1 girl & 1 boy or 2 girls???

The question I ask myself as I look at these two pictures is do I have two girls? What happened to my little buddy Cameron??

Taylor and Cameron both had friends over some how Brianna and Taylor convinced Cameron to dress up like a girl including makeup and nail polish. It was so funny! It was scary how good they made him up. The pictures arent that great but in real........ Taylor had to pay Cameron $4 to be able to take a picture of him dressed up. :) After he was done with his photo shoot, the door bell rang. You should have seen his mortified look wondering if it was one of his buddies! He was a good sport and showed the mom's in the neighborhood his look. He kind of freaked when he remembered he had a baseball game that night and was franctically getting the polish off his fingers! ha, ha, ha!! It was hilarious.

Black & Blue

Cameron was playing with the neighbors on Friday evening. They decided they wanted to golf. Cameron was helping Brady tee up when Ian decided he was ready to swing. He whacked the ball and ball was a direct hit in Cameron's eye. These pictures were taken this evening (Sunday). Each day the eye gets a little more black and blue. Duane will be home on Wednesday evening. Who knows what color it will be by then. This is Camerons first black eye so I thought I better get a picture. I am sure there will be many more in the years to come.

Level 6 States - Gymnastics

Taylor finished her last meet and is now ready to move to Level 7! She now considers herself an optionals gymnast. She competed against all 9 year olds in the state of PA (that qualified)at this meet. Well, actually she was in the senior side of 9 years old. Anyway, she ended up 8th place in All- Around with 3rd place on Beam(9.375) and 4th place on floor(9.2). Her goal was to get a 36.00 all around, she was just short with a 35.925. We are really proud of her. She did not fall off the beam once this year in any competition (two years in a row now). When she was a level 4 she STAYED on the beam only once the whole season in competitions.

Baseball Season

I am finally uploading my pictures to my computer from my camera. I thought this picture was so cute of Cam and wanted to share. He is playing coach pitch baseball and is on the A's team. He is really enjoying it. This picture was taken before his first game.

Picture Tag -

I got tagged to go to my pictures and find certain ones. I had to go to the 6th folder and use the 6th picture and do the same with the 7th folder and the 7th picture. I was wondering what picture was going to show up. It was kind of fun!! Thanks for the tag, Dawn!!

Here is the 7th folder and 7th picture. It is of Taylor on the last day of school in first grade. This is a picture of her and her teacher, Mrs. Perry. I ask the teachers to write down some things that they remember of Taylor from through out the school year. I take a picture of the kids with their teacher and place it all together in a scrap book.


This is from the 6th folder and is the 6th picture. Cameron and his neighborhood buddies were trying to go over a jump with their bikes. Here is Cameron and his perfect landing!!! :-) At least, he does have a helmet on! It was pretty funny to watch! He did eventually get it.

