Done with Kindergarten????

Yes that is correct, my sweet little baby girl is done with Kindergarten. Can that be correct? She just started. Literally I think it was last week that she just started. While that's not serious it is what it feels like. Julietta has grown up so much this year, but not in the ways that I feared. She has remained who she is and has stayed the sweet innocent little girl that she was on her first day. She has had some heartache dealing with other girls that are not as sweet and innocent as she is, but she stayed a good friend and has learned so much. She has learned that God made her to have a sweet spirit and gave her the gift of loving others. She said that is why he put a heart birthmark on her, because she loves! Julietta also made it through the entire year of getting green owls everyday! I am so proud of her. She loves school and loves to learn.
Here are some pictures from their end of the year party!

 Julietta getting her certificate saying that she completed Kindergarten.

 Julietta's teacher Mrs. Fields. The best teacher we could've asked for! She was wonderful :)

 Her friend Madison.

 This is her BFF Alexia. They found out today that they are in the same class next year! Yay!

 The teachers aid Mrs. Skiscim. She was wonderful too. They just loved on Julietta!

 Etta reading her end of the year writing about everything she learned in K and what she liked.

Julietta, Alexia, and Marley. They had so much fun this year!

We were very happy with our year, and after having so much worry about sending her to public school had a wonderful experience. We will be off for 4 weeks and then Julietta will start 1ST GRADE, on July 30th :)

this week

So, this blog is slowly just becoming about my struggle with my weight, but trying to not make it that! I did lose 3 pounds this week, so that's at least in the right direction :) 32 until my ultimate goal.... lol. That's gonna take forever at the rates I am going!

Anyway, the kiddos have been sick this week. Last night they all had fevers and were just yucky. I am praying that they get over it fast. Also I have stopped on the potty training Ender for the moment. It just wasn't going smooth, so I am waiting until I get back from my intensive to re-start. Next week I am leaving from Sunday until Friday to go to Liberty and do one of my three intensives. I can not say I am looking forward to it. Part of me is really excited to actually be doing some practical classroom stuff for counseling. The other part of me is hating leaving my family for that long, and missing 4th of July. But since money is tight I am sharing a room with 3 other girls in a hotel to keep cost down. While it's awesome to keep cost down, I do not know these girls. So the idea of sharing a bed with someone I do not know is making me a little nervous. Pray for Randy too during this week. He will be alone with the kids the whole time. He has never done this and while he will do great, it can be quite stressful and no fun. My mom and brother and sister are going to be out of town that week too, so he will have no help what so ever.

I will try and post a video soon, but Julietta is getting really close to swimming on her own. While this may seem late to some, this is the girl who hated getting her hair washed because she does not like water on her face. So for her to be swimming without a life vest and willingly putting her head under the water (even for 2 seconds) is a VERY BIG milestone!!!!

day one of raw

Today has been pretty good considering! This morning I had a banana with about a tablespoon of peanut butter. For a snack I had an apple. For lunch I had carrots and celery with hummus. I then got hungry again about an hour later and had another apple with another tablespoon of peanut butter. For dinner I had a big salad made of romaine, carrots, celery, avocado, and I had one hard boiled egg, with Goddess dressing. I know the egg is not vegan or raw. When reading about Raw and Vegan the most important thing is 90% coming from plants. Obviously with raw that needs to be raw plants. I needed some more protein today so I decided it was ok. My goal is to have 90% be raw vegan. I also must confess that I had my coffee with alittle cream and stevia in it. I am not ready to give up coffee or creamer. I have been in a little fog and a little cranky. I also have a headache now at the end of the day. I'm sure this is the sugar withdraw. However, it might be that time and it was raining today so we were all inside. That might be why I'm cranky ;)
I have not had the big detox effects yet that everyone talks about. From what I've read though this sometimes doesn't happen until around day 3. Praying for big results this week! I have done goo with water. I am one water bottle away from a gallon and it's only 7:30. I will get that in! I read somewhere that you should have the gallon in  by 4 so I will work on that tomorrow :)

End of 30 days

So I did 30 days of vegan. I gotta say I liked it. I didn't lose as much weight as I wanted. Almost 3 pounds which is really nothing. So, I'm taking this weekend off and then starting Monday, I am going Raw.... :) Hoping this does the trick!

