My favorite pictures from a wonderful Saturday.

Hey, Nat! Are you ready for the hay rack ride?!?

******** Nana and the girls

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Allie and my friend Lacey.

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Exploring with Dad.

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Playing in the water with Kyndal. Nat and Kyndal got along GREAT and played all day!

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My life-long friend Sarah (on the right) and my new friend Jaime (whom I finally got to meet IN PERSON this weekend....and I liked her just as much as I thought I would!! And Vanessa fell completely in love with her!)

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Quite possibly my favorite picture of the entire weekend.

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Just look at that happy face and those chubby thighs!!

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My beautiful little Pixie ready to take a hay rack ride.

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All the kiddies. Notice the lack of boys!

(Allison, Kyndal, Kali, Vanessa, Natalie, Jamie, and Taylor)
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Lovin' on Nana.

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She is so photogenic! Especially when she is having this much fun!

Many tears.

My baby graduated from Pre-K yesterday and I'm still crying. I started yesterday morning in the van after I dropped her off for her last day/dress rehearsal. I thought I was done until a couple of minutes ago when I was reading another woman's blog about HER daughter graduating preschool and well she was doing with it. I thought "good for her" as more tears leaked from my eyes. I cried when Natalie was sad she wasn't going to see her teacher or her friends any more. I cried when that made me realize that I wasn't going to be seeing any of the parents that I had come to know and like throughout the year. I even cried when she was upset they didn't have a snack on the last day due to getting out early for the graduation ceremony.

I have obviously kept most of this crying away from Natalie. I don't want her to be upset about something that should only be fun and exciting. She couldn't even begin to understand if I explained to her that I was mourning the passing of a big stage in her life and that I was not ready to accept the next stage she is moving towards. Full day Kindergarten scares the crap out of me and August seems much too soon to be sending my little girl out into the world without being by her side the majority of the time. I realize that after a while it will get easier and I will more than likely come to look forward to the breaks it will give me. Right now all I see is my baby girl growing up and I am not accepting it well.

I love this child

Driving on the way to Natalie's dairy farm field trip last Friday we passed an animal lying in the street that had been hit by a car. Natalie asked what it was. Not wanting to get into it I just said I wasn't sure. As she gazed out the window she shrugged and said very casually, "must have been a dead lemur."

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Every year we go to the opening day River Festival sun down parade and this year was no different. At one point in the parade there was a group of Harley riding men in wigs (yeah.). One of the burly men wearing a long blond wig held up his fingers and gave Natalie the peace sign. Natalie smiled and did it back to him. She then turned to me and was all excited, "We just said 'two' to each other!!"

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An essential part of Natalie's, Vanessa's and my bedtime routine is snuggling up together on my bed and reading three or four books. They take turns picking the books and sometimes I veto them altogether and we read what I choose. The other night it was Vanessa's turn to pick and we read a Valentine's Day Dora book. They both enjoyed it and participated throughout. At the very end Dora and Boots are having a picnic. Dora is sitting on her knees and Natalie pointed to her with certainty. "She is going to have bad knees when she gets older." Apparently her teacher tells her that at school. I love that she is already concerned about the health of not only hers, but also Dora's, knees.

All in the name of getting my kids to eat.

Natalie is one of the pickiest people I know. Everything drives her insane. The little bumps on her socks where they are seemed at the toes makes her cry in agony. A twist in her seat belt has her screeching and screaming. And then there are mealtimes. She has a select variety of foods she will ingest willingly and trying something new requires me to go to drastic measures to make it fun and exciting. And even then she will moan and pout about how she knows she won't like it because it's GROSS!!!!

One of the tools I use to get her to eat is a theme meal. I make something new and create other dishes that go along with it. It makes it an event rather than an ambush (because that is how she views my attempts to get her to eat). Since the girls seem to like these fun mealtimes I use them quite often, new foods included or not. Today's lunch theme was "Orange you glad your mama feeds you?". All the foods were orange, or a variation of it. They ate bagel bites, mandarin oranges, carrot sticks, goldfish crackers, and fruit punch. They ate happily and I was satisfied they were eating something at least a little healthier than candy or Happy Meals. Score one for me!