EASTER, First GAME, and COMPETIONS

Easter weekend Ryan and I took the kids to the zoo in Tyler.  We have been a million times but we love it!

Ryan and the kids.  Take note that Blake still not looking at the camera.  I think he does it just to torture me!

Of course if he is looking at the camera we have to have the fake smile that looks like someone has said "smile right now or I will hurt you"  (again I firmily believe that this came from a how to torture mommy class)  I just cant believe how big they both look in these pictures.

Easter Morning we went to church and then came home and hunted eggs.  Some of the eggs had confetti in them.  I thought this was a great idea because I have such fond memories of confetti eggs at my church festival when I was their age, however I did not factor in that the confetti would end up falling from hair and clothing for the rest of the day.  Needless to say the living room was swept many times that day!  Oh well they had fun.

Blake running to find the next egg, Kenedy getting her little brother with the confettie egg.

The next day was the much anticipated First T-ball game.  Blake is absolutely loving it. 

Blake right before the "big game"

The big game is what Blake calls EVERY game.  When I pick him up from school now he says "mommy today do I have my "big game?"  Fourtantely for him he has 2 "big games" a week all the way till the middle of May. 

         walking up to bat the first time                       The fisrt swing          

                            

                                    running to 1st base                                  his first time to run to home

The best thing about T-ball for me is that he loves to be cheered for.  I have strict instructions upon arrival of the game to make sure I yell go Blakers.  When he hits the ball the first thing he does is look at me so that I will start yelling.  It is very funny.  I am also amazed at how fast he runs.  One of the coaches even asked what we did to get him to run so fast.  (I of course having the personality that I do told him we chase him around the house trying to spank him)  He did know that I was kidding and has not reported us.  (that I'm aware of anyway) 

Kenedy is also haveing huge success in dance and Gymnastics.  At her last Gymnastics compition she got 2nd place on her floor routine.  She amazes me with the confidence that she has to get out in front of people and do the things that she does.  I dont think that even as an adult I could do the things that she does.  What is even more intersting is that if you really know her she is very shy and does not even talk to people she does not know, but something happens to her when she does gymanstics and dance.  I'm glad she has something that she can show such a different side of herself. 

Kenedy winnign 2nd.  I could not get her attention to look at me.  (Blake is giving her lessons)

This weekend she had a dance competion.  She received 1st place in her Jazz Solo and 4th place overall the 7 & 8 year old solos!  All 3 of her group numbers (ballet, Jazz, and Clogging) also received 1st place. 

I left this one big but it is still hard to see (Sorry in my hurry I did not zoom) she is the 2nd one from the left.  This is her 4th place overall award.

Here she is afterwards with all her trophies.  She had to set them on the ground for the picture because she could not hold them all.  Her last dance is next weekend and then it is time for a some weekends spent at home.  I am really looking forward to this. 

Ryan is almost done with Track (beg. of May) and maybe just maybe things will slow down a bit (I realize this is not really going to happen, it's okay though I really dont mind!)

Spring, Birthdays, and Braces

I am so thankful for spring.  I love the warmth and the sunshine, it makes me feel so happy. Kenedy and Blake are loving it too.  One of the first warm days Blake had his four wheeler out and Kenedy had her bike.  They both had a great time.

Over Spring break I got a new car, It's not new new but it's new to me and I could not be happier.  For those of you who don't know I have been wanting an SUV since the day we got rid of my Tahoe.  I could not have been happier when Ryan bought me my Ford Expedition.  Here is Blake showing it off:

Thanks to G-Mom, Ryan and I also got a night to ourselves over spring break.  We went to Dinner, and the boats in Shreveport, and spent the night.  This is all so rare I thought we should take a picture.  Of course the only way to do this was for one of us to hold the camera (apparently my camera has a timer but I did not know how to work it, oh well)

We ended spring break with a birthday party for Blake.  even though it was a whole week and a half  before he actually turned 4.  We had it at a place called Kids Station.  It is basically an indoor playground.  Lots of slides, climbing things, games etc.  Everyone had a fantastic time including the parents.  (Okay so the parents found this game called Deal or no Deal.  It worked like the game show where you pick a case only instead of the amount being in dollars it was for tickets.  I'm pretty sure we used more tokens than the kids did)

After Spring break it was back to reality.  School, gymnastics, Dance, T-ball (still working on getting pictures)  I spend all of practice cheering Blake on.  He will look at me and wait for me to yell GO BLAKE!  It's really quite hysterical.  The actual games start next week and I will be sure to have my camera ready. 

