Olivia completes her first 5K

Yesterday morning (Saturday) Olivia and I got up before the crack of dawn to make our way downtown to walk with Team Curtis and raise money for Mitochondrial Disease.
Curtis Jackson is a 3rd grader at our church and though we don't know him personally we were both excited to be apart of Team Curtis.
It was a quite a cold morning for Houston but we weathered the cold. We walked with Uncle Mark and Aunt JeanAnn and all their girls so that made it more fun for Olivia. Her an Allison were both dying after mile one and the last half mile you would have thought they had been lost in the desert for weeks. Silly girls, but I still think they had a great time.
To cap off the perfect morning we ate breakfast at my faaavorite place Goode Co Taqueria! Mark, JeanAnn and the girls joined us so it was an especially good time.

Olivia's First Audition

Yesterday afternoon Olivia tried out for a part in the Children's Choir spring musical at church. This was the first year she was old enough to try out. She has been waiting for the opportunity to try out since she was in Kindergarten. Of course she has been talking about this for the past two weeks, praying about it and asking all her teachers at school to pray that she gets the part. Her dad and I have tried to prepare her for a happy and no so happy outcome. In all her drama she says, " I will be soooooooooo sad if I don't get the part....I will want to cry"....and so on and so on!
So yesterday afternoon we pull up to the church with all excitement.....as we get out of the car Olivia says, " momma, can we say a prayer?" Just what her momma wanted to hear. I was going to ask to pray with her but I was hoping she would ask first. We knelt down on the ground beside our car, Olivia, Emily and I and we held hands and prayed for Olivia's audition. Such a sweet memory for me...wished someone was there to click a pic!
Olivia didn't seem nervous at all, full of confidence and excitement! WOW! I wouldn't have been like that when I was little. I would have been a bundle of nerves. I am very curious how she was in the audition....did she act nervous or confident? I would have loved to have been a fly on that wall!
Well, we find out next Wednesday what the verdict is......I will keep you posted!

Time to dig out the scrapbook stuff.......

I started scrapbooking when Olivia was born and loved it..... I did one book per year for her first 3 years. Then Abby was born and I struggled to get her first year book done by her first birthday, but I got it done and that was the only one she got. Then along came Emily....I started her first book and got 5 pages finished. When it got close to her first birthday I realized this book wasn't going to be completed anytime soon, so I made her a book on Shutterfly....which was very cute.
Fast forward three years....two nights ago Abby and I started looking at her first year scrapbook and then Olivia wanted to get hers out, so of course Emily wanted hers. I figured there was going to be a bit of a problem but I did not except little doodles to completely lose it. And that is just what she did. The tears were pouring from her eyes and she cried, " Where is my book, where is my book, I want one like theirs!" Daddy went and got her book that had 5 pages done and that calmed her down, but she quickly informed me once she got to the last page that I needed to finish her book.
I don't think I have it any me anymore, but how can a mother ignore the sweet tears her three year old baby. I will have to dig up by creative juices somewhere and get to it done! Just wish I had it in me to finish it before her 4th birthday which is only a month away.

