May Update...

Ok, so now the May update...

David graduated Kindergarden - wow what an accomplishment! :) He had a little ceremony on his last day of school, he was chosen to be a reader. He has come such a long way since the beginning of the school year. I didn't realize how much farther behind The Dunham School was academically until he started kindergarden. David was behind in reading and math. He was able to catch up and on his final report card he had all AP (above averages the best you can get!). The first part of the year his teacher told me he would rather hang out with the girls. This was a new school to David and most of the boys (and other students) already knew each other from being in Pre-K together. By the end of the year his teacher said he was best buds with the boys. On the last day of school I had planned a fun day to bring David to Chuck E. Cheese. He enjoys going there but we don't go anymore because Christopher is terrified of Chuck. The little boys were still in Mom's Day Out and I was looking forward to spending the day with David alone...until I got dumped! One of the boys in his class invited him to go swimming after the program. I have to admit, I was kind of sad that he would rather hang out with them instead of going to Chuck E. Cheese with me. I allowed him to go and offered to bring him over to the boys house but he would rather ride with his friend!! Since I was dumped and already had child care lined up for the little ones, I had a little pitty party for myself and then ended going to hang out at work.

David reading during his graduation program

David and Julie after his graduation.

David excited to go to his friends house after the graduation program.


After David was finished with school we decided to take a vacation before it got too hot and all of the other kids around the country were out of school. We packed up the truck and luggage carrier and headed to the Smoky Mountains. The kids and I made a list of things we wanted to do and things we wanted to see. The only thing I really wanted was to see a bear. We stayed there for about four or five days hiking in the national park and doing all of the touristy things. We went to Ober Mountain. It is a ski resort in the winter and in the summer it has tobogganing, water slides, ice skating and other amusement park type rides. All of us rode up the ski lift to the top of the mountain to toboggan down. When we reached the top Brad and I just looked at each other like duhhhh...what did we just do!!?!? We realized we have THREE kids and only TWO adults. Every child must go down with an adult. Something we should have thought about before reaching the top of the mountain. Even if Brad went down with one of them, he would have to leave a child at the bottom to come back up and go down with another one...then this really nice stranger offered to go down with David. Brad and Jacob went down first so they'd be down there to meet David and then Christopher and I went after to make sure she brought David. The lady was super nice! After that, I stayed at the bottom on the playground and Brad would bring them one at a time! :) As we were leaving Ober Mountain we saw a bear in the parking lot!! That really made my trip...I was ready to head home after that, but we didn't! :) After spending some time in the Gatlinburg area we headed over to the Blue Ridge Mountains in North Carolina for a few days. We went to the Biltmore (really cool!) and on our last day we drove over to bring the boys to Tweetsie Railroad, a neat amusement park that is railroad themed. They have a real steam engine train that goes around the area. In the beginning they had a cowboy on our car. During the train ride some indians came on horseback and tried to climb on board and steal some of our loot. Christopher and Jacob weren't too crazy about it, but the rest of us really enjoyed the train ride and being able to participate in the cowboy and indian show. They have all kinds of cowboy and indian stuff. The little boys enjoyed the rides.

Brad, David and Jacob going up the mountain to toboggan down...Julie and Christopher tobogganing down.

Tonya Harding just walked by :) Jacob (not happy), David and Christopher going to attempt ice skating

I had enough... :)

David and Jacob did too!!

Disclaimer: we were never in any danger...the land was flat on the other side of the fence even though it may not appear that way!

Hear no evil, see no evil. Christopher and Jacob did not enjoy the train ride too much! :)