Welcome Summer 2011!

Grace's last day of school was this past Friday. I am so proud of her - she has now completed 2 years of Montessori school fully immersed in Spanish.

First day of school

Last day of school

With Xochitl (the fabulous teacher assistant who greets us every morning)

With Sra Mayra (her teacher)


We rewarded Grace for a great school year with a inflatable water park. Both girls LOVE it and will be wonderful to have when it is so hot this summer.



We've also spent our weekend at the beach where we encountered jelly fish and a hermit crab. Needless to say, Grace spent her time building sand castles instead of being in the water.

We've also grilled a ton. Steve has become the best grilled pizza chef in South Texas. We also made homemade ice cream - yummy salted caramel!


Our plans for summer include Vacation Bible School at church, camps at Grace's school, trips to Hyatt Lost Pines and JW Marriott, swim lessons, and of course I want to expose the girls to city life so we'll be in Dallas for a few weeks too!

Happy Memorial Day!!

Grace's 1st Ballet Recital

While I had very low expectations for the day, I must say that at the end of the program I was such a proud parent.

Grace just hasn't really ever loved ballet. When we would do mommy and me classes in the fall of 2009, she would barely participate.

She has taken classes after school with her classmates for the entire school year now.

I would peek in the window when picking her up, and 79.5% of the time she would not be participating at all.

Sometimes I would think maybe she didn't have the chance to go to the bathroom after school (and before ballet) and that was the problem.

Then other times, I decided she hadn't woke up good from her nap.

But in the end, she did good.

We started the day by having Grace's friend Leighton and her family over for lunch while the girls had their hair done and got dressed together.

We had a wonderful lunch of chicken salad, pasta salad, fruit, ballet shaped finger sandwiches, etc, etc.



Ballet slipper cookies with the girls' names were a big hit as well.

Grace looking on while Leighton has her hair done. A friend's daughter was sweet enough to come do the hair for us.

Grace having her hair done.


Getting dressed



Her reward for sitting so still while getting her hair done? One of those cookies:)


Grace and Leighton at the recital venue.

Grace with some of her friends from class.


Grace onstage - she is forth from the left. Leighton is on the left end.

After the program, she was a little overwhelmed with all the people and flowers. Leighton's Nana gave Grace a beautiful basket of flowers. Leighton's mom gave Grace (and Claire!) adorable nosegays.



Aunt Anne and cousin Eloy came from San Antonio to see Grace dance and spoiled her with a Tippi Toes book and CD.

Lupita, Nancy and Baby Julio also came to see Grace. Claire loved sitting with Lupita and loving on Baby Julio. Lupita and Nancy have babysat for us since Grace was 7 months old and have become our family in Corpus.


It was a perfect day among friends and family.

We can't wait until next year when we'll have 2 on stage!

All Daddy's

Claire is in a phase where she only wants Steve. If Steve is home, he is carrying her around. If we are out to eat, she is in his lap. If she is ready for bed, he is rocking her to sleep. Bye, bye momma, hello Daddy!

Mother's Day Program

Grace's class had a special mother's day program for us last Friday. Each child escorted their mother to a seat. All the children sang 5 songs in Spanish. Then the program was wrapped up with a special breakfast served to us by the children.

Grace also presented me with a bracelet she had made in class. Over the weekend when she was going to bed one night, she started talking about how beautiful the bracelet she made was including the "purple and blue diamonds". We have never talked about the value of a diamond, but she must have picked that up somewhere :)




I am so blessed to be the mommy of 2 precious girls!!