Carlee's Mama is not as perfect as she thinks

I think I broke Carlee's heart the other night.
I was looking for something to eat and decided to heat up a frozen burrito. I told Carlee that Daddy ate a frozen burrito every night when he and I were dating. I told her they were cheap - 10 for a dollar. She asked if Daddy was poor when we were dating and I told her he wasn't but that he tried to save all his money so he could take Mommy on nice dates on the weekends. Then she asked me where he worked and I told her he worked the night shift at Budweiser. She didn't have a clue what Budweiser was- I was a bit surprised, but glad to know she is still in somewhat of a bubble at age 10. I told her it was a beer making factory and she asked why Daddy worked there. I told her it was before he was baptized. She asked if he every drank it and I said yes but that as soon as he met me and I told him I didn't like him to drink it then he stopped. I wanted to ingrain in her head that beer is gross so I told her to never drink it because it tastes like dog piss. I thought she would say she knows it is so gross and that she will NEVER drink it. She asked how did I know that it tasted bad and I told her a friend and I drank one of my friend's dad's beers one time. She got choked up and couldn't believe I would every taste beer. I explained to her that teenagers often think they know better than their parents and I thought I could make my own choices, even though it was a bad choice. I can't believe I crushed my little girl's perfect image of her Mama! We were then able to talk about making good choices and that parents know what is best for their children so we should always listen to our parents :)

Friends and drama

It's starting already...

The girls being mean to each other. I hate it! I hated it when I was going through it and I hate it now, for Carlee! And she just puts up with it.
The other night Carlee asked if 3 girls could stay the night. I said they could and that she can't invite a 4th girl because then that would make 5 altogether and I didn't want an odd number of them. Well at the last minute one of the girls couldn't spend the night. This meant that there would be 3. We all know 3's a crowd!!!
Late that night when I finally told the girls they had to go to sleep they happened to be trying to sleep in the love sack. I guess one or both of the girls told Carlee that they couldn't sleep with more than 2 people and so Carlee had to sleep in another room. Cade had fallen asleep on the couch and I was in his room talking on the phone. Carlee came in and said I needed to go out so she could sleep in there. I asked her why and she told me what had happened. I was MAD! Don't come to my house and treat my daughter like crap. That is such BS. So I went in and probably said more than I should have (I apologized later) but I wanted these girls to know that I don't put up with that kind of crap. The one girl IMMEDIATELY apologized to Carlee, before I had even had a chance to say much. I couldn't believe they had the audacity to kick her out of her own slumber party. I was 9 once, I guess I should believe it! The next morning the one girl said to Carlee, "I feel uncomfortable around your mom." And she should! I should probably have been more of a teacher but the mom in me got upset. It was a lesson learned for all of us. And I still can't believe Carlee was gonna just roll with it and sleep in the other room because these girls "could only sleep with one other person with them". What a load of crap. They both later admitted that they did not have a problem sleeping with 1, 2 or more people. I told them they could all 3 sleep in Cade's queen bed or I would move Cade and they could all sleep on the couch. They chose the couch.


Carlee had asked about doing some cheer classes. I had countered by asking her if she wanted to try softball (when Cade was in Tee ball she begged for her own glove and always wanted to know when softball was starting because she wanted to try it). Last weekend Grandpa Ron and Grandma Joann were here and Grandma asked her if she was doing any extracurricular things right now. She told her about chorus and then I said something about her possibly starting cheer. Grandma told her to watch out because there is a lot of drama with cheerleaders. So yesterday I was asking Carlee if we were gonna sign her up for cheer or softball or neither. She said she didn't want to do cheer. I was very surprised. She told me she doesn't like girl drama and Grandma told her there was lots of drama with cheer so she didn't want to be a part of that. I am glad that she listened and also that she knew she didn't want to have to deal with the drama so she forfeited cheer even though she really does enjoy doing it.

Braces Off!

