The girls had a blast jumping at Lindy’s birthday party a few weekends ago!

  

 

 

 

We love us some pj days!

 

A couple of weeks ago, we got locked out of dance class.  It turned out to be pretty fun!

Sweeties at Fuzzy’s!

 

 

 

I used my 6th sense “gut feeling,” a few weeks ago when things didn’t feel quite right, and ended up being super thankful I did!  Never ignore it; It saves lives!  “Obey Your Gut!”

I have the privilege of helping out with a super special program called Girls Laugh for our 4th grade girls at school.  I absolutely love hanging out with such sweet girlies each week! 

Happy 5th Birthday, Avery!  The Pond Princesses had a lovely time at your birthday ball!

 

Avery’s Momma is super creative and all the treats were princess themed!

 

Rapunzel’s Braids and Snow White’s not so poisonous Apple Juice

 

Anna Kate and Malia always have the best time hanging out!

 

 

This.face.though!  Lol!

 

Dancing with my diva!

I bet I’ve made this face a million times; It’s the OMG! it’s really no big deal, stop screaming face.  Every (girl) mom has to have humor with all the drama!

 

Princess Rose was on the go today while Daddy was having fun taking selfies in the mirror, lol!  #caughtya

 

Noelle and Avery, energy and spunk to spare! 

 

Payton, Jackson and Anna Kate

 

Jackson couldn’t stop staring at Noelle; He thought she was a real princess.  They danced all afternoon, and he couldn’t stop looking at her.  It was the most adorable thing ever!

 

In live time, I was watching Anna Kate playing with a balloon on the left until I saw my little princess on the right was having a hard time!  Bless her heart!  Don’t worry, I went and scooped her right up.  Her halo, I mean crown, got a little crooked!

 

 

These two crack me up!

 

Noelle’s dress is from Cinderella’s wedding collection, so she wore her glass slipper necklace to match!  I forgot we even had that necklace.  She doesn’t miss a beat! 

Avery’s little sister, Livi, is so cute!  She’ll be one soon!

 

Happy 5th Birthday, Avery!  It was a royal one!

 

There is just something super special about having little girls everywhere!  Rose has the spunkiest spirit we could ever hope for in our baby girl.  Our girls’ birth order matches their little personalities perfectly.  From the moment Rose was born, she has always enjoyed being our Pond family baby!  Right now she’s wearing green mary janes and a tutu asking me to hold her.  Gotta jet!

 

Fun little bonus shots I found!

I love these early morning pictures of the girls waiting for a very special photo shoot with the entire Banks/Ebert/Pond family, all 16 of us, one morning at GWL!  More on that to come, but these pictures where no one knew I was taking a picture except Anna Kate make me smile!  She’s such a goof ball!  In the mornings in the PondFam5, everyone is in their own little worlds.  Sweet times for sure!

This is one of my absolute favorite faces Noelle makes, but I’ve never captured it on camera until we sang “Happy Birthday” to her this year!  I’m so tickled about this shot because I want to remember this face forever.  Noelle LOVES being silly, light-hearted and having fun!  She was being such a goof ball in this picture, and I just can’t tell you how much I love her.  I’m all teary-eyed now!

For those of you that don’t know what Dairy Queen is, let me tell you!  It’s a low-key burger joint with awesome desserts here in Texas!  Most Dairy Queens are located in small towns.  When Mike and I first moved here, we would drive 30 minutes each way to get a Blizzard every now and then.  Blizzards are ice cream with a topping stirred in with a machine.  My favorite is Reese’s peanut butter cups and the rest of the PondFam5 loves Cookie Dough.  Over half of the girls hadn’t ever been to Dairy Queen.  When we pulled up, they were like, “This is it!?!”  I think they thought it would be a lot fancier, lol!  I told them not to judge a book by its cover and wait until they try it!  It was a fun experience for all of us!  Oh, one more fun fact about Dairy Queen is they always turn the Blizzard upside down before they give it to you to prove that it is still cold and fresh.  They even do this if you order one from the drive-thru before they hand it over.  They used to say if they forget, it’s free, but I don’t think they do that anymore.  If you’re in Texas, it’s a fun novelty to try!  Cold Stone and Marble Slab are cool but nothing beats a DQ Blizzard!