Other Hot news...Kenedy got her Braces!  She is so excited.  She has been stressing for a month over what color rubber bands to get.  I am not joking when I tell you that she put ALOT of thought into this very important decision.  Every night she would say I could get red and pink but that is too Valentine's.  Or I could get yellow and white (yellow is her favorite color) but that might make my teeth look like I did not brush them.  I can only imagine what she will be like planning her wedding if  rubber bands for your teeth are such a big deal.  Well the verdict is in and she went with (pink and green)

Great Spring Colors.  Now she has 7 weeks to decide what colors will be next!  She was such a trooper and has not been too sore.  Kenedy also had another big milestone, she got her own cell phone.  This is something Ryan and I have been discussing for the last few months and Kenedy has been asking for 3 years.  We decided that now was a good time.  With her doing so many activities especially gymnastics being in another town, and me having to have her one place and Blake in another (Ryan's in Track season and not available 2 nights a week)  This was just a good time to try it out.  She is so excited!

And last on this update My BABY turned 4 yesterday.  4 can you believe it?  It brings tears to my eyes.  In honor of his 4th birthday (it really was  not planned and just happened to fall on this day) I enrolled Blake at my school for next year.  He will be going to Pre-K.  I have 2 children in school.  That just sounds Crazy.  I mean I know I'm not old enough to have a 2 children in school and no children at home.  Where did the time go?  Sadly it seems to go faster and faster every year! On Blake's real birthday Blake got the soccer ball and net he wanted.  So I will end with some pictures of Kenedy and Blake playing together:

BUSY! BUSY! BUSY!

Well life in the Marion house just might have more going on now then during football season, if that's even possible. Let's see Kenedy's 2nd gymnastic's compition went better than the first.  She improved her bars, beam vault, and floor score by 1 to 2 points for each event.  She scored 11th on bars, 10th on beam and vault, and 5th on floor.  We are so proud of her.  I am an including a vidio of her floor routine, (Thanks Nikki for your instructions, your the best!,  She scored a 7.2.
Kenedy's Floor routine
You will have to click on this link and it will take you to youtube where I have the vidio downloaded. 

Next Blake went to a birthday party for a friend at school.  It was a Mario Party. Here Blake is pinning the mustache on Mario and then Making his own personal Pizza.

Kenedy had to deliver some Girl Scout cookies to G-Mom's Work so we made a quick 1 day trip to Killeen.  Blake liked playing This little Piggy with Baby Troy.

I cut Troy's head off in the first picture so I tried to stage the next picture and have Blake come back and play Piggy's again (knowing I wanted to put it on the blog)  Blake was already intersted in watching something else so as you can see Blake is not looking at Troy anymore but I got Troy's face.  So much for Spontanous photo's.

Kenedy and Jacob had a great time together as usually.  They are getting so big and grown-up. 

I thought it was kinda funny that Jacob is pointing his nerf gun at the camera while Kenedy is throwing the peace sign. 

This past weekend Kenedy had her first Dance compition.  She performed her Jazz Solo.  In Dance everyone recieves a trophy based on thier score so Kenedy got top first.  Dance is new to me and I'm not sure of the order of awards but it must have been good because she also recieved 5th place in her 7-8year old age division. 

Here is Kenedy in the dressing room.

I have also included a vidio of her Solo performance.  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPRe9gStVH8 (click on this link to view Dance Solo)

For those family members who have been asking me to give you the dates of her next performances here they are.

