BFF

Sienna had her first friend sleepover this weekend. This is her best friend, Jasmine, from her preschool. Of course, all of her friends are a best friend. The girls were so cute together. Sienna waited all day for Jasmine to come. I tried to explain to Sienna that Jasmine wouldn't be coming over until 4 or 5 but the concept was lost on her. I tried every way I could think to help her grasp the idea that it would be a while before Jasmine arrived. After a while I finally accepted that Sienna wasn't going to get this concept today and started waiting with her. So, when I found her parked infront of the window at 10:30 am looking for Jasmine's car, I plopped down next to her to look out for Jasmine's car.

Oh the joy when Jasmine finally arrived! These two girls ran around the house like wild horses for a minute. The excitement was really too much for their little bodies to handle, I think. Then they were off to Sienna's room in the blink of an eye. Within all of about 10 seconds they had touched every item in Sienna's room (Jasmine discovering and Sienna showing) and had even both been on the top bunk and back down again. It was pretty amazing, really. They both had so much fun even though Jasmine decided to go home at about 10:00. I thought she did really well making it that long. These are 4 year little girls and it takes some time to stay away from home. I'm sure she'll be back soon (considering that Sienna won't stop asking for her to come over.)

"Shane and David gave me a cow."

We watch alot of The Upside Down Show in my house. Anyone ever watch this show? It is aired on Noggin (my favorite children's network) and it's one of my favorite kids shows. The show consists of these guys named Shane and David who are brothers on the show. Like almost all preschool programs it is very interactive with the kids and they ask the kids to participate in different activities with them. What makes this show so great and different from the others is that it mostly consists of imaginary play.

As I've mentioned before, Sienna lives in an imaginary world. Her imagination is amazing. It is so intense and so real. We are constantly taking 'Abby' or someone else with us everywhere we go. Lately, she's had an entire posse following her around.

Sienna was watching The Upside Down Show this morning while I made breakfast. When everything was ready and Levi was in his chair I called the girls. Sierra came bouncing in with no worries. But Sienna was quite different. She came walking in very slowly with her head hung down and her arm stretched out behind her with her little hand closed in a fist (so I knew someone was with her). I said to her, "Sienna what is wrong?" She looked up at me with such a seriously disappointed face and said to me, "Shane and David gave me a cow." She continued to let me know that she didn't want the cow so I took the cow from her and put it into the pantry. She was satisfied with that but still very disappointed in the entire situation.

Bring on the Sun

My beautiful Sierra Rose. Where do I begin? She is such an amazing person. Sierra has this amazing 'sponge like' ability that not many people have. I give her life information and she absorbs it completely. So much so that the next time she encounters a similar situation she applies that information perfectly. She also has a tendency to be mini-mom, especially to Levi. It's so funny to be in the other room and here her say something to Levi that I do all the time~ like, "You better get it together, Levi". I use the 'get it together' speech all the time. Sierra has taught me more about myself than anyone else in my life, and she continues to do so everyday. I can see alot of myself reflected in Sierra. If I've been snippy and quick to get irritated with the kids she shows the same behavior. So when I find myself telling Sierra to have more patience with the little ones I am reminded to have more patience with all of them. I acknowledge that to Sierra and we agree to work on more patience together.

School is approaching the year's end and Sierra is get really exciting for her trip to Myrtle Beach with Papaw. Dad and Hilde are taking all of the potty trained grandkids (his & hers) to Myrtle Beach for a week. Sierra has gone twice with them before so she is really excited to get to go again. Maddie isn't going due to sport commitments and Sienna says she doesn't want to go if Mommy or Daddy aren't going. So, it looks like just Brandon and Sierra are the only one's going from Dad's side, but both of them are super excited.

As for Sienna, Levi and myself~ we're just looking forward to summer. We're excited to go to the Rec pool again. I'm just sooooo ready for some super sun!! If I close my eyes right now I can feel the warmth from a hot sun on my skin~ the way it feels like your skin is soaking it all up. Yum. It feels so good and I'm ready!

A Little Taste of Summer

Sierra, Brandon & I went to Kalahari last night. We had so much fun!! It was a little strange to only be the three of us though. Normally, I won't do one kid if they all can't go. How do you say yes to one and not all of them? I can't do it. But this time was different. Sierra worked VERY hard to sell enough Malley's Candies for the school to earn her Kalahari ticket. And Brandon received a Kalahari ticket from Grami as a birthday gift. These tickets are NOT cheap, let me say. One ticket on a non-weekend day will cost $39 per person!! Can you believe that?! I'm pretty sure that's more than a Cedar Point ticket. But anyway, you see why it wasn't really feasible for all the kids to go. But I still felt bad leaving other kids behind and thought about them the entire time.