MoNsTeR JaM FiNaLS

Here is the pictures I promised earlier of Cameron's birthday to Monster Jam World Finals in Las Vegas this past weekend. We left early Thursday morning for our flight to Las Vegas. We had been in the air for about 30-45 minutes when the pilot came on and said we were landing in Pittsburgh. This was not on the plans. A few minutes later, he came on and said we were having electrical failure and were landing in five minutes. It was all uneventful - thank goodness. After landing, they told us, we would needed to switch planes. As we were deplaining, the pilot was there and he looked quite stressed. Also, Cameron noticed that they had people dressed in the gray fire suits. He pointed them out to us. We arent sure what really happened but we were glad to be on the ground. We made our flight to Chicago and made the Las Vegas connection without any problems. As were getting ready to land in Las Vegas, that was pretty rough. If that had been Pittsburgh, I would have been very nervous. We made it and was ready to have some fun. We ended up in the "cowboy" suite at our hotel. The pictures of it are on Duane's camera and not sure how to download them. The room had bunk beds, which Cameron spoke for the top bunk. It had the split rail wooden posts all around the room with a cowboy themed border and bedspreads. It was quite cute and very spacious.
After checking in, we went to lunch. We then headed to Planet Hollywood Casino because we had tickets to the evening's Ultimate Variety show. We weren't sure where we were going or how long it would take. Once there, the kids decided they wanted to see the animal show, too. The kids really enjoyed this. It had different animals doing different tricks, jugglers, and other kids entertainment. We had to wait an hour for our other show so we walked around the mall inside Planet Hollywood. It made it seem like you were outside. It is much cooler than Ceaser's Palace!!! The Ultimate show was good but the kids didnt get half of the comedy stuff. It was way over there heads. It was supposed to be the best show for kids. All in all, it was a fun day. The kids were up bright and early the next morning. They were still on PA time zone. The Monster Truck Double Down didnt start till noon. It was a long morning. They were so excited but driving each other and us batty!! :-) I took them down to the exercise room to burn some energy. It did seem to help, slightly! At 9:30, we finally left for the Monster Jam. We knew we would be standing in line but then they would at least be there. When we got there it was quite cool. We had shorts and t-shirts for the day. I had packed our jackets for later in the evening. We ended up using them for the entire the day. After standing in line for about a half hour, Taylor and I decided to go sit in the car and let the boys stand in line. It was much warmer in there! Finally, it was time for the gate to open. Yea!! Taylor and Cameron ran straight for Grave Diggers tent, they wanted to get his signature first. He is Camerons favorite. Duane and I tried to follow them but they were long gone. Parents werent supposed to run. We (Duane and I) finally reached the the tent, Cameron and Taylor were the third 'family' in line. They looked quite pleased with themselves!! :-) After Grave Diggers signature and picture we headed for Maximum Destruction. We had to wait a little longer in this line but it wasnt to bad. He knocked Cameron's Grave Digger hat off his head as he stepped up to get his signature. (Max D and Grave Digger are the two most popular trucks). When it was time for pictures. Tom Meents put his Max D hat over Cameron's hat. We all had a good laugh. The drivers are all very friendly and joke with the kids. The kids had fun going around getting pictures and signatures. We did this for most of the day. The kids also made posters for the actual jam to hold in the air. They had all sorts of different bounce houses for the kids to play on. Later that evening, we watched the qualifying of trucks for the race portion for Saturday evening. By then, it was quite chilly, I am so glad I packed a blanket with us. It was a lot of fun. Donkey Kong posted the fastest qualifying time.
On Saturday morning, we took the kids to Sunset Station where they have a huge play area for kids. We checked them in and wondered around the casino. Duane and I decided to go get breakfast but they wanted $15 per person for the buffet. We werent that hungry so ended up spending almost $15 at Starbucks instead. We thought it was quite funny or crazy. We decided to play the slots for a bit but that wasnt to exciting. We lost a total of $5, big gamblers we are. I think if we would have been winning it would have held our attention a lit longer. We picked the kids up after an hour and half and headed to Monster Jam!! Saturday was much nicer weather wise. It was warm and sunny. Duane and I have slight sunburns to show for it. At least the kids didnt get burned. We finished getting the signatures that we missed on Friday. We also got pictures of the kids with the trucks. The kids wanted to go bowling, so off we go. Taylor won the first game. She had 2 strikes in row. WOW! This was her best game ever. Cameron won the second game. Duane and I watched the kids. They had fun. Back to the Monster Jam for the Finals.
We got there early but they had a lot of entertainment for us so the time went by quickly. The racing was a lot fun to watch. Duane's favorite TAZ ended up in a tree and had to be taken to the hospital. He ended up being okay but unable to do freestyle. During the final race for the championship, it was between Maximum Destruction and Captain's Curse. As Captains Curse was making his way around the turn, he went out of control and ended up in the stands. No people were seated in the area. They block off the lower section with blue tarps. Good thing! The camera man went running as he watched the truck come towards him. Alex Blackwell wasnt injured. Yea! It took a while for them to get his truck out of the stands. It did quite a bit of damamge to the railing. oops. Max D won the racing portion. Now onto Freestyle. This is where thr trucks go over jumps and smash all the objects in the arena. They basically go till there trucks can go no more. Either they have flat tires, tires fall off or most end upside down. US Airforce Afterburner won this portion. He gave a great performance. It was a lot of fun!! After the freestyle portion, Max D came back out and did the first ever Monster Truck back flip. It was awesome. Sunday morning came to quickly and back to PA without much excitement. It was very fun and fast mini vacation! Here are the pictures.
Cam's favorite
Taylor's favorite

Cam and Dennis Anderson

They have Monster Trucks there that they allow you go to for a ride in. They take you over some hills and do donuts. It is quite a bumpy ride!!

My favorite is Monster Mutt

Duane's favorite is TAZ

The kids making their posters

Taylor getting Madusa's signature

Cameron getting Dennis Anderson's signture!!

Spring Cleaning

I got this hair brained idea at the first of the week to begin my spring cleaning. I was thinking it would be one, maybe two days at the most. It is now Thursday evening and I am 2/3 done! I was trying to figure out why my house was so dirty and very dusty in corners and ceilings.etc.... It finally hit me! This is the longest I have ever lived in one place since moving out of state. I also realized that I havent given my house the really good cleaning that it needs because of that! I have moved so much and that was when I would do my cleaning and purging. I now understand how people accumulate so much "junk" and how it ends up where it does. :-)

It has been fun going room to room and giving it a good scrub. The hard part is at the end of day, it doesnt look at that much different. I keep thinking it should look so much cleaner and shinier. I made the mistake and asked the kids if they thought the house looked any different. You guessed it, their answer was "No, not really... is it suppose to?".

Today was Taylors room, she wasnt to happy that I made her help me. I wanted to go through her closet and figure out what would fit for this summer and things she had outgrew. She is a major pack rat, she doesnt want to part with anything. I had to convince that we would go shopping in Las Vegas next week if we got rid of some of her clothes. Well, that changed her tune pretty quickly. Next thing I knew we had a big garbage sack of clothes. A friend came by and we gave them to her for her daughter. She was thrilled. Her daughter has never recieved hand me downs and was very excited. I had told Michele to give back what she didnt want. I would give them to Good Will. She brought Cameron home and said Grace loved everything and wanted everything!! Ahh!! It made Taylor feel really good. I dont think Duane will be to happy when I tell it what it is going to cost him. hee, hee!!!

Tomorrow is Camerons room, it should be pretty quick. He isnt picky or choosy!! Then it is down to the basement. I asked the kids to help me go through some of their toys. I asked if they thought they were ready to throw away any toys, out came the look of horror! I quickly suggested that we donate their OLD toys to Good Will. They were fine with that idea. As I am typing this Taylor said they were going to go down and start going through their toys!! YEA!!! Maybe I will done sooner than the weekend. The end is in sight!