We took Ethan and his friend Zane down for a hike and swim in the Barton Creek Greenbelt at the Twin Falls access point over memorial day weekend. We have been getting lots of rain, and the creek is really high. It is a great time to go for a swim. We all hiked down the trail to the creek. They boys both found good walking sticks which proved to be handy.

Here we are at a portion of the creek where the water was flowing pretty fast. Ethan decided to check it out by hanging on a tree branch. No, it is not as dangerous as it looks - the water is very shallow here.

Here are the boys testing out the water with their walking sticks; it was pretty chilly!

They decide to take the plunge!

We both swam with the boys. I even enjoyed it despite the cold water.

Ethan had his Kindergarden show last week on 5/26/2007. Each of the Kindergarden classes assembled in the gym for a series of songs - one song was "A Whole New World" from Aladdin. Then, each of the classes sang a song about colors. Ethan's class was the color blue. The class wore blue tie dye shirts and blue and white whale hats.

After the show, we headed to Ethan's classroom for cookies and juice. Here is Ethan in his classroom with dad.

The big surprise for Ethan was that grandpa Ed from Florida appeared at the show. Ethan was standing in line in the hallway and grandpa Ed walked by. Ethan was really suprised - he smiled and waved really big and then gave grandpa Ed a hug. Ethan's last day of Kindergarden was Friday, May 25th 2007. We are on to summer and then first grade...

Last Friday was Field Day for the Kindergardeners at Cox Elementary. Ethan was so exicted! They had multiple obstacle courses and some water courses as well. Ethan picked out this outfit - glasses, hat, and all for the adventure.

We had Ethan's last soccer game for Spring 07 over the weekend. Ethan's team won (Ethan scored several goals). It was a good game; the teams were evenly matched in terms of skill level. Here is a shot of the team and coach Tara (minus two players).

Here are some shots of Ethan in action on the field. Here is Ethan going for the goal. He gets past the red team member and SCORES!!

Here is Ethan signaling to his team mate that he is open for the pass.

Here Ethan is ready for the kick off. Probably the funniest moment of the entire game was when Ethan put two fingers towards his eyes and then pointed the two fingers back at an opposing team member just before the kick off as if to say "I have my eyes on you." The entire crowd was very amused.

After the game, the team had a cook out and awards ceremony with cupcakes.

Here is Ethan showing of his medal (complete with blue cupcake frosting on his face).

After eating and awards, the kids headed for the playground. Ethan is doing one of his playground favorites - the monkey bars.

Here is Ethan jumping on a inflatable bouncer with his friend Zane during his 6th birthday party.

Ethan had his sixth birthday party this year. I cannot believe he is already six. Time really goes by fast. We had his party at a jumping castle place. It was two big rooms full of different inflatable bouncers. We invited Ethan's Kindergarten class, some kids from the neighborhood, and a few friends from his old school. It was a great time. Ethan had a Lego theme. Dad made a Lego Starwars fighter jet to put on the cake.

Here is Ethan with Dad blowing out the cake and the kids eating.

There was a little kids plastic car at the inflatable place. The kids seemed to spend just as much time with this car as with jumping on the inflatables. I love this picture of Ethan.

The Huies were in Austin and stopped by for the party and so was grandma Sharon from Florida! Here are the Huies.

Grandma Sharon was in town for the whole week! We took Ethan to SeaWorld for the first time. We had lots of fun - despite the long lines. Grandma and Ethan played a water game and won a stuffed Shamu - here are some pictures.

We went to the Shamu show. I thought it would be fun to sit in the splash zone. We got splashed alright. In fact, we got totally soaked with cold salt water from head to toe. Ethan was not happy about this at all. He wanted to leave the show right away. We had to buy him a dry outfit in the gift shop. Here I am wet and Ethan in his new outfit with wet hair!

It was a great birthday and an excellent week!

Ethan had his first big homework project to build a rocket. It was a family affair with dad helping during the initial design stages. Ethan and dad found two large wrapping paper tubes and cut them to size. They also used some balsa wood for the cone nose and fins. The picture above is Ethan standing outside of his school with the rocket.

After the boys finished gluing the pieces together. Ethan and mom worked on decorating. We used foil and construction paper. We cut out designs in the construction paper and layered with different colors.We were all very happy with the rocket. Ethan's rocket was the biggest rocket in Ms. Collin's Kinder class. Ethan also reported that his was the second biggest in the whole school! The picture above is of Ethan in his classroom.