Sierra has been to Kalahari a few times before but this was Brandon's first time going. Let me mention for those of you that don't know, Kalahari is an indoor water park and resort in Sandusky. I know that it's the largest indoor water park in Ohio and potentially the US since their recent addition. Even though I've been before this was my first time getting past the kiddie pool. I almost forgot how much fun a good water slide can be! My biggest dilemma for the day was 'how do I get any pictures'. Water and a digital camera is not a good combo. So we came up with the plan to head straight for the slides and larger activities and come back to the other things with the camera. I think the kids would have agreed to anything if it got them to the slides. Sierra and Brandon were exceptionally well behaved. I was very proud of them. We had a ton of fun. Here's a few pictures of the some of the things we did.

This is Sierra and Brandon attempting to hop across the lilly pads with the assistance of the over head rope. Not as easy as it seems, they discovered.




This is the one that I think they enjoyed the most. I never got a chance to ride it because you must have two people to ride. But they rode this one over and over and over. This was the ride that got the 'one more time'. It's called the Zip Coaster.








Here they are in line for the Zip Coaster, again.










I don't remember what this one was called but I'm calling it The Toilet Bowl. Because I think this must be what it feels like to be flushed down the toilet. It shoots you out of this tube and then swirls you around before dropping you into a hole. Notice the girl in the picture?

We didn't do this one though. The warning signs said you needed to be a STRONG swimmer and you're dropped into 6.5 ft of water. I thought that one might be a bit much for the kids. I'll do it next time!


And here's the Family Toilet Bowl. We did this one and it's pretty much the same idea as the other one except you're all getting flushed together on a raft. Please notice the raft in the picture. It's not small. It holds 4 people. It was heavy, very heavy and awkward. I didn't have the luxury to be scared about the ride because I was so exhausted from wrestling that thing up a million stairs that I would have rode it over a water fall just to stop carrying it.

It was just alot of fun. I want to say thank you to Brandon and Sierra for being the wonderful kids that they are. Thanks for a great time!

Here's a little video of the Family Toilet Bowl in action. Enjoy!

A Bus Ride and pizza too!

Today was Sienna's first field trip riding a school bus. Her preschool visited a local pizza place which involved about a 10 minute bus ride. When Sienna got to school on Monday she discovered that the kitchen play area had been turned into the 'Preschool Pizza Shop' and the kids spent all week taking orders, making pizzas and exchanging play money. They even made a HUGE pizza out of cardboard and paper with a thank you note for the pizza place which was hanging beautifully on the wall. The kids got to make their own pizzas and then toured the restaurant. They were all so excited. It was a very nice field trip.

Sienna has a great group of girls in her class. They really make me laugh. They're ALL so outgoing! I've made mention of these particular girls before, in the post about Sienna's Thanksgiving Feast. Remember how distracting my purple nail polish was to them? I made sure to have no purple nail polish today. Today they all seemed to have tattoos to show me. It must be something in the air right now. Even Sienna is rockin' one on her leg right now. I've never seen an entire group (class) of children that get along so well with one another. I really think it's credit to the teachers and type of program that they use. I am very pleased with them. Big thanks to Pine House Pizza and to the Western Reserve Preschool!

The Power of Communication

As I've mentioned before, Levi does occupational therapy every Thursday at Fisher Titus Hospital. He used to do physical therapy as well but has since mastered his physical milestones and is continuing to develop at a 'normal' rate. I was hoping that Speech would be the one therapy that Levi didn't need. However, he won't be skimping out on any therapy sessions. He needs some speech help. He says a few words~ Mama, Dada, Hi, Go and ever so occasionally Bye. Levi is 19 months old now and should be say more than this. He doesn't even say Uh-Oh. I talked to his occupational therapist about it and she agrees that Levi should start in speech therapy. However, there's a HUGE waiting list to get in Speech at FTMC. I think he is like number 27 on the list, right now.

