It's Independence Day!

Today is one of the best holidays of the year -- the day marking America's independence. While people are celebrating by grilling, drinking, and shooting fireworks, I hope they remember all the troops who work daily to protect the independence and freedom that we often take for granted. My thoughts and prayers are with the troops and their families -- thank you for protecting our country so that my children can grow up free to be who and what they choose!

Now that I've resolved to keep up with this blog, let me catch you up on what's been going on:

Jayden is now 7 and going into second grade. He had a little trouble with getting into trouble this year -- small things like talking, not listening, etc. As a teacher, I hate when parents blame the teacher for a student's behavior, but his teacher definitely didn't help anything. I'm hoping his 2nd grade teacher has better classroom management and can continue to foster his love of learning. He is great at math and loves working on math work. He received the Academic Achievement Award for earning all Es (excellent) in reading and math this year, as well as the Perfect Attendance Award for not missing any days of school. The Houston Astros partnered with participating school districts and offered tickets to students who didn't miss school, and Jayden got 4 tickets plus gets to be in a parade before their game next Sunday against the Cardinals!

We just wrapped up Jayden's baseball season. He was on the Diamondbacks and played 1st base all season. Jeff helped coach the team and had a blast; he's a natural working with the kids! Jayden made All-Stars and played 2nd base, and naturally Jeff helped coach again. Their team made it to the championship game where they lost by 1 run in the bottom of the last inning!! It was an exciting game to say the least, and our boys definitely deserved to win...they played so hard! I just love watching Jayden play baseball!

Julianna is 2 1/2 -- she'll be 3 in September. She acts like she's 10 already! Jeff said the other day that he's in trouble when she gets older...she has her dad wrapped around her little finger! She's just as smart as Jayden was when he was little: counting, naming shapes, picking out words, etc. Her favorite phrase right now is, "I wanna he'p youuuuuu" so she can "help" with whatever we're doing. Jeff and I both have an iPhone, and as soon as she sees/hears a game she'll run over to whoever is playing and want to play with them. Such a stinker :)

We found out last August that I was pregnant with baby #3! We were so excited because we'd been trying for a couple months. Jeff went with me to my first doctors visit and she mentioned that she and her husband didn't find out the sex of their 3rd child because they already had a boy and a girl. That small comment planted a seed in Jeff's head...he thought it would be fun to keep the gender a surprise and not find out. I was very hesitant at first, I didn't think I could NOT find out...but I said ok. The baby would sleep in our room then share with Jules, so we didn't need to get a nursery ready, and we already had hand-me-down clothes from J&J. All we had to do was get 2 outfits for leaving the hospital, one for a boy and one for a girl. It was SO fun seeing the shocked look on people's faces when they asked what we were having and we said we weren't finding out!

It was such an exciting moment for us when the doctor said, "It's a boy!" We were hoping for a boy all along, and the only name we had truly decided on was the boy's name: James Colin, named after his great-grandfathers. He was born April 15 and will forever be a tax baby :)

He's 2 1/2 months old now. He's smiling and laughing (which sounds like a choke when you're not looking at him) and he'll try to stand up when you put his feet down. He's such a mellow, happy baby and a great sleeper -- I've definitely been blessed with good sleepers!

I'll be teaching in a new school this upcoming school year, and I'm excited to start a new journey. I'll be teaching at-risk students in a small school, so I'll be working with the same students just in a new environment.

Jeff is loving working a "normal" M-F job rather than shift work, and we love having him home!