded into Leo, and we were off....finally.....well, after a stop at Aunt Annette's apartment for some things that the girls had left behind the weekend before! ;o)

The drive actually wasn't so bad, and the girls were excited that we had to drive through Checotah, Oklahoma (Carrie Underwood fans know what I mean).....okay, so I was the main one who was excited! LOL! No star sightings, but we did play her song "I Ain't in Checotah" when we left...we are major cheese-balls!

We made it to the lake around 4 hours later than we intended, and finally got to hold that sweet, sweet baby....aw (more pics and movie coming up next)!!

That evening, Grace and our girls swam in the lake and had a blast. When Gunter finally arrived home from football practice, the kids (and the big kids) roasted marshmallows and made 'smores. YUM! Then they settled into bed to watch Nim's Island, while the grownups watched 21. It didn't take long until everyone was conked out for the night....even little Gavin managed to sleep 7 straight hours for the first time!

Another Kinder Playdate.....

After a crazy summer schedule, Joni finally got all of us Kinder-to-be moms together for another playdate. We headed back to the park by the school, but this time, the kiddos got to enjoy the splash pad. It was a lot of fun, and a couple more kinder kids joined us! Can't believe school will be starting in 21 days!!!! eek!

Happy Anniversary to Us!

Bill and I celebrated our 14th Wedding Anniversary this past week. His sister, Annette, asked for a chance to spend a weekend with the girls, so we were able to spend some alone time together. It was so nice! We planned an outing to Frisco with some shopping, spa, dinner and hotel. Our first stop was IKEA. We needed a few things and actually spent a good hour and a half there!

Next we headed to the Stonebriar Spa for our "couple's" pedicure....which was actually a good thing after walking so much through IKEA! Anyway, this was Bill's first pedicure, and he already has said that we will do this every 3 months! LOL!! He really liked it a lot. It was a fun experience for us to share together.

After the spa, we headed just down the street and checked into the Westin Stonebriar Resort. It was a very nice hotel on a golf course. I was surprised at how many families were there since the resort isn't really in the middle of things. I guess that was the point....you really felt like you got away.

We had reservations at 6 for Buca di Beppo which actually turned out to be a good thing. We got there right around 6, and in the 5-10 minutes that we had to wait for our table, the wait time for walk-ins increased from 30 minutes to 1 hour! Crazy! Anyway, for those who don't know, Buca di Beppo stands for Joe's Basement. It is a family style italian restaurant that has no windows, so you feel as if you are in a real basement. The decor is very eclectic and the dishes/utensils didn't match. And the food.....AWESOME!!! I have recently started liking Portobello Mushrooms, and they have an awesome grilled musroom appetizer....yummy!! We ordered the Quattro al Forno which gave us a sampling of their baked pastas, including: cheese ravioli, spicy sausage stuffed shells, spicy chicken cannoli and manicotti. It was all delicious!! Can't wait to go back!

After dinner we headed to Super Target and picked up some pints of ice cream. We went back to the hotel, rented a movie and ate our ice cream. Sunday, we woke up and enjoyed the restaurant's breakfast buffet (yummy omelet) and then went on back home. Well, after we stopped at the car wash because apparently the front parking space at the hotel comes with the steep price of bird droppings....if only they had posted a sign before we joyously pulled into that spot the night before! ugh!

But, it was a great anniversary for us!! Thank you so much, Annette, for taking on our girls!! And thank you, Nana, for taking them all shopping!! I know it isn't easy having all 3 at once....you guys are great!!! Love you!!