I tried going through the Early Intervention program (which is the program we started on when Levi was 4 weeks old before being referred to FTMC for therapy at 10 months) but all they offer right now is group sessions. After going to one hour long speech group session, that felt an awful lot like an extended OT session, I couldn't bring myself to go to another one. I've been to alot of therapy sessions but that one was by far the most difficult to deal with. Some sessions are extremely difficult and tiring when Levi is in one of his moods. If he doesn't want to do it then he just won't do it. 'Just won't do it' doesn't happen at therapy. If he won't do something then the therapist and I physically hold him in the situation and make his arms and hands do the action we wanted. As you can imagine, Levi gets extremely upset about this and screams and hollers. But we tell him how wonderful he has done and I give him a hug and he settles right down and gets back to playing. On a real bad day we can have about 6 or 7 'fits' during a 30 minute OT session. However, we haven't had a real bad day in quite a while. Levi is even doing 45 minute sessions now instead of just 30. He hasn't even had a 'fit' for at least a good month now. Progress is finally starting show!!

So, we're still waiting for the speech to come through. But in the meantime, his occupational therapist gives me some good ideas to work on at home. One of the things she has suggested is teaching Levi some sign language. The thing that I am most worried about is that his lack of communication abilities will result in frustration and fits. He's already gotten upset with me a few times because I just didn't know what he wanted. So, we're trying a few words of the sign language and he is doing really well with it. He can say please, thank you, eat and more. When I walked into his room he was standing in his crib and looked right at me and said 'Mama' and then he said 'eat' with his sign language. It's really amazing to see him use the sign language without being prompted to. I know that he will talk eventually but the sign language will give him the ability to communicate with us while we wait.


Here's a little video of Levi running around this morning in his diaper. The middle of the video gets a little dark when Levi runs to the living room but it just lasts a couple of seconds. He can't stay still for long.

The Hostess with the Mostess

This is a picture of Sienna playing with her new tea set. This is probably about Sienna's 50th tea set over her little 4 years. The girl has a serious love for some tea sets, followed closely by anything kitchen play. That's because she loves to care and tend to people. Not only will she serve you your tea but she'll also, gladly, make you something to eat with it. This picture only shows the new tea set, not any of the older ones that came to the table as her tea party quickly grew. I know that all this is pretty normal typical 4 year old girl stuff but I am still amazed by her. As we played tea set this afternoon she was absolutely mesmerizing. I sat there, drinking my tea and eating my bologna sandwich (made from a doll house door and a plastic Easter egg), and I just watched her tend to her guests with such care and concern for their individual desire. They each got individual time with Sienna to tell what they would like and she accommodated each one accordingly. It really didn't matter that it was all imaginary and the guests were 2 Dora dolls and a water baby. As the party was winding down, Sienna decided that it was time to put all the babies to bed. Then it was time to wash all the dishes. Her detail is remarkable. Nothing is missing, not even one little step. My bologna sandwich even had mayo on it, because Sienna said it just doesn't taste as good without it. Watching Sienna today makes me want to tell everyone~ take the time to notice our kids. Not just play with them, not just keep them safe, not just provide for them, but to really notice them~ their small details, the little things because that's where the true magic is.

Easter Dinner

I am so totally full! I couldn't tell you the last time I ate so much. I don't know what was wrong with me today, but I ate like a pig. I just couldn't get enough. I said that I felt like a refugee who just came home to their first meal in years! How pathetic is that?! Everything just tasted soooo good. I don't think there was one thing at the table that didn't taste FABULOUS to me! I probably could have ate my plate. I was terrible. I guess that'll be an extra day at the gym this week! (lol, ha-ha, lol)

So, obviously I very much enjoyed dinner at Shell's with Mom. The kids always have a great time whenever we go to Shell's house. Even Levi knows~ as soon as pulled in the drive he started grunting and pointing at the house. It's always fun at Aunt Shell's. Heather and Casey came too and she is so adorable right now. She's 12 weeks from having her first baby so I'm sure she's not feeling adorable but she looks it. If you don't know who Heather is, she is Shell's stepdaughter and she is super tiny petite. But now she's got a nice round baby bump. Usually when I see those super skinny girls who are pregnant and don't like them (even though I do not know them) because I know they're going to pop out that baby and go straight home and pull out those size zero jeans and slip right back into them. Meanwhile, I'd give my left leg to see a size 10 again! But with Heather that's not the case. I suppose since I love her so much that doesn't anger (make me soooooooo incredibly jealous) me as it normally does. I'm so happy for her and I can't wait to see that new baby!!

It was just a really nice day. As I was helping Sienna take off her Easter dress for jamey time she says to me, "I had a really fun time wearing that dress today with my tights". That simple little statement almost made me cry. It was an awesome day that has left me feeling extremely blessed. I hope that all of you had as nice a Easter as I did.

