LaPorte Family Blog

SWIMMING

2009-07-06T16:56:00.000-07:00

Shelby is learning how to float and even swim a little on her own this year and is loving every minute of her lessons. She asks to stay for open swim everyday too.

Tyler is swimming farther and better this summer already just after one session. He moved up from level 2 to level 3 after the first session. He even tried to swim with the flippers during open swim to help keep him afloat longer.

4TH OF JULY

2009-07-06T16:47:00.000-07:00

For the 4th of July we were invited to a friend's house for dinner and fireworks. The kids have only seen firework shows we have never done fireworks ourselves so this was definately an experience. Tyler loved all of it. As he was holding a sparkler his words to me were "Mom, look I have fire." A little scary to hear!! Shelby wasn't too sure about having fire in her hands. Once they started the other fireworks the loud noises scared her and she just wanted to sit in my lap and cuddle under a blanket to keep warm and plug her ears. After about a half an hour Tyler sat down with us and asked "When are the fireworks going to start?" I couldn't help but laugh. I guess he was waiting for the sky show so we had to explain to him that what we were doing was fireworks. He seemed a little disappointed that there wouldn't be any big sky fireworks, but he got over it quickly and we enjoyed the rest of the evening.

A FEW HIGHLIGHTS FROM THE PAST 6 MONTHS

2009-07-06T16:18:00.000-07:00

Tyler won second place in the Young Author's Contest this year for his book The Case of the Missing Dog.

Riding bikes...Tyler without training wheels for the first time and Shelby doing better at staying on the path.

Easter

Tyler's science fair project. He was trying to find out if lemon and lime juice could keep an apple from turning brown. He found out that lime juice kept apples from turning brown better than lemon juice, but that apples with lemon juice tasted better.

Shelby's dance recital. She danced to the song In the Merry Old Land of Oz. Her grampy and grammy brought her these beautiful roses after the show which she LOVED!!

Shelby's all finished with preschool and here she is with her preschool diploma. She is so excited about starting kindergarten in the fall!

Tyler turned 8 on June 20th. He had his party at Grampy and Grammy's house with a jumper again with 5 friends. This year we decided to have water balloon games which they loved, but I didn't get any pictures...bummer!

Thanks to many friends and family we were able to get season passes to Great America again this summer. Here we are getting ready to spend another fun day there.

CHRISTMAS MEMORIES

2009-01-08T07:15:00.000-08:00

It must be a new tradition for us to have someone sick for Christmas. This year it was Shelby. It was Christmas Eve and we actually had to take her to the doctors on the way to Grampy and Grammy's house because the night before she woke up with ear aches. She ended up having a double ear infection. Once on the medicine though she started getting better by Christmas day, but on Christmas Eve after opening presents she needed a little rest.

One of Tyler's favorite gifts this year which he had asked for many times was the Lego Castle.

He also got more Star War figures which he was excited about.

Shelby really wanted to get Pochantas because she was the last Princess she needed to complete her collection. It was in a package from Tyler, but Shelby was convinced that Grampy and Grammy had gotten it for her so when it was her turn to open she kept choosing from the pile from Grampy and Grammy. She kept getting disappointed when it wasn't Pochantas. So finally my mom said to me, "Can't she open that soon so she'll be excited about what she's getting from us!" So here she is opening Pochantas and saying "YES!"

Grampy and Grammy got Tyler a Sponge Bob bowling ball. In another post I will put the pictures from our bowling game with the new ball. They actually pulled off a little scheme to get Tyler to the bowling alley ahead of time to have him measured so his ball could have the holes drilled for him so he could bowl right away. Tyler had no idea.

One of Shelby's favorite gifts this year was her new cat which she has named Abby.

Another favorite gift for Shelby was her new doll house.

Here are Tyler's favorite gifts that he spent Christmas morning building.

SHELBY'S CHRISTMAS PROGRAM

2009-01-08T06:57:00.000-08:00

When Shelby gets nervous she plays with her hair which she is doing while she is supposed to be reciting a poem.

Your class sang a song about wrapping yourselves up for Christmas and I actually caught a cute picture of you wrapping yourself up.

The program was titled "J is for Jesus" and that was the last song that all the classes sang together and here you are with your "J".

They also did a play about the birth of Jesus on that first Christmas. You were one of the Angels. You didn't have to talk, you just went on stage as the first Angel who appeared to the shepherds. You were so cute as an Angel.