Pullen Park

 Ender loves the train. It's such a fun part of the park.

 Big kids on the boat. There was no way Kyleigh would get on that!

 So she watched along with Nana

The girls riding the train! 

There is this awesome park here in Raleigh that has little boats, a merry go round, train, and playground. It also is on a lake. Mom and I took the kids one Sunday morning. And I'm pretty sure that is the best time to go. The park is always slammed. It re-opened recently and we went for the grand-opening and it was heart attack central. I was so stressed when I got home because I just felt like I could not keep an eye on my children. It wasn't crowed at all on Sunday morning. Raleigh is a fairly religious area so I'm assuming that is what it's about. We left around 2 and it was starting to pick up. We will be going tons in the fall but I'm hoping to get one more chance to go in before it gets too hot.
The kids had a blast. Kyleigh did not like the merry-go-round. I'm not sure why except it was kind of fast. Next time I'll try sitting with her in my lap.

pool days

This weekend we went to our pool and then to my moms pool. I say we and it was me and the big kids. Kyleigh is still deathly afraid of any and all water since the beach so she stayed home with Randy. However, he wants to go so she is going to have to get over it because we plan on spending LOTS of time at the pool this summer. It was so nice. I got a tan and felt wonderful to soak up the Vitamin D and the kids just had a blast! Ender had an accident at mom's pool and thankfully he was wearing a pool diaper, but it was still pretty sketchy. I felt bad since it was a neighborhood pool..... so we are potty training as we speak. It may be hard and long but he's almost 3 and it's time!

These are just two pictures from Saturday at our pool. I'm sure I will have a ton more as the summer goes along. Etta is doing really good swimming. She is finally putting her face in the water and we are trying to teach her out to tread water. I'd love to put her in swimming lessons but right now that's not an option. But she is doing wonderful without them!

still going

So I'm still going strong with veganhood. Monday was two weeks. I feel pretty good and it hasn't been that hard. However, I have not lost any weight :( I was really expecting to have a pretty big chunk gone this month so this is kinda upsetting. I have so much weight to lose too. I never thought I'd see myself as a fat person. So.... that being said I will not stop! I may introduce meat and cheese, but I will still be plant strong and still count my calories after the month is over. I have started working out and running this week so maybe next Monday I will see a better result on the scale.I will drop these 30-40 pounds.
I haven't been writing everything on the blog because frankly it's a little depressing! :)

Kyleigh got tubes

Well Kyleigh got her tubes today. She did pretty good. I was concerned because her surgery wasn't scheduled until 7:30 but we had to be there at 6am to do preop. This meant I had to wake her up at 5:30. Ok that concerned me too! But the big problem was that she couldn't have anything to eat or drink. My other kiddos this wouldn't have bothered them as much, but the first thing Ky does in the morning is drag me into the kitchen and want something to eat and drink. She actually did great. I think she just didn't know where she was and so there was more to look at. She got to wear the cutest little hospital gown and surgery socks ever though. Who knew they made them this tiny! I will say there's something extremely unnerving about seeing your baby being carried by nurses back into the operating room. But, once I was out in the waiting room it was only 10 minutes until the doctor came out and told me she was done and did great. The nurses then came and got me and the first thing they said was boy is she a firecracker. Yes we know! She was screaming and thrashing everywhere. I believe it was the anesthesia and  being scared. I think she was also in some pain. The crying lasted for about an hour and in about 3 she was totally back to normal. She has been great today. The only issue is she is walking around like a drunk sailor because her equilibrium is all off! Thanks for the prayers for everyone who said them :)

Ky and Ender today on the webcam

Ender praying

I just had to do a quick blog about Ender praying. We've been doing devotions at night and it's been really nice. Etta prays a lot for us which is always sweet and nice. Last night Ender said he wanted to pray. His prayer was the sweetest thing I've ever heard. He started saying Jesus is my good friend. Then said Thank you Jesus for God. Thank you Jesus for everything. Thank you Jesus for the mall. Thank you Jesus for the dinosaur museum. Thank you Jesus for me. In Jesus name Amen.

It was so sweet. I don't want to forget his first prayer so I wanted to jot it down really fast!