Happy Easter!!

Happy Easter everyone! The kids were up bright and early this morning asking if the Easter Bunny came. As soon as we got to the bottom of the stairs Sienna was already looking for the eggs. Sierra, of course, was already on the hunt. Levi went straight for the baskets. I was anticipating this holiday to be a good one for Levi. I figured with a basket full of goodies just for him, it was bound to be a favorite. The first thing on Sienna's mind after getting that Baby Bottle Pop open was, "are we going to go to church now?". She couldn't wait to get all dressed up. Sierra, of course, was the first one dressed (accessories included) and ready to go. Any legitimate reason to get all dolled up and Sierra is all over it.

We went to Steve Payne's church and it was absolutely beautiful. The service was lovely. I think that Steve Payne might be the one and only person that I could actually sit and listen to all day. His sermons never seem long to me and the end always comes by surprise somehow. As for Levi, he went in the nursery today!! And stayed!! Yeah! I was a little worried that he wouldn't stay but once we got to the nursery all my worries went away. There was about 10 little boys and zero girls. Levi was absolutely thrilled!

That was our Easter morning and now we're heading over to Shell's for dinner with Mom. I'll have more pictures and another post later. Happy Easter everyone!

Here's Come Peter Cottantail

The family colored our Easter eggs tonight. It was alot of fun. And believe it or not, no one spilled anything!! I thought that was pretty amazing. Everyone got their own full set of colors and an equal number of eggs to color. Daddy and Levi had to share their eggs and coloring for obvious reasons.

Having 3 kids is alot of work but it has some benefits. I get to experience the holidays (or any event) through each of their eyes. Sierra is 8 now and she is definitely at that tweeny stage. Which is an awesome place to be for her, but that fresh eyed wonder is gone. Don't get me wrong, she still experiences that fresh eyed wonder from time to time (like the other day when we were looking at some heels at Payless). But it is replaced by understanding and knowledge which leads to an innocent wisdom that is so amazing to see in your child. Sierra understands the reasons behind our holidays now. The eggs and goodies are just a bonus. She doesn't just rush through her eggs anymore. She takes her time and is creative with them.

This of course led to a breakdown for Sienna when she ran out of eggs first. She insisted that Sierra got more eggs than she did. Why does someone always think someone else is getting more or better? But overall Sienna had a blast coloring eggs. She was so very careful with each and everyone one of her eggs. I wrote on some of the eggs with a white crayon ahead of time and she was so excited when she pulled an egg out of her pink dye and saw her name on it. Again, that fresh eyed wonder is so amazing.

As for Levi, I think he colored one egg the entire time. It turned out a beautiful shade of orange. I think this picture of Levi has captured that fresh eyed wonder I was talking about. (He's not crying, it's sheer excitement and wonder with a shutter delay from the camera.) We put him in his high chair and gave him the cup of orange coloring and an egg. He knew exactly what to do. That egg went straight in the cup with no hesitation. He sat there looking at the egg in the cup and then at us. He finally reached back into the cup to get the egg and was sooooooooo totally shocked to discover that the egg was now orange. It was the funniest thing I've seen for quite a while. After a bit Dave tried to get the egg from Levi. Levi wasn't happy about this. He SCREAMED and was diligently trying to get to his egg back. Dave quickly gave him a new egg and all was okay. The new egg went into the dye and came out orange so Levi was happy again. Levi dunked and retrieved his egg over and over and over and over again. His hand was a darker shade of orange than our pumpkins from Halloween. His arm was orange all the way up past his elbow. Needless to say, Levi did not enjoy clean up time.

I hope all of you have a wonderful Easter holiday filled with lots of love and family!!

Ouch

This is a picture of the steps that I walk up and down every day upon exiting or entering my home. I love our new house so very much in so many ways; however, I hate these steps! I'm not sure what it is about these particular steps but they've got me scared to death to leave the house. I have fallen down these steps TWICE. That's right, not once but TWICE. We've only lived here a month and I've fallen down the same steps TWICE. Most people would learn after the first fall, but not me.

The first fall was on Levi's therapy day two weeks ago. I knew the steps were icy. I had already warned Levi's Help Me Grow caseworker about the ice on the steps as she was leaving (approx. 30 minutes before my fall). I ran out to the van to start it up so that Levi and I could jump right into a nice warm ride. I opened the door and took one step out and before I could blink my eye I was sitting at the bottom on my butt and feeling much pain. I was more stunned than anything else. I haven't fallen because of ice in years. I was a little stunned that I had actually just fallen. Then I started to become very aware of the excruciating pain in my ankle and hip/butt. It was so terrible. It hurt so bad. But I was determined to be strong and just shake it off and NOT CRY. A few tears did manage to find there way out of my eyes but, hey, that really hurt.

