Swing Batter Batter Batter!

We have been all about baseball at our house lately! Between the Rangers in the World Series and Jackson's practices and games, we just can't get enough. 

Here are a few pics of Jacks from a game 3 weeks ago...a couple of action shots at bat, and then one of him looking a bit bored in the outfield.

And then, 2 weeks later, you can see we had some different weather because Jacks is wearing long sleeves under his jersey! But these are fun because you can actually see the baseball in a few of them (he hit them, but they went foul). He looks so big and tough here! 

Here's Jacks, AKA "Slugger," Dodgers #26.

Jacks and one of his good friends and teammates, Stephen.

And I just had to share this....Anthony has been an assistant coach on Jackson's teams for the last few years, but he coached at the last game because our head coach couldn't make it. And guess what? Under Coach Anthony's leadership, the Dodgers got their first win of the season!!!!

He looks so big and tough here, doesn't he? ;)

Go Dodgers! Go Jackson! 

Cody = Student of the Month!

Cody's teacher picked him to be the September Student of the Month for his class. The SOTMs are those who best demonstrate their school motto of being respectful, responsible, life-long learners. Yay Cody!

The Students of the Month from all the classes around the school come and stand in the hallway before the Spirit Assembly (which celebrates the SOTMs), and they cheer and wave pompoms and signs as the classes all walk into the gym.  

Here's Cody waving his clapper....

Cody was nice enough to let Luke stand next to him and cheer, although he doesn't exactly look thrilled about it, does he?

Do you see how much bigger Cody is than the other First Grade SOTMs standing next to him?

Our school mascot is a tiger.

So at the Spirit Assemblies, all the kids have Tiger Paws that they wave around. Paws up!

Here's the VIP section where the SOTMs sit. Cody's in the front row, 3rd from the right. Again, he looks kind of underwhelmed about it all, don't you think?

Cody really doesn't enjoy all the attention. He's proud of himself, but he doesn't like everyone looking at him and he feels really uncomfortable about it all. Whereas Luke, if he ever is chosen for something like this, will be leading a freakin' conga line of SOTMs across the stage. LOL It never ceases to amaze me how different siblings can be! 

Cody has just been wowing us all in First Grade. Not only was he chosen as his class' first SOTM, his teacher also sent us "Tiger Mail." It's an email to parents celebrating a kiddo's accomplishments, and the teacher cc's the principal on the message. Then the principal calls the student down to the office for a more personal recognition and a little prize (a tiger pencil). 

Cody certainly is Tigerific, and we're very proud of him! 

Wordless Wednesday

Texas State Fair 2011

We look forward to the State Fair all year, and today was finally the day! The boys were so excited.

First, we tried out a few rides. After a disastrous attempt at a little rollercoaster we THOUGHT was a relatively gentle one that turned out to be quite spinny, jolty and rough (Cody was NOT happy), we chose to stick with the simple pleasures of monster trucks that go around in a slow, small circle.

And then Jackson used his awesome pitching skills to pop some balloons with a hacky sack (yep), and he won...a banana. 

See the resemblance? Jacks named him Banana Fred (instead of banana BREAD...get it?).

Jackson, Luke and I rode the giant ferris wheel, the Texas Star. It's SOOOOOOOOO big! 

Check out the view from the top! Hello Downtown Dallas!

Lukey said, "Hey look, we can see the Eiffel Tower!" To Luke, all tall skinny towers are the Eiffel Tower. :)

It was a fun ride! Even Banana Fred loved it. 

Though we always enjoy the corn dogs, pretzels, funnel cake and cotton candy, we usually avoid any of the deep-fried options the fair is known for.

Seriously? Fried chicken skin? Who thought that was a good idea? EW.

We said howdy to Big Tex.

We visited the car show and the dog show, and we checked out some beautiful quilts and a life-size lady and her cow carved out of butter. Wow! That's not something you see every day!

We always have fun at the fair!

Arboretum Pumpkin Patch

Last weekend, we headed over to the Arboretum to get a taste of fall with their beautiful displays.

There were horses made out of hay!

And sunflowers...of a different flavor than we're used to seeing!

And of course, many, many, MANY pumpkins!

The boys were real troupers and posed in a million different places for me.

We were so excited to have Kate-Kate with us! She makes everything twice as fun. :)

And some individual shots of my handsome boys!

And look, Anthony and I were there, too!

Now here's a little blast from the past...this next shot is one from 2 1/2 years ago. Look how Lukey's little eyes barely peek over the windowsill! 

And here's this past weekend looking out of the same treehouse window:

How time flies! Happy Fall to All!