We had a blast swimming with the Horton girls and Katie earlier this week!  It was a morning full of girlie FUN in the SUN!

Here’s a picture of The Pond and Horton Girls back in 2011!  Noelle was 5 years old, Brylee and Anna Kate were 2 1/2 years old, and Cerly and Rose were only 6 months old!

Here they are today, summer of 2013!  (and sweet baby Audree too, who was asleep during this picture)  Noelle is 7, Anna Kate and Brylee are 4 1/2 and Cerly and Rose are 2 1/2!  Time flies by so quickly!

Here’s a look back at Katie, Cerly and Rose during their first swim play date in 2011.  They were 6 months old!

Here they are during their second summer at age 1 1/2, summer of 2012!

And here they are full-out 2 1/2 year olds in the summer of 2013!  Love that these sweet girls have been friends forever!

And here are some throw-back pictures of Brylee and Anna Kate.  The left picture is the summer of 2011, when they were 2 1/2!  The right picture is the summer of 2012, when they were 3 1/2!

And here they are this summer, 2013, at age 4 1/2!  Brylee was helping Anna Kate learn to hold on to the side.  You can see Anna Kate was so proud, beaming with pride!  Mike and I were talking about these pictures tonight, and we both noticed Anna Kate and  Brylee both changed a lot from 2 1/2 to 3 1/2, but not much from 3 1/2 to 4 1/2.  That means this next year for Rose will be a big growing, changing year!  I can’t wait to see what she will look like when she’s 4; I think they change little by little after that, but the biggest changes are happening right now!

I love these super fun 2 year olds!

Snack time!

Cerly, Rose and Katie had fun posing for their adoring Mommies! 

And here are the big girls, Anna Kate, Brylee and Noelle, growing up too quickly!  Thanks guys for such a playful, giggly morning!

Rose relaxing on the mud bench by our back door!

This.baby.

Kevin and Katie’s baby shower

Marcos braiding Noelle’s hair

Tea parties and dress-up

Play doh with Illy!

Anna Kate’s swimming lessons turned into a little something like this!  Never.a.dull.moment.

Here are our happy girls, right before our sweet Anna Kate attempted her first swimming lessons with her preschool teacher’s son, Dylan!

Dylan is a lively senior grad who loves to teach swimming lessons.  We thought it would be the perfect set-up for Rose and Noelle to play in the back yard, while Anna Kate works on getting comfortable in the water.  All was fun and happy until Dylan asked Anna Kate to get in the water.  She looked at me and the tears just started falling as she went into panic mode!  Mrs. Paula came out to help, but Anna Kate was not having it!  She loves the stairs of swimming pools so much that we call her “stair girl.”  Up until now, it has been a wonderful set-up for me to be able to take all three swimming by myself, because I always know where Anna Kate is… but we yearn for her to feel the happiness and freedom of swimming!  Anna Kate is going to require the best swimming lessons that money can by, with Mommy no where in sight.  We decided to spend this summer going slowly, focusing on her just feeling comfortable in the water and emphasizing to her that we will always keep her safe.  Next summer will be the big challenge and hurdle to overcome.  I’m praying I’ll find just the right program to meet her needs.  If any of you local friends have a recommendation, email or text me, please. 

We did have a wonderful night of laughing at Rose and playing with Paula’s puppy, Patriot, once we relaxed and let Anna Kate know that swimming lessons were over… for now.

Everybody loves Rose… she’s always been and always will be full-out and arms wide open!

We had such a blast with the Preston family a couple of weeks ago, just grilling out and playing corn hole in the back yard on a Saturday!  Wish we could do it much more often!

Funny side note: Anna Kate’s sun dress didn’t last long!  She said the ship needed a flag!  She loves doing girlie girl activities, but she doesn’t like jewelry, and she could care less what she wears!  Noelle and Rose are the exact opposite!  Even now, if I pick out shorts for Rose, she’ll look disappointed and say, “Princess dress!” and want me to pick out a dress.  Anna Kate just puts her hands up with it’s time for me to put on her clothes.  Sometimes I’ll ask her if she wants to pick out her outfit, and she’ll say, “You do it, Mommy!”  They are all so sweet and different!