I think I've mentioned before that I'm not much of a morning person and I think that might have played a factor in the second fall. It was first thing in the morning and since I own two young dogs, they go pee before I do. So, I'm carrying Max (he can't be trusted to not stop and pee in route to the door) and I see the stray black cat outside of the door. I can barely see as it is since my contacts are still stuck to my eyes but I thought the steps looked dry and occupied by the stray cat. I yelled at the cat and told it to leave. I kicked the door and screamed at the cat, but it just stayed there, looking at me, meowing at me. All the while, Max is squirming like crazy to get down and feel like I'm about to burst too. I'm afraid to let Max outside though for fear that he'll run off chasing that cat. Considering that I'm standing there in my house shoes, boxer shorts and tshirt I really wasn't wanting to chase the dog down. And not to mention it's only 6:30 in the morning. It's still dark out. So, I finally had the great idea that I would just step out on the steps and kick my foot at the cat while yelling and it would run away. So, with Max in hand, I stepped out onto the steps and before I could yell at the cat I was down on my butt and my house shoe was in a snow bank. My first thought was "AGAIN???!!!!" I didn't care about being strong this time, I balled like a baby. I turned Max loose and looked around for my missing house shoe. There was that black cat, just sitting there looking at me as Max ran off in the other direction. What was I thinking?!! If my fat ass falling down those steps isn't going to scare off that cat my little kick/yell combo wasn't going to do a thing! And Max~ no interest what so ever in the cat. He could have cared less. He peed and came right back inside. I finally got up, still bawling, retrieved my house shoe from the snow bank and went back inside. My poor little pitiful thin boxer shorts were soaking wet and dripping water onto my legs which made me cry even more. And I still hadn't even peed yet. When the girls came down stairs I told them what happened to Mommy and they both said, "Again?!" I told Dave. He said, "Again?!" I told my sister. She said, "Again?!" Yes, damnit, AGAIN! Apparently, you only get the 'are you okay' response on your fist fall. After that, not so much.

I am recovering nicely though. No worries. My bruise from the first fall is gone but my ankle is still swollen. It doesn't give any trouble really so I'm sure it will be fine. The second fall has left me with a bruise across my backside bigger than the eastern seaboard and is still quite sore. However, that too will heal. However, every time I think about that second fall~ I can't help but laugh out loud. Is that strange? It hurt so bad but I can't help but laugh hard. And here's a picture of Sienna just because.

Need a Little Chap Stick?

I cannot stand having some chapped lips! I've always got a least one tube of chap stick on me at all times. Sienna asks for the chap stick frequently. Apparently, she doesn't like chapped lips either. While we were snowed in over the weekend, I came across Sienna and Levi on the couch. Apparently, Levi doesn't care if his lips are getting chapped or not, he doesn't want any chap stick.

Dinner Time

I finally get to make a post! Yeah! I say that because my internet isn't all that I had hoped it would be. For what it cost us to get it I should be able to send emails to the moon and back in the blink of an eye. However, half the time I'm not able to send an email to my sister who is just 5 miles down the road. (I typed that last sentence and then the breaker blew!! It might be a sign) Anyway, I am grateful for this chance to blog again. This is a picture of Levi's cabinet. He claimed this cabinet for himself at the very first dinner I made in this house (which consisted of taking pizza out of the box). I keep this cabinet pretty empty just for Levi, with the exception of some water and a couple small things that sit on the shelf. He plays in this cabinet every night while I make dinner. I thought I would give you all a small glimpse into a very small piece of my life. This is what life is like in my house while dinner is being made. The video is a little dark but you get the idea.

I love this picture of Max! He looks like a bobble head, doesn't he? He's got a big ol' head but he's a totally baby. Lola is way more ferocious than Max could ever dream of being. But he's getting really big. I'm starting to get the dogs confused. If I'm standing up and looking down at them, it's hard to tell them apart. Max's face is alot darker than Lola's, but if you're not looking right at their face it can be a little confusing.

That was my quick little doggie update (since I'm sure all of you have just been dying to know the current status of my dogs).







