JUNE....Well, June before last weekend.
Can you believe that this little girl is going to be in the FOURTH GRADE??? The kiddos school had a blessing and sending ceremony before the school. The ceremony is mostly for the sixth graders who are graduating from upper elementary and moving into junior high, but after each of the sixth graders have a few minutes to share their reflections, they give a small bouquet of wild flowers to one of the third graders, since they will be graduating from lower elementary and entering upper el in the fall. Miss Madeline was so proud.

I snapped this sweet picture as we were leaving the sanctuary to go to a potluck. What a tremendous blessing it was having these two wonderful ladies to nurture and love on my Timothy for the school year!

Mike helped with the grilling...he's the best there is ;)

Madeline having fun with some of her friends during the potluck. These two young ladies happen to be moving to upper el with her next year.

Check out these last day of school smiles!

Riding his bike after the last day of school. He happens to be patching as well. He's doing such a great job. It isn't fun to use his weaker eye, but he has been patching for over an hour a day now for the past couple weeks. (Some days over two hours!)

We've been to the park a few times already since school let out for the kids. They love this park right by the zoo in town.

Madeline still loves climbing to the top of this every visit...

...even though it's a lot of work, and has already left her with several blisters!

We went to the drive-in and saw Up! Loved it! Before the show started we played some miniature golf.

Pretty sure they weren't supposed to be climbing on this "mountain," but there was no sign...so I snapped a picture before I made them get down. =)

I'm really enjoying this business of having no classes to attend! I hope I haven't ruined myself come fall, but for now, I'm just enjoying summer as Mom. I'm always Mom, but Mom sans medical school is a lot more fun! I have some great pictures of this past weekend when we went home to Ohio to visit our family, so those will be up soon too.

-shannon

The Cruise
I will start by saying that vacation pictures are way cuter when there are kids involved. So, unfortunately for the blog, Mike and I went on a "grown up vacation" while the kids were still in school. Grandma was so wonderful to come stay at our place and take Madeline and Timothy to school (she even got to go to farm!) while we were away. I missed the kids so terribly, but it helped a lot knowing they were with Mom Renfrow while we were gone.

This first shot was taken the night we flew into Orlando. We went with some friends of ours from Nebraska who celebrated their 30th wedding anniversary this summer! So, we took them out for some delicious seafood to treat them for their anniversary. We got them another gift too, but that's a very long story.

Here are Rick and Linda on the ship the next day. They were total newbies. They put their life vests on the very first time the cruise director made the announcement that there was going to be a safety drill. ;)
They got the hang of cruising pretty quick though, and we had lots of fun. Our first port was Nassau, Bahamas and we rented segueways and took a tour. We watched Paul Blart Mall Cop the day before to get ourselves ready.

It was a bit overcast, but we didn't get rained on except for a few sprinkles, so it was a pretty nice day. Mike was excited to be somewhere with palm trees. I was excited to be somewhere he couldn't use his cell phone or check his work e-mail!

The food was awesome that night on the ship. It was a formal dining night and they always serve their best meals that night so we all had lobster!

Rick and Linda...looking sharp!

They wouldn't let me take a picture of them without getting one of us too.

Our server, Igusti, was awesome. Mike figured out how to work him so he could get the lobster and the steak, or the next night the veal and the shrimp....and so on. OK, if you must know I might have finagled myself the tiramisu and the "bitter and blanc" bread pudding for dessert one night. I just wanted a bite of both of them...how's a girl to decide?

Of course there was a towel animal on our bed each night when we got back from dinner. My favorite was the elephant.

After a day at sea, we made a stop at St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands. We took a jeep tour when we got on shore. Here are Mike and me in the back seat enjoying the scenery while Rick chauffeurs us around the island. =)

It was beautiful!

Some people took extra measures to ensure that the experience was properly recorded for posterity. ;)

We got behind a school bus and got to see all the kids getting off in their uniforms. It was pretty cute.

Back on the ship for dinner that night.

Did I mention the food was yum-o? Prime rib and veal parmesan....mmmmm.

HA! This one cracks me up. Because this picture is from right after we got off the ship at St. Maarten, when we realized that we had ourselves a cash limitation. Everyone was trying to figure out whether or not we'll be able to afford a taxi back to the ship if we take one to the other side of the island to look around.

No worries....we had enough. We rode over to the French side of the island and went to the open market, which was very cool.