The Preston and The Pond Girls… soon to add up to 6 coming this fall when Ava and Eden’s baby sister is born!  We can’t wait to have another girlfriend in the mix!

We had a little bonus dance class last week!  Anna Kate was done (we had our recital; that was that in her mind, lol), so Rose took her spot for their last little class of the summer.  To say she was a crack-up is an understatement.  She’s not quite there yet, but since it was a free-be class, I thought we’d let her have a little fun with it… and she did! 

She had her eyes on a little brother watching the class.  He kept egging her on that he was going to steal her spot (her green tape), and she gave him looks like, “Don’t you dare try, buddy!”  They were both cracking their moms up!  We couldn’t stop laughing at them and just let it play out.  Fortunately, it was all looks… but did last the entire class.  At least it gave her something to do… because she is 90 to nothing, that kid!

Noelle got to be in charge of ballet, red light, green light!

Back to participating, for a moment!

Now back to protecting her tape!

It’s like she looking at him saying, “Just try to touch my tape… see what will happen!”  They were both taunting each other so much… I’m laughing out loud right now remembering the whole exchange.  Oh Rose… you are so tough.  I wish I was as tough as you are!  I would get my feeling hurt a lot less!  You girls truly teach me how to embrace life and enjoy these crazy days with you munchkins!  Thank God you are here with me! 

So stinky and so cute all packed into once precious bundle!  These pictures are worth a thousand words!  I appreciate your spunk and zest for life!  You’re not messing around.  People pleaser?  Please!  You’re going to do what you feel is best and not think another thought about what other people think about you.  If all us women could be as healthy as our spunky 2 year old.  I joke about you a lot, because you are such a trip, but at the end of the day, if we continue channeling all this spunk and energy into positive outlets, you are going to be on top of the world someday.  We need all different types of people in this world, and I can’t wait until you can help me figure out how you do it, because when I grow up, I want to be just like you are right now!  Thanks for being all God made you to be, full out, with the spunk, with the kisses and cuddles, all of it!  You are Rose Avery Pond, and anyone that has a problem with it needs to back up!  You go girl!

Anna Kate, Emily, Ava and Noelle had a blast swimming at their first cheer function!  Although it was wild and crazy and hard to find our squad, we had a blast meeting some new friends and playing in the water.

Our neighbor, Lesleigh, was there with her 5th grade squad and the girls were SO excited to see her!

Anna Kate and Lesleigh hung out most of the night.  Lesleigh is such a teacher at heart, and Anna Kate has this deathly fear of water, so Lesleigh was determined to help our little buddy out.  Both of them are strong-willed, so I enjoyed giving them some freedom to work together.  In the end, Anna Kate made progress, but won this battle… but everyone we swim with is going to have to help us help Anna Kate feel safe and happy in the water!  I don’t know what we’re going to do with our sweetie pie!  And that’s just the thing, she’s so sweet that we don’t want to terrify her. She has these puppy dog eyes that beg to get out of the water (even if she is being held by someone; she will grab them around the neck and not let go), and it’s just a mess.  Daddy’s going to have a hard time saying no to those eyes when she’s a teenager!

Noelle jumped off the big diving board in 12 foot deep water!  This was a big step for her swimming confidence this summer!  She’s doing great!

Ava is a rock star in the water!  She has a pool in her back yard, so she gets lots of awesome practice.  It was at her house one Monday afternoon, that the girls swam for several hours, and Noelle came home a swimmer.  I’ll never forget the next time Noelle and I swam together was at the Jenkins, and she was comfortably doing the back stroke across the pool. 

Good friends are the best teachers and motivators!

Anna Kate always enjoys water as long as she can touch the bottom.  Stairs are her home, so much so, that last summer, we nicknamed her “Stair Girl.”  It’s not that she would not get in the pool; she was simply always on the stairs.  And she loved it!  Every time I turned around last year, she was always happily playing (all day even) on the stairs.  She’s not getting in the pool, and she’s not getting out.  We’re going to figure it out in its time.  She’s a smart girl, so she will learn to swim when she is ready.  As we were leaving, I told Ava she looked like a nun, and she looked at me so funny and said, “What is a nun?”  I told her I would send a picture to show her so that she could see what I was talking about.  I sent these to her mom last week.  I think I was right on, lol!