After 8 months of:
"go brush your teeth, Carlee"
"you have food in your braces"
"if you don't brush then your teeth will rot behind your braces"
"go floss so your braces don't embed in you gums and have to be surgically removed"
"Carlee, did you brush?'
"Carlee, did you floss?"
"Carlee, did you use your mouthwash?"
ETC
ETC
ETC
CARLEE finally has her braces off and her teeth look absolutely FABULOUS!
Now we just have to wait until the rest of the baby teeth fall out and see how the adult teeth come in. She has a permanent retainer in that will keep her top four teeth from moving. When she is 11 she will have a recheck and see if she requires braces again. Hoping not!

First Day of 4th Grade

Yup, she's a silly girl!

Cloee woke up just in time for a few quick pictures

California trip- Carlee, Mommy, Angela

Carlee was having a remarkably rough summer and so when Cade and Daddy went on a Scout trip I decided to take Carlee to relax at the beach for a few days. We stayed in Del Mar. Angela came with us and Cloee stayed with Grammy. We had a fun time and relaxed a lot! Carlee was wet 90% of the time- ocean or pool, it didn't matter to her. She had fun playing all by herself or befriending those around her to play with. It surprised me how easily she could keep herself busy. She would have been fine as an only child. Although she missed Cade and Cloee, she didn't need them around to play with.

One day when we were at the pool at the hotel Carlee the camera and took a bunch of funny pictures of herself making goofy faces. That's how she entertained herself I guess since I wasn't gonna swim with her. It makes me laugh every time I look at these pictures. Such personality!

Ang and I spent a lot of time reading (I'm on the left, she's on the right wrapped in a towel)

One evening we went to Old Town in San Diego

If you look closely you can see me and Angela walking away

Since we don't have ginormous trees like this in AZ we have to take pics in front of them when we are out of town- Seaport Village

San Diego Temple- me and Ang

San Diego Temple- Little Miss Carlee

Once again keeping herself entertained

Imperial Beach, Coronado Island - Carlee's is easy to pick out with the blue shirt on

Del Mar Beach
It was a cold, overcast day but that didn't keep Carlee outta the water. We were freezing cold just sitting on towels on the sand.

It was freeeezing cold

This was at the outlet mall that we stopped at on the way over there

Last Day of 3rd Grade

Carlee and Mrs Eidsvaag

Carlee and her best friend Kayla

Brookie and Johnnie Concert

Brookie and Johnnie are two sisters who are from Gilbert and are trying to work their way up to Jonas Brothers status. They are cute but definitely not as good as the Jonas Brothers. Carlee loved them though. We went to a free concert they had at Freestone Park and she got two of their CD's and got them to sign some stuff. It was a fun family night out together.

3rd Grade Field Trip

Will went with Carlee and her 3rd grade class to a museum as a chaperon. I think the teacher assigned all the naughty boys to their group along with Carlee and her best friend Kayla so Will (and Carlee) could keep them in check. (My biggest pet peeve is when Carlee's hair is down in her face, I know I put her hair in braids the morning before they left for school so it urks me that she took them out!!!)

after the field trip in the classroom

Carlee's Veteran's Day program

I thought I had previously blogged about this but just found that I hadn't.

The entire 3rd grade at Carlee's school had a Veteran's Day program that they prepared and practiced for and then they performed it for their families one evening. Each class was assigned a different branch of the military. They made their own costumes to fit according to their branch. Carlee's class was the Navy. She told us she wanted "the Army so bad because I wanted to represent Daddy since he was in the Army before I was born." She was able to have a poster board full of pictures from when Will was in the Army and it was displayed at the front of the cafeteria for all to see when they first walked in. She was proud of herself and we were proud of her as well. She did so great and we really enjoyed her performance.
On the way home Will and I were able to talk to her a little bit about our country and express to her how extremely grateful we are that we live in a wonderful country where we are free to choose what church we go to, how we dress, where we go, etc. It was good communication. We all felt good to talk about these things.... (
Until Cade piped in and said his country didn't let him stay home from Carlee's boring program. That's Cade for ya!)

Carlee and her good friend Lilly

Carlee is on the top row at the very right of the picture