Olivia's New Hair Cut....brought tears to her eyes

We have to go back in time for this one.....I didn't take the time to blog the story when it happened back in November.....so here we go.
I took Olivia to get a haircut or should we say get her hair trimmed....she was in the process of letting it grow out and the ends where way to straggly for momma. So I told her she needed to get the ends evened up. So in we go to SuperCuts....I know not the best place to go but anyway.... I told the guy we were just getting it trimmed she was trying to grow it out. I also mentioned that I know she didn't have any style to her hair but that was okay. He talked about putting a few layers in and I thought okay why not, maybe it will have a little style.....well I don't know what he was thinking but he went to town. I wasn't giving him my full attention because I had the other two with me so I was trying to keep them entertained. I looked over to Olivia and I see him pulling up the top layer of hair and cutting it pretty darn short. I start paying more attention to him and I realize oh my this isn't looking good. Then I see Olivia's eyes and she is looking at me with eyes that are saying "WHAT IS HE DOING TO MY HAIR". I start to get a bit worried and before she is even out of the chair the tears are flowing. I feel awful. She steps down and the guy shows me her hair which is now cut into some sort of shoulder length shag!
As we go to the check out counter Olivia is out the door and sitting on the steps outside crying.They guy asks,what do you think mom.....I replied well it is a bit short, I thought you were just going to trim it! He could see she was terribly upset and told me I didn't have to pay for the haircut since she was not happy. I was thankful for that but felt a bit bad for him.
As soon as we got in the car I told Olivia we would go home and find a cute way to fix her hair and it would look great.
We got home and I checked it out more closely. She really had a cute hair cut. For SuperCuts he did an awesome job, so then I really felt bad that I hadn't paid. We put a headband in her hair and she liked the way it looked. I told her I would take her to Justice, her favorite store, and buy her all the headbands she wanted. That made her feel better.
Later that evening she came to me and said, "Momma, it doesn't matter what my hair looks like, all that matters is what is in my heart, right momma?"

Olivia is Thankful......

Olivia brought this paper home from school the other day and I had to post it. She had to write a composition on what she was thankful for. It was a graded paper....I don't even remember what the grade was.....just thought the words were so sweet I had to save them and share them with you. It blessed my heart to read her words the day she brought this home. I treasure things like this and don't ever want to forget them!

Abby's First Spelling Test!.....

Abby had her first spelling test today. It was words in the at family. We have been practicing for days. She has been so excited to take it since her sister takes spelling tests every week and talks about getting 100's. Abby's teacher doesn't grade with 100's but that is all Abby could talk about. " I am going to get a 100 on my spelling test" When she got in the car after school she wanted to show me her spelling test of course. As I was looking a show she had a bonus word and she got that right as well. I said yea Abby you got your bonus word right too. Abby replies, " Does that mean I got 2 100's?" Abby is a very proud girl today and so is her mommy!

Olivia is Baptised on Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve has come and gone......and I never found time to blog the story of Olivia being baptised by her PawPaw from Louisiana. Christmas Eve what a special day for all, now made even more special with Olivia's baptism.
It was a special blessing that our church let her grandfather do the baptism. A precious memory for us all.
Olivia was very excited as she has been asking for over year to be baptised, she took her class and patiently waited on her parent's.
It was a special evening as Olivia let it be know to all in attendance that Jesus Christ is her Lord and Saviour!

6 days since my last post!!!!

Well let me just say....there is been nothing exciting going on at the Simpson house to blog about!!! We did have a looonnnngggg lunch at home with our friends the Cross' who were home for the holidays from France and I told myself to take a picture of both families together so I could put it on my blog and then I forgot!! Missed opportunity and who knows when we will all be together again! Oh well. Emily and Thomas their 3 year old played beautifully together while the older girls all sat around and watch TV for 3 hours Emily and Thomas played kitchen and all sorts of fun things!
The Cross' are headed back to France today and Emily and Thomas got to play one more round of hide and seek before they left. I hope they remember each other the next time they see one another!

Today Emily is playing with her buddy Chloe....actually Abby would say it is her buddy and she will not be happy to hear Chloe was here today while she was at school. Oh well, the bonuses of being 3!

We are preparing for a big freeze here in the Lone Star State! I am so excited about the cold. I was telling Abby yesterday freezing temperatures are coming our way. We can thank Jesus that we have a nice warm house to stay in. Abby immediately responded, what about the people that don't have houses?" After I did a little explaining I told her she needed to pray for those people, that they would be kept warm and that somehow they would know that it was the Lord providing for them. This morning she asked me again about the homeless people and I asked her .....did you pray for them last night? She got big eyes and said oh no I forgot......I will pray for them right now and as she sat at the table eating her breakfast she prayed for them. Sweet Abby!

Happy New Year with Resolutions.........

I told my self this year I was going to be more diligent about chronicling lives of my little girls a bit better in this blog. So here we are at the start of the new year and I am making an entry before I go off to bed. I have lots to catch up on.....like Olivia's new hair cut and the drama in came along with it, her Thanksgiving paper she wrote at school, her baptism on Christmas eve and of course all the Christmas festivities the girls love, but I will save that for another day.