FAMILY PICTURES

2008-12-17T07:00:00.001-08:00

BREAKFAST WITH SANTA

2008-12-16T18:39:00.000-08:00

On December 5th Lincoln School had a Breakfast With Santa. We took a nice family picture, had a yummy breakfast, and made ornaments. In the picture above Tyler was trying some blueberries that were really cold and that's what the silly face is all about. Here are some more pictures from the morning. I will post our family pictures in another post.

FIRST PLACE

2008-11-17T18:26:00.000-08:00

This weekend was Tyler's soccer tournament. He played four games over the two days. His team played so well together and ended up taking first place. The final game was very nerve racking because we kept being up one point, then tied, then down a point and so on until we finally scored the winning goal. I wanted to post more action shots of Tyler playing, but there were always other players in the pictures that I can't post. So you'll just have to enjoy this picture of Tyler and his first place medal.

TIME FOR STICHES

2008-11-13T07:18:00.000-08:00

Tyler had to have his first stiches. He was in my classroom yesterday after school and was running around the tables after Shelby and slipped right into the edge of the table and cut his face right above his eye. It happened so fast, but there was so much blood that it was a little scary for me!! We rushed to the hospital just to wait. Luckily the ER nurse told us we would be waiting forever so she made us an appointment in Urgent Care. Which turned out to be a blessing from God because it was $160 cheaper for us to do that than stay in the ER. We didn't get a before picture since I was at school and really worried about Tyler, but here are some after pictures. He ended up having 3 stiches and this morning he has a nice bruise to go with the cut and stiches. He was so brave through the whole thing though!!

LET'S CARVE OUR PUMPKINS

2008-11-08T09:24:00.000-08:00

It's time to carve our pumkins. Tyler and Shelby each had their own pumpkins this year again. First we scooped out all the seeds. Then they each picked a design for daddy to carve into their pumpkins. Tyler's pumpkin is the clone trooper below and Shelby's pumpkin is Ariel below. It was a lot of fun and daddy did a really good job!!

Ariel

Clone Trooper

Harvest Festival

2008-11-08T09:09:00.000-08:00

Here is the Pan Clan. Steve is Captain Hook, Jennifer is Wendy, Tyler is Peter Pan, and Shelby is Tinker Bell.

We finally got the kids to agree on coordinating costumes this year and it was a lot of fun!!

Watch out Peter Pan here comes Captain Hook.

It wouldn't be a harvest festival without fun games. Here are Peter Pan and Tinker Bell having a duck race. It looks like Peter Pan is the winner.

Fall Day of Fun

2008-10-19T18:09:00.001-07:00

We started our fun fall day at the corn maze. The picture above shows you what the maze looks like from above. The picture below shows Tyler and Shelby at the front of the maze.

Here we are taking a break to figure out where we are and where we need to go next.

After the corn maze we went to pick our pumpkins. We didn't buy any this big, but wanted to have a picture with these big pumpkins.

Here are some more fun pictures from the pumpkin patch.

They have rides at this pumpkin patch. The kids got to choose three rides and one of them was the pony ride. Here are pictures of them on the ponies.

Young Love

2008-10-18T07:39:00.000-07:00

Shelby has made a new friend at school and "his" name is Nicolas. Last night at dinner we were talking about her day at preschool and we asked her who she sat by and played with and she said Nicolas. I decided to ask her why she liked him so much and her response was "because he is handsome." We all started laughing and I couldn't believe that she could be in love already at the age of 4.

My mom picked her up from school today and one of the teachers told my mom that Shelby will come up to her and tell her that she wants to play with Nicolas so the teacher will tell her to go ask him to play with her. Shelby says no I want you to ask him for me and asks all embarassed. This is so adorable that I just had to share it and have it as a memory that I can tell her about one day when she is older.

GOAL

2008-10-12T18:20:00.000-07:00

Tyler is playing soccer this fall. He scored his first goal of the season Saturday and it was so exciting. Of course I didn't have my camera with me, but I will have to post some other soccer pictures later so be looking for those.

Our little reader

2008-10-12T18:13:00.000-07:00

Tyler has really become quite the reader. As a summer challenge they were supposed to read at least 15 books and if they did they would be awarded a special medal at an assembly at school. Here is Tyler with his reading medal. He read way more than 15 books this summer. His favorite books to read this summer were Henry and Mudge books and Scooby Doo books. We are so proud of the reader he is becoming!!