I have to say, I’m pretty impressed with Emily and Noelle’s ability to create their own fun while the littles were napping one day last week!

They first built the perfect farm, then decorated their faces as monsters with face paint, and then the big bad monsters destroyed the farm!  They were the most gentle destroyers I’ve ever seen!  I think it was more about the make-up for these divas, ha!

Last week, Rara came to babysit Rose at home so that Mike and I could take our big girls to the Rangers Game!  We used a coupon at Outback before the game, so we could get full on good food (instead of ball park junk), and that way we all got to visit and hear all about Rara and Poppa’s recent trip to England to see the Ebert family!  Noelle was just looking at these pictures and said, “I miss Rara already!”  She also helped me out with some doctor’s appointments and mending and by the time her overnight trip had come to an end, we had accomplished a lot!  Thanks Mommy for all your smiles, hugs, grand daughter sitting (lol), and Mommy time!  You’re the best to drive all that way to help!  Don’t make yourself a stranger now that you are back in the states… you either Poppa!  We missed you guys!

Mike was given these amazing seats, and it was such an amazing experience for Mike and me growing up as life-time fans!

Here’s a picture after we had just found our seats before the game started!  We were soooo excited!

We were 13 rows behind home plate!  It was a great game to be a part of!  The fireworks went off several times, and the Rangers just kept hitting the ball out of the park… and most importantly, we won!  Here’s a picture of the girls with the Rangers Camaro right before the game!

We were this close to Nolan Ryan the entire game.  For those of you not from Texas, he’s the best pitcher there ever was and is in the baseball hall of fame; he is part owner of the Rangers now.  He is in the blue shirt talking to the man in the red shirt, standing up in front of the ball park.  I wonder how many eyes are on him each night?

The girls were SO excited to be headed into the most beautiful ball park in the world!

We let each girl get a special treat for our little baseball date night.  Anna Kate picked cotton candy (I didn’t let her eat all of it; it was so sticky and gross), and Noelle got a lemon chill.  They both shared so they could each get two treats!  They’re learning!

This is how happy they were to have a little sugar in their lives, lol!  Fruit is our sugar at the Pond house, and treats are a big fun deal!

Anna Kate started getting REALLY sleeping and ended up laying in my arms and falling asleep for the first time I can ever remember!  It made my night!  I just kept leaning down and kissing her forehead!  It was a dream come true!  Love when my babies want to snuggle!

Some Ranger fan favorites: Our feisty manager, Ron Washington, always takes up for our team!  It feels good when you feel ripped out of a play, that he comes running out of the dugout kicking and screaming (so to speak).  He’s so entertaining!  When Mike and I were little, there was an old man in the audience (right in front of home plate where we were sitting this time) who was named Zonk.  He would always get the crowd going with his awesome drum.  Tonight, the girls met Sister Frances, the next audience drummer for the Rangers.  She told us Zonk passed down his drum to her in 2002, and she’s had season tickets to drum along with the fans, organ and fun player’s music before they bat ever since!  I saw another older man eyeing the special attention she was getting.  I think he may want to carry on the tradition when she’s ready to pass on the drum. 

These hats Noelle and Mike are wearing cost $20 with supreme nachos inside.  I saw some little teenage boys eating their nachos when we first walked in and thought, “They aren’t going to want those pink hats, and they would be great for popcorn at home!”  So I took Noelle and Anna Kate over to them with me and asked if we could have their hats when they’re done with their nachos, which of course, they were like, Oh, yeah!  Pink, get it away, lol!  So we anxiously waited for them to finish, said our thanks as we got them, and went to the bathroom to wash them clean.  The girls loved having them for the rest of the game!  We looked for a third to bring to Rose after the ball game, but we couldn’t find one.  The hostess says the pink hats are always the first to go!  People were down on our level snatching all kids of plastic cups and red ice cream hat helmets.  Washing out two hats of nachos was about all I could stomach, but being resourceful is the key to success for me! 

Of course, the dot race is a favorite tradition to everyone young and old!  The girls got red tonight.  They cheered and cheered, and red ended up winning!  It was a win-win all the way around!  Go Rangers!  Cheers to a fun family night at the ballpark!  We missed you, Rose!  Can’t wait to bring you next year!