The January 2007 Ice Storm in Cedar Park, Texas shut down Austin and the surrounding area for three days. Monday was a holiday already (MLK Day), but Tuesday and Wednesday were Ethan's first "no school for bad weather days." William and I were also off of work and school for the weather. We also were lucky enough to get some snow in the mix. In the picture above Ethan is checking out the ice on the bushes.

We did not get much snow accumulation. If you look closely you can see the snowflakes.

Above are some examples of the big icicles hanging off the house. Ethan ate a few icicles, and we still have a big one in our freezer that we are saving.

Here is Ethan and his friend Zane as they head out to play in the little snow/ice that was accumulating. At one point, Zane's mom called and recounted a funny thing Ethan said. Zane's mom asked Ethan if we had a fireplace. Ethan responded "we do not have a fireplace, but we have a big warm dog." Ethan came home a bit later, and immediately started petting Holly to warm his hands.

We had a nice visit with my grandparents and Ethan's great grandparents Baevich in San Antonio over the Holidays this year. Ethan had fun opening the cool presents from his great grandparents and putting together his Lego Batmobile with the help of dad. After present opening, Ethan and dad headed outside to pick some delicious tangerines on G&G Baevich's tree (which they planted themselves). We brought a great big bag home with us and are germinating the seeds. Our little minerature pinscher "Ginger" loved grandma. I have never seen her so excited about one person before. Ginger kept running around the house and asking grandma to pick her up. It was very cute. We had a great dinner from a nearby mexican food restaurant and enjoyed catching up. It seemed Ethan was playing and not paying attention to the conversations, but he was listening. Every once in a while Ethan added a funny remark.

Part II Christmas in Corpus 2006 - While in Corpus Ethan had is first piano lesson from Grandma Gail. Ethan enjoyed learning about the piano. Aunt Claire was in Corpus as well, and Ethan and Aunt Claire played several challenging games of Othello. I am not sure who won, but to hear Ethan tell it he won every game! He is quite the competitor. We also played a few games of croquet in G&G Billy's back yard. Christmas morning Santa visited and left lots of presents for Ethan. This year Ethan got to use dad's stocking from when he was a kid. This was a real treat especially since "the stocking is huge." Everyone had fun opening presents on Christmas day including the dogs who got to open two wrapped presents each. It was a doggy christmas! Ethan loved his Christmas gifts, and we thank all of our family and friends for sending us gifts, cards, and well wishes for the Holiday season. Last but not least we celebrated our ninth wedding anniversary this year! To commerate our anniversary, I ordered us matching Dunder Mifflin Paper Company t-shirts! Those of you who watch "The Office on NBC" will know what I am talking about. Here we are. Happy New Year everyone - Love, Stephanie, William, and Ethan

Christmas in Corpus, Christi 2006 with Gail, Grandpa Billy, and Aunt Claire was lots of fun! This was the first Christmas in Gail and Grandpa Billy's new house. The had a beautiful 9 ft tree. While we were in Corpus, we went to the new addition of the art museum which was very beautiful and designed by an architect from Mexico. We also went to lunch at Water Street Oyster Bar - one of the Huie's famous haunts for oysters on the half shell. Ethan and I passed on the oysters, but still had lots of fun doing the word search on the kids menu. Ethan is really into world records these days, and during lunch he imagined a world record word seach that would cover the entire world and people would have one year to complete it. Here are some pictures of the museum (Ethan is using his new digital camera) and our lunch at Water Street. After lunch we all headed for a walk on the bay and to visit the replica of the Columbus ship the Nina on the T-Heads. Here is the gang by the ship and another picture of Ethan and me outside of the museum. While we were in Corpus we had the opportunity to go to the beach with Ginger and Holly one morning. We found a strech of beach with no one else around and let the dogs run loose. Ginger loves to run in the water and so does Holly. We all had a great time at the beach. This time Holly did not drink the salt water!! Ethan got to practice real golf (as opposed to mini golf) on the course behind G&G Billy's house. Ethan has a putter at the house and went out with mom and dad for some practice shots. Ethan did a great job, but mom was the real suprise - a perfect hole in one! We also took some time out to feed the ducks in the golf course pond. I am going to finish up the story of Christmas in Corpus 2006 in Part II - stay tuned.