We stayed out late last night popping fireworks and hanging out at the bonfire at Nana's and Poppy's. We were so engrossed in our evening we forgot to ring in the new year. Can you believe everyone was still up and running past midnight. We got home at 1:00 and went right to bed of course everyone fell asleep as soon as the car took off. Except poor Olivia who said she was trying to stay awake so she could put her tooth underneath her pillow when she got home. Daddy and I assured her we would take care of that for her so she could fall asleep!

For now let us remember our first day on 2010. A lazy day until we went bike riding at Mercer Park, had yummy chocolate fondue after dinner. Bananas seemed to be the favorite dipping item of the night. It was a good day and of course the question asked from Emme to daddy almost every night, are you staying home tomorrow? Daddy has enjoyed be able to stay yes a lot more than usually because of the holiday season! Two more days of daddy staying home in the morning Emily will be happy.

Thank you Santa Baby!

At the end of my last post, which I had forgotten I had even mentioned this, I cried out to any Santa listening about my camera woes, not expecting a darn thing just feeling the need to cry but low and behold......I GOT A BRAND NEW NIKON D3000 FOR CHRISTMAS! Do I not have the best husband in the world. I never expected to be getting an SLR any time in the near future. I am so excited. So be looking for some great photos of my adorable girls! I know my dad is just as excited as I am.....I am sure he was tired of loaning out his camera all the time!

Thank you momma for the BEST NIGHT EVER!

Last night Olivia and I went to see the Nutcracker downtown. Her first time to see it! It was a fun night out just the two of us. She loved it. She said it was better than Mary Poppins which we had just seen a couple of months ago. I think not but she loves dancing....though they danced in Mary Poppins...even on the ceiling!
Shortly after it started she did lean over and say are they ever going to talk! Now she knows there is no talking in ballet's. She thanked me all night for taking her, which was really sweet.

As we sat down (behind railing of course) I was thinking I wish we were all her as a family together, but there is no way Emily would have sat through that! At intermission Olivia bought a ballerina ornament for the Christmas tree and had her pictures taken with some of the cast. She loved that! We decided to change seats at intermission since there were some available without obstructed views. Those seats where much better Olivia told me. She also told me, "if you see my eyes closed it is just because I am resting them, I am not falling asleep." It was a late night, as it was the two previous nights before......oh well, tis the season!

p.s. I know the pictures are blurry....but we don't even want to go into the the whole camera story. I just hope some Santa out there anywhere hears my camera cries!

How do you hunt for a moon?

Let me quickly get this funny one down.....which is what I am suppose to be doing every time it happens......I am knee deep in Christmas decorations and I want a break.....I guess!
As I was taking down everyday decorations to put up Christmas decorations, I was looking through a stack a books I was putting in a box. I told Abby she might want to look at some of these books. They are coffee table books that never get looked at. As I was going through them with her telling her about each book and where it came from, I came across a book of Paris. I told her this is where daddy and mommy went on our honeymoon. She looked at me and said....."how do you hunt for a moon?" LOL!

Are you kidding me.....

Let me blog this story quickly while Abby and I are sharing a lunch of microwave stir fry.....before the story is forgotten or better yet I just don't get around to blogging it.....like so many other stories, please don't tell Olivia I haven't blogged her 8th birthday yet and it is almost a month past.....back to my reason for logging on today......
Abby is home with me on this rainy day...we have finished her school work and she was playing play-doh. At clean up time which took her forever...I was sweeping up the play-doh on the floor and of course some of it wouldn't sweep up because it was smashed into the tile. I ask her to scrap up the play-doh on the floor and I would give her a toothpick or something to get it up with......she gets down on the floor and starts moving it around and I hear her saying "scrap up the play-doh on the floor....are you kidding me" I looked at her and replied, " did you just say are you kidding me?" I informed her she does not say that to her mother to which she replied.....I didn't know I wasn't suppose to say that! Good answer Abby and this time you can get away with it....but next time you will know so just remember that for when you turn 13!