Parade

2008-09-25T18:13:00.000-07:00

This past Saturday Lincoln school, where I teach and Tyler goes to school, participated in the Newark Days Parade. We were in the parade and here we are waiting for the parade to start. The theme was magic so the boys wore magician hats and the girls wore bunny ears to be the bunnies coming out of the magician hats. It was a lot of fun!!

Off to School

2008-09-03T18:43:00.000-07:00

Shelby is all ready to go to preschool. She has on her new Ariel backpack that she got for her birthday and is all ready since she got to visit on Tuesday.

Shelby goes to Kings Kids preschool and can't wait to show me her new classroom.

However when we got inside she suddenly wasn't so sure she wanted me to leave. So I stayed while she got started on her first project. She is in the Curious Koala's class and so her project was to color her own Koala for the wall. I reminded her that she needed to be brave like she learned at VBS and then she was ready to say good-bye to me. She is such a big girl now!!

Tyler's First Day of School

2008-09-03T18:21:00.001-07:00

Tyler is in Mrs. Trickel's first grade class and he lines up at this school bus when the bell rings.

Here is Tyler outside his classroom. He is in room 6.

Mrs. Trickel loves dogs and this dog looks just like her dog Tyson. However it reminded Tyler of the dog Mudge from the books Henry and Mudge that he was reading over the summer on his own.

Finally here is Tyler sitting at his desk ready to get to work as a big first grader!!

Birthday Girl

2008-09-03T18:01:00.000-07:00

Shelby is enjoying some of her birthday presents. She is wearing a new dress and expecting some rain.

When Shelby put this dress on in the morning she asked me to do her hair fancy. So here is my attempt at a bun. She loved it!!

Finally here she is on her new bike from Grammy and Grampy. It was scary to watch her because she didn't always watch where she was going and almost crashed quite a few times.

Church Picnic

2008-08-27T16:20:00.000-07:00

We had a church picnic on Sunday. They had games for the kids to play and Shelby won this noise putty and everytime she made the noise it would make her laugh hysterically!! In fact she went around making the noise for everyone. We renamed the putty "poofa putty"!!
Tyler played a game where he had to run down and put on all these items as fast as he could and here he is putting them on.

Rock Climbing Wall

2008-08-27T15:54:00.000-07:00

We went to a birthday party on Saturday and they had a rock climbing wall. Shelby and Tyler both tried the wall. Here is about how far Shelby made it up the wall. She just liked swinging down.Now it's Tyler's turn to start up the wall.
He's about half way there.
He made it to the top and rang the bell. Tyler and one other girl at the party were the only ones to make it all the way to the top. Tyler did it three times.

Shelby's 4th Birthday Party

2008-08-23T09:03:00.001-07:00

We had Shelby's 4th birthday party yesterday. Here she is with her number 4 balloon from Grampy and Grammy.
She wanted a castle jumper this year for her party and here she is in front of the jumper before all the fun begins!!
Shelby had lots of friends at her party, but here is a special friend that showed up. She wouldn't look at the camera though. This is the cat that Grammy has adopted and the kids love playing with him.

BLOW, BLOW, BLOW!! This year Shelby wanted Grammy to make her famous ice cream cake for her party for the first time. It was a big hit again.

Finally here she is with one of the wonderful gifts she received from her wonderful friends!! The party was at 1:30 and all morning Shelby kept asking when her friends would be there. It seemed like longer than Tyler's party which was the exact same time, but I guess when it's your party it seems like a longer wait. Once her friends starting arriving she immediately starting asking me to open her presents. I told her we were going to jump for a while, have cake, and then do presents. She didn't like that plan and kept trying to get me to speed things along which I did a little and they just had more time to jump at the end. However then she just wanted to take the toys out and play with them and she had to wait again until her friends left. She had to learn some patience and did pretty well!!

Vacation Bible School

2008-08-09T08:41:00.000-07:00

Tyler and Shelby went to Vacation Bible School this past week and had a blast. The theme was "Power Lab" and they spent all week learning about God's power and how he shares his power with us. They had fun singing, playing games, making friends, doing crafts, and hearing bible stories. Tyler's favorite part of the week was the game time. His favorite thing he learned from the week was the lesson on having the power to be thankful and that he needs to remember to be thankful for what God has given him. Shelby's favorite part of the week was playing on their playground. In fact everyday when I picked her up she wanted to show me what she did on the playground and I have picture below of her on the monkey bars. Her favorite lesson from the week was the one about Jesus giving us the power to be brave. After that day she kept telling me all the things she could do now because Jesus was with her and would help her be brave. Such as walking up the stairs in the dark or saying goodbye to me. Friday night they had a program where the kids could be up front singing the songs from the week and wrapping up all they learned from the week. Tyler didn't want to go up front because he had done it two years and remembered he didn't like it so much, but Shelby was very excited to go up on stage. So we went and Shelby was very cute up front and Tyler enjoyed watching from the audience. Here are a couple pictures. I have more that I wanted to include, but there were other people in them that I couldn't crop out.