I told the girls to pose for their Mommas.  It was fun taking their pictures in such pretty light and seeing their cute expressions!

Happy 8th birthday, Noelle!  Hope you had the time of your life! 

This year we made these cute shirts, got birthday blizzards, and had a sleepover for Noelle’s little birthday party!

 

I’m usually more organized, but Easter and GWL and so much more threw me off my game!  I went to Wal-Mart the night before and got the table decorations with a few balloons added the day of the party from Party City.  Zebra is so easy to throw with another color.  I do this a lot if you haven’t noticed… makes it super fun and festive!  Everything turned out super cute, and most importantly, all the girls were excited and had lots of fun enjoying everything! 

 

First up, making shirts!  The crowns and names were both iron-ons, but it was a steep learning curve.  If I ever do this again (lol), I’ll probably do all vinyl and no fabric… that was a mess, but they turned out super cute!  Brianna was adorable ironing on her name!

Here are the girls after dinner going over house rules and rules for our little “field trip” to Dairy Queen.  Going somewhere with Mike and me and 10 girls was a little crazy, but they did great, and it was a whole ton of fun!  These girls are great! 

Emma-P and Noelle-y!

 

To settle down before bed, we did a fun little quiz all about Noelle.  They loved it, and it made the birthday girl feel super special!

 

After lots of snacks, a bedtime movie, silly stories, and me having to sleep on the couch to get everyone to quit giggling, we finally fell asleep!  We were on a strict bedtime schedule because the next day was Mother’s Day, and I promised the girls’ mommies I would have them rested.  Crazy fun!  Would I do it again?  Definitely… in a couple of years! 

  

Ready for Noelle’s 8th birthday party! 

 

  

 

  

 

  

 

 

 

We had a blast taking the Pond girls and Emily out to eat for Noelle’s 8th Cinco de Mayo birthday dinner!  Good times!

 

We’re about to celebrate Noelle’s birthday up on here… are you guys cool with that!?!    Last week was so much fun but so hard too!  The night of Noelle’s birthday, she complained of an upset tummy after dinner.  She NEVER ever complains of being sick and is always a good sport about going to school, so I knew something was up.  I made her start the day after her birthday at school and promised her I would get a doctor’s appointment scheduled in the meantime and pick her up before lunch.  Sure enough, Tuesday afternoon, she tested positive for strep.  That threw me for a huge loop because she only complained of a tummy ache.  Then, I got tested positive for strep at the doctor on Wednesday, after a night of the sorest throat ever.  The littles both had to go to the doctor for different reasons after that, and Rose is on antibiotics too.  We were at the doctor 4/5 days last week, and it was Noelle’s birthday week!    I am just so thankful we have good doctors and access to them.  All the kids are happy and healthy this week, but last week was plain awful.  Taking care of them with strep (having it as an adult, I hear, hits us worse than kids for some reason) was pretty rough, but it’s my greatest honor to put them first and never let them down. 

Noelle and I text all the time, especially days when I’m down with fibro.  It has greatly improved her grammar, punctuation, spelling, and we get to be silly with Emojis.  Here’s a little peak into a text the morning after her birthday.  The picture on the left is from when she got home from school last Monday on her birthday.  She 100% picks out all of her outfits for school (new this year) and has done such a great job!  She’s so creative and always looks so cute!  She puts things together I wouldn’t think of in a million years.  I admire her fashion skills! 

Noelle asked for birthday donuts the morning of her birthday.  This has sort of become a birthday morning tradition and are the only mornings during the year we have donuts for breakfast; Gives us something to look forward to.  They take after their momma; White sprinkled donuts are my very favorite too!  After an awesome Monday morning celebrating Noelle and getting ready for school, it wouldn’t be long before her traditional birthday dinner got here, Cinco de Mayo style!