Gymnastics: in Allan March 27th,

Mesquite April 10th and if she makes it to state that meet will be May 1st in Garland

Dance: In Tyler April 17th

and Ft Worth April 24th

Yes that's right folks 4 weekends in a row starting on April 10th. 

Blake starts T-ball practice on Monday.  His team is the Pirates and he is super excited about that. As soon as we get a t-ball schedule I will share it with you. 

 If I'm sane at the end of this school year,  we will be on a long break.  Until Aug.  Kenedy will be Sad but I will be resting! 

I promise I will take Plenty of Pictures of upcomming events and post them.  Oh and one more piece of exciting news.  Kenedy has been begging to go away to camp.  She wanted it to be a gymnastics one but  one of the one's that is recommend has WAY to many girls at it for me to feel comfortable leaving her.  (maybe in a few years)  The next one you did not stay the night at so Kenedy was not intersted.  Well we have settled on a Girlscout camp.  She will get to swim, horseback ride, hayride, ride horses, go to a petting zoo, crafts, etc.  But most importantly to her she will get to stay for 5 nights and 6 days.  I tried to get her to got to a shorter one (like 3days) but she informed me that she wanted to be away for longer than that.  I'm a nervous wreck and she is PUMPED!  She has been telling everyone about it.  The only comfort I have is that I have talked her my friend Kristi into letting her daughter Alli go too.  (technically Kenedy's 3rd cousin, but that sounds like we are from hickville).  Alli is just a year older than Kenedy and they have always been close even though we live 5 hours from each other.  I'm sure they will have a blast.  (while I sit at home and cry!)  Good thing I'll have Blake with me to make me laugh.  Speaking of Let me end with a comment from Blake the comedian:  While sitting at luch today, Kenedy was telling us all she had learned about Texas: the state flower, tree, seal, etc  Well Blake pipes in "I dont know what ya'll are talking about but it's sure boring!"

Gymnastics, Skating, and SNOW

Well Kenedy's first meet went well.  She looked adorable of course and she got a real eye opener to some tough competion but she had a GREAT time and is excited about her next one (Feb 20th)  This shot is on of her on beam.  I failed to charge the video camera and so we only had enough battery to record her floor routine, which was too long to upload onto blogspot.  I will have to get the help of my friend Nikki to find out how she utubes her video's on (Nikki feel free to e-mail me those directions :)

Last weekend we went back to Dallas for Avery's 4th Birthday party.  It was at the skating rink and the kids had fun.  They had this awesome contraption to help you learn how to skate (see pics below of Blake using it)  It sure made the day easy since Blake could get around super fast and there was no falling.  Kenedy also figured out how to skate on her own and she is super proud of herself!

We do not know the man beside Blake he just happened to be in my picture:)

   

Lynsey Kristi and I decided we could not let the kids have all the fun so we put on skates and joined them (plus Ryan bet me that I did not know how to skate anymore, so I had a point to prove, He lost)

We unexpectedly got 6 inches of snow on Friday and Ryan and the kids had a great time playing in it (I happily volunteered to take the pictures since I dont like the cold.)

Kenedy and Blak

My snow Angels

They worked hard and did a great job. 

After the snow man building of course there had to be a snowball fight!

And then Ryan brought our the boogy board from the beach and pulled the kids on it like a sled.  They loved it!  Here is Rye and Blake

And Finally we finished the week off with Kenedy going to a Birthday party. She is getting so big!  This weekend she will go to her 2nd meet and I will do better with the video camera so you can see her in action.  Also Blake signed up for t-ball this week we will soon be able to post pictures and video of him as well.

One last thing (ignore the dates on my pictures, my camera battery died and when I replaced the batteries I did not fix the date.  I will make sure I take care of this technical difficulty prior to the next post.

OVERDUE UPDATE!

An update to our blog page is long overdue.  It seems that I have had a hard time shaking the holiday's off.  I have not been motivated to due anything, But I'm ready to force myself to get back into action.  Lets see, what has been going on...

Well we had our Bulldog State Celebration and here is our family picture with both state trophies!

