Tristan's Birthday Continues...

Tristan's 4th birthday continued this weekend too...Remember last Saturday we all went to the Dallas Children's Museum...Well, this weekend we went to the chidren's "memorial" craft fair at the historical museum here in Ardmore. It was a pretty good time. We made star wreathes, American flag pins out of safety pins & colored beads, stand up stars and coloring pages. These projects didn't hold Tristan's attention for long so she mostly went running around the museum & checking out all the displays! Sophie & Spencer made quite a few projects before becoming bored with the cutting, glueing & coloring.

We took lots of pictures, although Sophie really wasn't in the picture mood...so even though she was there - I got very few pictures of her...However, with Spencer & Tristan - it's all about hamming it up! Sgt. Spencer loves airplanes, guns, & war movies so he fit right in with the display about WWII. Tristan found the old buggy's and boxcars - of which she actually climbed INTO the display (yes, that means she crossed over the ropes!). Luckily, Mom got the shot before we got caught!

Then we went to Central Park and had some fun there! Lots of climbing, swinging and sliding. Sometimes even giving Mom heart failure as they are leaing over the side of the railing or sliding down the slide like you would the railing on a staircase! We took some pretty pictures by all the beautiful flowers there and then went over to the Memorial Fountain so the kids could make their wishes...and Mom could get some pictures! After we had all of our fun at the park/fountain, we decided that Sonic slushies were calling our names so we jetted off to get some delicious refreshments...

Sunday we went to Grandma's so Tristan could get her birthday presents! Tristan couldn't wait to put on her new clothes & have me take her pictures! I swear she is going to be a model, but that would be after she is a cheerleader! YAH! We had a really good time this weekend...and we miss Sophie a whole bunch! She was with Akami this weekend...We hope she was having as much fun as we were!

Emily's Birthday Estravaganzaa

Eminey, as we sometimes call my friend Emily at work, celebrated her 25th birthday with all of us crazy gals!! Pink & white streamers & lots of "birthday girl" signs were all over her work area! She was so suprised when she came to work that morning & had to walk through a curtain of streamers! We got her an entire basket full of tons of pedicure supplies - with some really awesome toe nail polish! Chocolate cheesecake for dessert - YUMMY! Thanks for having a birthday Emily!

Dallas Children's Museum

320 miles round trip in the car with 4 adults & 3 kids...what a way to spend a Saturday! But, that is exactly what the Bruce Bunch did this past weekend. Since Tristan's 4th birthday is on Memorial Day this year, we figured we better go ahead & get out of town to do our "birthday" trip before all of the holiday traffic. Well, although my butt was sinched up tighter than you can imagine cuz Eric was driving like he was in the Indy 500 & in a rain storm of all things - we did have a great time! Not to mention that we also had a flat on the way there, after we missed the 1st exit, so we had to detour around a residential area. Well, all the people were hanging out on this porch, yelling out at us that we had a flat. We slowly crept up the road, looking for a gas station to pull over - thinking that we were going to be sitting there a while waiting for roadside assistance - but Nope - we were right around the corner & there was a tire repair shop! Had that flat fixed in under 30 minutes & we were back on the road! The kids LOVED the museum! Aunt Chrissy came up with the idea, so we headed on down to Dallas. There were multiple little areas for the kids to experiment: bubbles, trains, dinosaurs, creeks/lakes, farming, school house, dentistry, wind tunnels/tornados & even some live animals...and I think that's it. We did ALL of it. Plus, we even took in an IMAX Coral Reef movie - which made me sick the entire time I was in there ( had to sit through most of the movie with my eyes closed). Eric hated it & Sissy wanted to run up & down the stairs....Man...told you there are no boring moments with a bebe Bruce kids!

So, then we finally got home after a long trip & we found our new addition in the back yard. Well, you know that Murphy & baby Murphy were attacked & killed last week...Dad was talking about getting the kids (and him I suspect) a dog. We came home to find a red healer pup in our backyard. He is about 3-4 months old, no tags, nothing!! We were so excited. We don't know where he came from & even Eric asked his friend who works for the animal control if there had been anybody reporting a lost dog & he said no...A sign? Who knows but we are thrilled to have Roscoe! He's been so great! The kids are so excited to get home to play with him everyday after school. Here is our new Roscoe :)

Mother's Day weekend was,very relaxing & pretty uneventful. The kids got me a DVD of one of my favorite movies, Walk the Line...I think Tristan likes it as much as I do cuz she wants to watch "Johnny Cash" every day when we get home! She loves to sing all the songs & will stand with her microphone, on her stage (which happens to be her night stand) and sing the songs word for word. She is definitely my little "artist." She even says that when she gets bigger, after she is a cheerleader, she will be on American Idol!! She is a girl after my own heart. So...Sophie spent the night with her bio-mom Akami on Sat night & since Sophie was going to get to go spend the night somewhere - Spencer & Tristan were bound & determined that they were going to spend the night somewhere too! Aunt Jennifer & Aunt Chrissy were coming over Sat night for a visit & Spencer decided - That was his chance! He packed up his 4 Wal-Mart sacks of stuff - basically consisting of nothing that he really needed or clothes that matched & he was ready to go. Tristan was not going to be left behind... She ran & got her boots on (2 sizes too big since they used to be Sophie's), her baby & her purse! She goes no where without her Baby or purse! She had it filled with the essentials to stay the night - her dress up shoes!! Funny kids! And great sports they are - Jennifer & Chrissy for taking them for the night, even though it wasn't planned! One other event that happened was that our stray cat, Murphy, who we adopted several months ago, gave birth on Friday night. We went looking for her when we got home & Dad was mowing the lawn & I started pulling weeds - Murphy hadn't come out of her hiding place...So, we went on a hunt. We found her behind the air conditioning unit on the side of the house & she had 3 babies. Unfortunately, by Saturday afternoon, 2 of them had died. So, Murphy with her 1 baby are pictured here with Sissy "mothering" them. Tuesday morning, we found Murphy under my van, very badly beaten & mangled & her baby was no where to be found. She had been attacked in the night by some other stray & very mean animal. We had to call Animal Control to come get her so they could put her down. Her injuries were so severe, there was no way she could make it. Rest in Peace Two Murphys! We will miss you!

Muffins With Mom

The yearly tradition of Muffins with Mom was today @ Will Rogers and I was so excited to get to spend some special time with Spencer. He didn't even mind having to go to school earlier than usual...We had to be there between 7:30 - 7:45. Tristan, however, was more than irritated that she was not getting to go with us to Bubba's school. But, since she will be in school there next year, I will get to do it with both of them! Today was also the last day for Spencer's teacher, Mrs. McElhiney. Although she will return next year (and be Tristan's teacher YEAH), she is taking the rest of the school year off in order to take care of some medical needs. She has done such a great job with Spencer this year & regularly compliments at how smart he is. I am very proud to say that we had a great year with her this year!

Spencer loved his 1st muffin, blueberry with some apple juice. That just didn't cut it though, so we had to sneak into a new line to get seconds...SSSHHH - don't tell :). We got some orange juice & poppyseed muffins that round...yummy!

Mrs. Hunter, Principal of Will Rogers and Spencer! She is fantastic & really loves all the kids there. She knows each child by name & it is so impressive to see how great she runs the school. Will Rogers was voted a Great Expectations school this year! Good Job.
Mommy & Spencer - Isn't he sweet!