Great America

2008-07-27T18:12:00.001-07:00

This summer we got season passes to Great America. In addition to the theme park with all the rides they also have a water park called Boomerang Bay. We went there for the first time last week and the kids had a blast going on the little water slides. Shelby kept going on this orange slide over and over again. Tyler was a little more adventurous and here he is on a blue twisting slide. We had a lot of fun and can't wait to go again.

Swimming Lessons

2008-07-27T17:58:00.000-07:00

At the beginning of swimming lessons Shelby had a death grip on her teacher. One day she didn't even want to go into the water. I finally had to just put her in and then she was fine. Everything her teacher asked her if she would try Shelby would just shake her head no that first week or two of swimming. Her teacher had a hard time doing much of anything since she wouldn't let go of her neck.

Tyler on the other hand got right into the water and would shake his head yes for everything his teacher asked him to do. He moved quickly from level 1 to level 2 after the first session since he was swimming pretty much all by himself with little or no help. He also wanted goggles so he could be underwater more without it hurting his eyes.

After four weeks of swimming Shelby went from the death grip to swimming on her own. She moved from level 1A to level 1B. She was fun to watch because as she was trying to swim with her face in the water her little butt would stick up. I tried to get a picture, but never could time it quite right.

Tyler got to practice diving during the second session. He really liked this part of the lesson. He really wanted to dive off a diving board or the starting blocks they had at this pool. He has become quite the swimmer in just a short amount of time.

Tyler's Teeth

2008-07-24T10:25:00.000-07:00

Tyler lost his first tooth on July 10th. It had been loose for almost a month and he was actually going to the dentist on the 10th. I kept telling him that the dentist would probably pull the tooth out since it was so loose and the big one was already coming in. So we were about 15 minutes away from the dentist and just pulled off the freeway when he said, "Mom...look my tooth just came out." He was so excited that it came out and that the dentist wouldn't have to pull it out. However we have to go back this Tuesday so they can pull out the tooth right next to it because the big tooth is coming in already too and it is big and needs some space. Then in a few months we may have to have two more pulled. I really hope Tuesday goes well since he is a little nervous and we may have to have more pulled in the future. He does have the visit from the tooth fairy to look forward to as you can see in the next picture. He got a special letter and one dollar.

Tyler's Seventh Birthday

2008-07-14T13:59:00.000-07:00

Tyler turned seven on June 20th. Here are some pictures from the birthday party.

This year Tyler got a Scooby Doo jumper for his birthday party. Tyler likes getting jumpers for his birthdays and having them at Grampy and Grammy's house since they have a nice backyard. Tyler jumps all day in the jumper with family and friends.

Here we are about to enjoy Grammy's yummy ice cream cake. She made one for us a few years ago and now for every birthday that Tyler has he always asks her to make him an ice cream cake. Tyler also likes to have m&m's on the cake too. It was a very hot day this party day so Tyler is exhausted from the heat and jumping as you can see.

Summer Fun

2008-06-19T16:03:00.000-07:00

Today Tyler and Shelby were having fun in the little pool and I thought I would try to post a picture.

I'm finally giving this blog a try...

2008-06-18T08:24:00.000-07:00

I have entered the blogger world. I'm still trying to get used to all this, but thought I would just jump right in.

Tyler just finished kindergarten last week and turns seven on Friday which I still can't believe.

Shelby is finishing up her first year of preschool and will be four at the end of August.

Here's a cute story about them. Just this morning they were talking about heaven at breakfast and Tyler wanted to know if there would be video games in heaven. You can see how he wants to spend his time this summer. Then he was telling Shelby that we would have new bodies in heaven that wouldn't get sick anymore. Her response was that she liked her body and didn't want a new one because she was already pretty. I'm glad she has no self-esteem issues!!=)

Anyway we are looking forward to swimming lessons starting at the end of this month and just having fun together since I'm off of work for the summer.

Hope to hear from other bloggers with some blogging tips, but for now this is my first post and I hope it was a good one. Next time I'll try to add some pictures.