Unfortunately this is the only picture I have taken in a couple of weeks (so unlike me).  I promise I will be back to my old self in no time, and the weekly updates with pictures will be back on track! 

What else has been happening well Ryan's Parents came and Ryan and his dad found the sewer line and began laying pipe for the bathroom being built in our bedroom (Thnaks Papa)!  Ryan has been steadly working everyday on the bathroom and it is coming along.  I had know Idea that so much went into putting pipes in and getting water to a new spot.  (I still dont know because I have helped none, but Ryan has worked very hard and I'm VERY appreciative!)  So far all pipes are in and we now have a shower.  I'll take pictures when it is completed. 

Blake LOVES, LOVES, LOVES the Wii.  He know things about it that Ryan and I dont know how to do.  His new favorite game is the Madden football game.  I dont even know how to make the guys throw the ball and Blake can score touch downs and tackel the other team. 

Kenedy has her first gymnastics meet this weekend Jan 30th in Dallas.  She is very excited, Dont worry I will take plenty of pictures and will even try to video some of it and post it on here.  Kenedy's other big news is that she will be getting braces on her top teeth.  She is THRILLED and even asked if they could do it that day.  She was disappointed to find out she had to wait a few weeks.  We will do braces on four of her top teeth for a year and then a full set of braces on top and bottom when she is around 11. 

I hope everyone is doing great and I promise I am back to weekly updates!

Christmas Break

I hope that everyone had a wonderful Christmas and a Happy New Year!  This has been a very busy 2 weeks for the Marion's.  The day before we got out of school Aunt Re came for a visit.  Unfortunately the 2 and 1/2 hour trip from the airport turned into 5 hours due to a wreck on the highway :(  she made it safe and sound.  The kids loved having her all to themselves and of course they get to do what ever they want.  Here they are cooking with Re.

I am aware that everyone's eyes are closed but it's the only one I got.  Maybe it's what made the food taste so good. 

Then of course the Bulldogs took on the Graham Steers for the State Championship and WON!  Congrats to Ryan and All the Bulldog coaches and players for their hard work.  BACK TO BACK STATE CHAMPS!

The next day we celebrated Kendy's 8th birthday at the Waterpark with her friends and cousins.

water park party day

after that we traveled around the state to celebrate Christmas with Family First we went to Killeen to be with my family, then home so the kids could wake up Christmas Morning at our house and then we went to Ryan's parents and spent some time there for Christmas.  (My parents are 4 hours away going towards central Texas, back 4 hours to east Tx where we live and the 5 hours to west Texas to be with Ryan's Parents)  Whew thats alot of driving.  At one point we were so tired we let Chewy drive (Blake's Dog)

kidding but thought the picture was cute.

Kenedy, Blake, Jacob and baby Troy with Santa at my moms

Santa brought Kenedy a set of Gymnastics bars for Christmas she loves them and has been practicing every day (the days we have been home anyway)

Santa brought Blake a 4 wheeler.  Lord help me when he really is driving.  He is fearless. 

At MiMi and Papa's they had all 9 of their grandkids together WOW!  I think Christmas is the only time we are all together at one time.  I wish we lived closer so we could see each other more.  The kids had such a great time together!

They are lined up oldest to youngest with the exception of Morgan holding baby Tag.  The newest edition to the Underwood family.  Lets see that puts Rance with 2 children, Ryan and I with 2 children and Mitzi and Robert with 5 children.  Whew thats a lot of grandkids in one house.  Luckily Papa built a play room for them all set up with a Wii and everything. 

Since Tag is the newest edition to the family I felt he needed his own debut picture.

Oh my goodness he is so CUTE!

Well the break has been wonderful and I'm not sure that I'm ready to go back to crazy schedules of Work, gymnastics, Dance, School, and t-ball but since Monday is just around the corner I guess I better get ready! I hope that everyones 2010 is filled with as many blessings as 2009 brought my family and I.  I love each of you and look forward to keeping you posted on the Marion's Family in 2010!

 One last picture before I go.

Blake got a much needed hair cut.  Isnt he the cutest!