This day held probably the best weather we got during a port day. It was beautiful and sunny and hot hot hot....but not as hot as Texas.

Awww....I know. We're so sweet. I told you vacation pictures are better with kids. Are you sick of seeing us yet?

SO HAPPY to be in a taxi on the way back to the other side of the island.

They told us that the Dutch side of the island was a lot cheaper than the French side, but the prices seemed about the same. I think the taxi drivers turn a faster profit if they stay on the same side of the island...

Ok, so this was supposed to be all four of us with the ship in the background...complements of Rick's long arm. However, after so many tries we gave up on the ship and were happy to just get all four of us. =)

Look at that...back on the ship for dinner. We were so good looking every night Linda couldn't help but take our picture. ;)

Someone ask Mike what time it is.

Awww...the swans the last night.

Even cuter now.

We are so awful....our steward took the divider out between our balconies so we went over to our wonderful neighbor's cabin and altered their towel animal display. Mike looks cute and mischievous...I look like I'm about to have a cow because we're not running back to our room. I think it's obvious who is more accustomed to getting into trouble.

Fortunately our dear friends were still our friends even though we had ruined the romantic display. Here they are on the beach back in Orlando the next day before we headed to the airport.

The best part of this vacation for me? Getting home to see these little turkeys! They're donning the souvenirs we picked up for them in St. Maarten...made in India, of course.

So...that was the cruise. I'm doing pretty well with this blogging stuff. Don't get terribly used to it. You know how I can be. ;)

-shannon

May
Ah, May. The sun is shining, the flowers are peeking out, and we take the time to celebrate mothers. Incidentally, it is also the month that my husband leans over during Hallmark commercials to remind me that I am not his mother. This awesome shot of both my kiddos is the one that graced our Mother's Day cards this year. I used to think that as the kids got older that it would be easier to get a picture of them simultaneously looking at the camera and smiling. not so much the case. We managed to get this one though...so no complaining.

Because I was done with classes, I was finally able to drive/chaperon for the kids' trip to farm. Every week, the kids take an afternoon field trip to a farm. They have science lessons, learn about the workings of the farm, and get some hands on experience too.

I went on a Tuesday with Timothy's class. Check this picture out...that is in fact a MOUSE crawling on the arms of my little guy...and that is a SMILE on his face!

Here Timothy and some of his classmates are digging holes for tomato plants.
Here's my little beancounter with one of the gals in his class who has been a good friend to him. (They really are counting beans.)

Here he is climbing under a tree to retrieve pine cones with classmates.

Timothy is doing an observation exercise using the sense of touch here. They were blindfolded and then a partner led them to a tree and they felt it. They were then led back to the circle where the blindfold was removed and they had to try to find the tree again.

Because Timothy has a summer birthday we brought a treat in to share with his class to celebrate early. This picture is fuzzy because the lighting was low and I didn't configure my camera accordingly, but I wanted to snap a picture before they finished their song. It was so sweet. Timothy held a globe in his hands and walked around a candle in a holder that looked like the sun. They sang a song as he walked around the "sun" seven times, to represent his (almost) seven years of life.

That was on a Thursday and it was that afternoon that I went with Madeline's class to the farm. Here she is with some of her classmates during circle...as well as some very colorful visitors.

One of the activities Madeline's class did was to find wildflowers and talk about the parts of a flower.

Then they pressed them. She loved this! She has been pressing flowers in books for quite awhile now. In fact, her teacher told her that she had noticed Madeline pressing flowers and it was her inspiration for this activity. My little gal felt like a million bucks! =)

Madeline got to dig holes for tomato plants too.

Then they went over to the pen to check on the baby goats. I believe they were about three weeks old at this time.

She was so excited when she came home from farm the day after they had been born. It has been neat for her to see how all the animals on the farm grow and change throughout the year.

The farmer also keeps bees. Here she is telling some of the children about the hives...

...and looking at and touching some real honeycomb.

In other news, May is the month that our little Timothy got his glasses! You've seen this picture already, but I thought I'd post it again. It was taken within an hour of picking up his new specs. He's been doing such a good job wearing them everyday, taking good care of them, and also patching. His myopia and astigmatism are so severe that he has a lazy eye. So, he wears a patch for (up to) a couple hours a day now.

So this was our May. Well, we went on a cruise too, but that's a whole new post. We'll see if that one makes it up tonight or not. ;)

-shannon