Last day of school and 2 month check up

Nina and our mini dachshund Nori on her last day of school....

Last day of school for Nina was yesterday. Can't believe she'll be in 5th grade next year. My mother in law who is here visiting and I went to pick Nina up from school when they dismissed and it was so neat to see all the kids so excited about summer. Of course, i can't hardly remember what summer vacation was like anymore. One very neat thing about Nina's school is that they really celebrate the 6th graders. They have a little graduation and lots of activities for the 6th graders thru out the year. Yesterday on the last day, the parents had their cars decorated, balloons, flowers, etc... all to celebrate their last day of grade school. One parent even rented a convertible to ride the kids around in all afternoon. How fun!!

Nina's softball team also won their doubleheader on Wed night. They smoked the two teams they played. Nina really hit the ball well and moved from right field to shortstop for a few innings. She really liked that position. She even got clocked in the arm with the ball at third base. Totally an innocent play but the outfielder threw it to the third baseman and of course it hit Nina instead. But she was tough and wouldn't take an ice pack. :)

Julia had her 2 month appt this week. She is officially a big girl now. :) She weighs 11lbs 3 oz, 23 1/4 " long. That's the 60% and 80% respectively. So she's still long and skinny. Sally has had a very fun week with Julia. We've gone shopping, to lunch with friends, Nina's game....

8 weeks old....

8 weeks old and growing like a weed!!! To celebrate this occasion, I headed to Lawrence for the ground breaking of my biggest project to date; widening of I-70 thru Lawrence. Pictured with the Kansas Turnpike Board members, KTA Chief Engineer, Secretary of Transportation Deb Miller, Douglas County Councilman and the Mayor of Lawrence... This project has been 5 years in the making for me. We will be reconstructing I-70 thru Lawrence, including 13 new bridges, 2 new Kansas River bridges, reconstruction of both interchanges and a new toll plaza at East Lawrence. Price tag for this project was bid at $113.5 Million. Now that's a chunk of change.

Another week has just flown by. Nina softball team is 0-3 but the girls are having fun and improving every game. Nina is really doing well and has moved up in line up every game. There's only a week and a half left of school this year. Nina has a talent show this Friday and field day next week. Ah, grade school field day..... Ours was always so much fun when i was a kid.

Saturday we headed over to Independence to celebrate our good friends Jeff and Cindy's daughter Eastyn's 3rd birthday. Can u believe we were at Chuck E Cheese? ha ha It was fun to hang out with our friends and the kids were so cute playing the games. Skee ball seemed to be the favorite. Even though the kids couldn't actually throw the balls, they discovered they could walk up the little ramp and just throw them in the slots.

Then even though i haven't played volleyball in such a long time ( I can't even remember the last time i played), I headed to the KC corporate challenge vb tourney. Our team (work team) haven't even played together but we managed to place first in our pool so we moved on to the tourney play that was tonight. We didn't win our first match tonight but the team really played well. It was a lot of fun.

Sunday evening our neighbors Julian and Jill Viso had a bunch of us neighbors over for a cookout. It was a lot of fun to spend time with the neighbors and get to know them better. It was also an evening to celebrate our neighbor Cindy's 50th bday. Cindy is also going to be our day care provider. It was a very fun evening.

The week will be another busy one. Mark is out of town Wed night for work so i'll be playing single mom all night. Hope Julia starts to sleep more this week!!

Happy Mother's Day

Another crazy but fun weekend around the Friedman home. Friday night the girls and I went to see Wicked at the Music Hall. It was fabulous. I didn't know what to expect but i truly enjoyed the show. I wish now that I would have brought Nina with me. I really think she would have loved it. If you are unfamiliar with the musical, it's based on a book written in 1995 "Wicked" about the Wicked Witch of the West and Glinda the good Witch of the North when they were growing up and in school. The second act is more of what is happening while Dorothy is in Oz. Kind of behind the scenes or what we didn't see.... I can surely say that i cannot watch the Wizard of Oz the same way again. Anyway, such a great show and i would see it again. Plus this was my first night out with the girls since Julia was born. It was very nice and fun.

Saturday was full of parties. Started off with my great friend Lesley's bridal shower. Julia and I went to the shower and I think everyone loved seeing her. Then we were off to Nina's 10th bday party at Studio Ladida. This place is great for girls to have a makeover party. Nina had 5 friends come and they got to dress up, nails done, hair done, makeup or sparkles done on their faces. Then they danced, sang and had a fashion show. Each girl walked the runway while the owners announced their likes, dislikes, etc. It was really neat and the girls just loved it. Then it was time for ice cream and cake and presents.

Finally, it was Lesley's bachlorette party. Now I've been to quite a few of these but it is only the second time that I've been to one with a stripper. Lesley was quite the trooper but I think she would have rather enjoyed the evening without it. I only stayed for the first half of the festivities and then came home when the girls headed to Kelly's and other bars. I already knew I would be up most of the night at home with Julia. :)

Birthdays

This week we celebrated Mark's and Nina's bdays. Mark and I went to the Royals to celebrate his. The Royals crushed the Angels. If you haven't been to the K this year, y'all need to go. The new scoreboard is just awesome!!

Nina turned 10 yesterday. I can hardly believe it's been 10 years since that wonderful day she entered this world. We surprised her with a new bike. She also got a new IPOD nano from Peter & Sally. She loved all her gifts. Her friends John & Lexie came over for some cake and ice cream too.

Play dates and the art fair

Julia napping while Joseph plays.

What a very nice weekend we had here in KC. Friday Julia enjoyed her first play date at her friend Caroline Patnode's house. Her friend Jackie Kennedy came too. Caroline's twin brother Joe and older brother Jonathon were also there. The kids had a great time looking at each other, drinking their bottles and taking little cat naps.

Julia Patnode with Caroline and Jolyn with Jackie.

Saturday, Julia and I headed to Brookside for the annual art fair. We started the morning off at our friends Beth and Steve's house. Then we met up with Gigi and her two girls, Sage & Skylar and also with Margie and her girls, Gretchen & Amelia. The art fair was very neat and i couldn't find anything for the $150 budget Mark put me on. ha ha Although i fell in love with this painting that was only $12,500.

Me, Gigi and Margie at the Brookside art fair.

Today was a nice day to hang out. Julia got a bath and i took a very nice 2 hr nap!!
Julia after her bath...

Softball season has begun

Last night Nina had her first softball game. Although they lost 13-7, the girls looked great for their first game out. Nina went 1 for 2 (they usually only get a couple of at bats in per game) and scored. Pretty sure the team would have won if their star pitcher was there. She was home sick. Julia enjoyed the game as well mostly in her stroller but we did get her out so everyone could see her and also she got hungry. :)

Nina at second base...

Beautiful day here yesterday so Julia and I got out for a nice walk with our neighbor Jill Viso. Jill is full of neighborhood info so i need to walk with her more often to get to know everyone around here. Another funny thing we discovered yesterday that the name Julia (or the form of this name) is very popular in our cul de sac/neighbors. Within the cul de sac itself, we have my Julia, neighbor Julie and neighbors Julian and son Julian. Behind me we have our neighbors Julia and Julie. We hope to have a bbq sometime this summer with all the "J's". Hopefully after we get our retractable awning installed. Still waiting on word from the home owner's association on that while i'm getting quotes.

Julia in her beautiful knitted sweater and hat from Mark's aunt Jill.