Check out this picture of Sierra. I let the girls take the camera upstairs the other night and this is one of the pictures I found the next day. Doesn't she remind you of Chris Crocker in this picture? Remember him? The EXTREME Brit-Brit fan who found 15 minutes of fame over a video he posted on MySpace where he was under a blanket screaming "leave Brittany alone". If you don't know who I'm talking about, consider your self lucky. I just thought the picture was cute. Let me be clear that Sierra was not impersonating this guy, she doesn't even know who he is.

Pretty Princess

We all know how Sienna loves to play princess. As I was trying to set the computer up Sienna came running in telling me to get the camera and come see. She was soooo excited but I didn't really want to stop what I was doing. Everyone knows what a pain it is to set up the computer. All the cords and plugs~ not to mention you have to crawl under and behind your desk, it's just such a hassle. At the moment when Sienna came in I happened to be under the desk with 2 cords in my hand, 1 cord in my mouth and the tower tipped sideways and propped on my leg. So you could say that I was kind of in the middle of something. But she was just so excited so I asked her what she needed me and the camera for. She said, "Me and Daddy play pretty princess!!" Now, I had to pause because I knew that Dave was napping on the couch. So I finally said to her, "Well, isn't Daddy sleeping?" She replied with a very excited YES followed by lots of hand clapping. So I grabbed my camera and went to see Pretty Princess Daddy. Sienna was so happy with how pretty she made Daddy look. And Dave must have been so exhausted from the move because he slept right through the whole thing, even me taking about 50 pictures!

Finally

Here's the cheerleading video, finally! This new internet is not as fabulous as I had hoped! Enjoy!

Sienna is 4 years old!

It's so hard to believe that Sienna is 4 years old already! It really is amazing how fast the time goes by, especially considering that it seems so slow in the moment. February 3 marked the 4th year of my amazing princess. This is a picture of her all dressed up in one of her new dress-up outfits. She even made Aunt Shell take a picture of the shoes. It's so amazing to me that her little feet are a perfect fit for those shoes. A true Cinderella. :)

She had such a good time at her party! All of her cousins came (except Brandon due to a basketball game). Sienna really enjoys getting together with ALL of her cousins. Birthdays is really about the only time when all the kids from both sides of the family can get together. We had a princess pinata for her. We always do pinatas for all the birthday parties and usually the kids doing really well with looking out for each other and not being crazy about getting the candy. (I make them all share it anyway.) But for some reason this party Sierra lost her mind over the pinata. She tackled Levi to get to the candy! Maddie had to jump into the pile of children and pull Levi out from the bottom!! I was completely and totally shocked. I still am. I don't even know what to say about it.

It was a really nice day. I was afraid with only having a week to get the house together and do a party that I would be all stressed out but I wasn't, thankfully. Dave was a big help. He put up the decorations and hid the last few remaining boxes for me. Sienna is such an amazing person and I am so blessed to be a part of her life. She inspires me everyday. Happy Birthday Sienna! We love you so much!!

Mini-Cheer Clinic '08

Yeah for the mini cheer clinic. One of my absolute most favorite times of the year! We all remember from the football cheer clinic that Sienna didn't enjoy the three practice days but she loved the performance. So when the basketball cheer clinic rolled around I really didn't know what she was going to want to do. She decided with ease that she definitely wanted to do it. She promised that she would go to every practice and not cry. I was still pretty nervous about what she would do especially since they were doing 4 practices this time. Day one came around and she said she didn't want to go. I'm talking it up and going through all the usual reassurances when she pops out with, "Mom, if you give me an ice cream cup I'll go to cheerleading and not cry." I gave her the ice cream cup and she went to cheerleading with no tears. Now, I know that she totally worked and manipulated me there but it was worth it. An ice cream cup is a small price to pay for no fight and not wasting $40. She went to practice everyday and loved it. She even won a high five ribbon award for being the most spirited on her squad on day one and won a bear on the last day for being the most spirited on her squad overall.

Sierra loves the mini cheer clinics. She has done every single one since she was in kindergarten. They do 2 a year. Sierra has always given a 110% at every practice and every game. She is such a good cheerleader. It's really impressive that she remembers almost every cheer, dance and move long after the clinic is over. Sierra won a high five ribbon award for being the most spirited on her squad. Her big cheerleader (that's the high school cheerleader who is in charge of her squad) even gave us her phone number for babysitting. That's worth the registration fee alone!!

They both did such an awesome job and I am so proud of them both. Here's a little video of their performance.

Edit: You'll have to check back for the video. I can't get it to upload right now and it's late and I'm tired. I'll try to get it on tomorrow.