Happy Anniversary Mommy and Daddy!

So we found out that today was Mommy and Daddy's anniversary.  It's crazy....we just finished celebrating Mommy's birthday and along comes another holiday.  Basically we had a week of celebrations and dinners out and sweet goodness.  Definitely cool!

Anyway, we headed out this evening after my gymnastics practice.  We had to go and pick up movie tickets so Mommy can go see the Harry Potter movie with Daddy tomorrow.  Now I'm kind of perplexed.  I mean, I want to see Harry Potter too, and it is a kid's movie and all.  So I just don't get why they aren't taking us along.  They said it's to celebrate their anniversary, but shouldn't we get to be a part of this?  I mean we are a product of this great event that they celebrate every year.  In case you care, this reasoning got us nowhere...we are being left with the sitter so they can enjoy the movie without us.

After they got the tickets, we told them we were hungry.  They started naming off all these fancy shmancy restaurants we could eat at.  Now, let's think about this for a second.  These are the same people who are constantly grounding us from "dinner out" because of our behavior, and tonight they are saying we can go to a nice place to eat dinner...all because they've been married 11 years.  I guess they're getting so old they can't remember how nightmarish we can make things.  But, being the nice kids that we are, we decided we would be fine with good ol' Subway.  You could see it on their faces...they felt defeated.  But in the end, I think they realized that our decision was really the best.  Otherwise they would have had to endure some horribly long wait before we were even seated, followed by the normal annoyances we pull out of our bag of tricks for the actual meal.

Now, because we chose Subway, we were finished with our meal super quick which left us time for a quick romp through the fountain!  Yes!!!  There was a fountain right outside the Subway that shoots water into the air and you can play in it!  There were tons of kids in it and it just looked like so much fun, so we put on our cutest pathetic faces we could muster up and pleaded for a quick run through the water.  Mommy relented (and Daddy kind of grumbled under his breath) and said we could, but we needed to stay relatively dry.  Well, they didn't say what our "dry" was relative to....so we decided to stay dry relative to how wet you would get going over Niagra Falls in a barrel.  As you can see, we had a blast!!

Happy Anniversary!!!  We love you so much...even if we don't always listen to you.

Game, Set, Match

For those of you who don't live in Austin, you might not know, but the Davis Cup quarterfinals are being held here this weekend...specifically the Spain vs. USA match.  Because Lizzie and I are learning tennis this summer, we had the chance to go downtown yesterday for a Davis Cup Fun Day.  And fun it was!!

When we got down to the UT tennis courts, we got ourselves signed in and picked up our "scavenger hunt" cards.  Basically we had a bunch of different activities we had to complete to try and win the Jr. Davis Cup.

Here we are sporting our scavenger hunt cards.  Not sure what is up with Lizzie...she should be excited to be here!

And then we had to wait.  Why, you ask?  Same reason every time...Mommy and Daddy got us there good and early, as usual.  While we were waiting, Daddy took some pictures of Lizzie and I posing with some of the USA team players.  Okay...it's not really the "real" players, just their pictures, but we figured this was probably the closest we would get to them.

Finally it was time to get down to business.  The first game we played was Lobster Catch.  One of us had to stand and gently toss a ball to the other person.  The other person's job was to catch the ball between two racquets.  I did a fantastic job of bouncing the ball to Lizzie.  So good, in fact that she was able to catch one.  Lizzie, on the other hand, didn't understand what "gently" meant.  She kept firing the balls at me really hard so that I couldn't catch even one!

After this game, we took a quick break to get our faces painted and make posters cheering on the USA Davis Cup team.  Lizzie copied my sign because she's still a baby and doesn't know how to spell.

After our break it was back to the court for some more games.  Over on the courts for kids our age, we got to play two new games.  The first one was called Alligator Alley.  Everyone lined up in 2 lines and we had to roll the balls back and forth to each other using only our racquets.  Then, one by one, we each got to take a turn being the alligator.  When we were the alligator, we were trying to avoid being hit by the balls.  When we weren't the alligator, we got to try and hit the alligator.  I love games where you try to hit people!!!

The Alligator Alley

Lizzie making it safely through the alley.

My leap through the alley!

Then it was time for some Koosh Ball Tennis.  Not much really to describe here...it's exactly what it sounds like.  We practiced passing and catching a koosh ball using only our racquets.  It was actually a lot of fun!

After Koosh Ball Tennis we got to head over to one of the big kid courts to try out something new...wheel chair tennis.  Before we could test out the chair, we hit some ground shots with one of the pros.

Then it was wheel chair time.  It was weird trying to move them around.  It took me a little bit to figure out how to make it turn.  Lizzie never figured it out.  She just got out of the chair and turned it on her own.  But even better than just rolling around in the chairs was trying to hit tennis balls in them.  It was really wild!!

Finishing wheel chair tennis basically had us finishing everything on our scavenger hunt list except for one thing: shaking hands with one of the players.  We found out that they weren't even going to show up at the event for another hour so we took a quick break for dinner and hit a German Biergarten that happened to be right down the street.  We timed it pretty perfectly and only had to wait about 15 minutes before we spied the team coming from their practice at the Erwin Center.

That's them in the distance!

And here they are up closer.  That's Andy Roddick in the black shirt.

 Once they arrived, I'm sure you can imagine the craziness that ensued.  Each player was put at a different court to hit balls with the kids.  Mommy decided that we were going to head to Andy Roddick's court (along with 75% of the people in attendance).  It was mass chaos, but in the end Lizzie and I each had the chance to hit 3 balls apiece with Andy.  It was really cool!  And Mommy even got pictures!!

Me hitting with Andy!

Lizzie hitting with Andy!

 Once everyone had a chance to hit, we all filed up into the bleachers so we could see the entire team.  Here they are...the 2011 USA Davis Cup team.

Coach Jim Courier, Andy Roddick, Mardy Fish, and Mike and Bob Bryan

The Davis Cup team with their big heads!

 Overall it was a really, really, REALLY fun night.  I hope it's something we can do again....although Mommy says it's doubtful.

Happy 4th of July

Yeah, yeah...we know.  It's one day late.  But we had so much going on this weekend that we literally fell into bed last night.  Okay, not really fell into bed...Mommy and Daddy had to tackle us down and throw us in them...but we actually fell asleep right away which according to them, is pretty much a miracle so I think we can say are justified in saying we "fell into bed."

Anyway, we had a pretty fun-filled weekend.  I gotta give it to Mommy and Daddy.  They made sure this 4th of July weekend was a good one even without the possibility of fireworks.  (For those of you not lucky enough to live in our great state, fireworks were pretty much nonexistent because of the dry weather we have been having.)

Saturday wasn't necessarily a "fun" day.  Mommy and Daddy did the usual long weekend thing and drug us around to a bunch of stores.  I think that must be in the Parent Handbook...maybe somewhere in the chapter on Long Weekends:  It is a must to drag your kids from un-fun store to more un-fun store, all the while repeating, "If you're on your best behavior, we'll do something special."  Somehow Maddie and I managed to be on our best behavior...or what is best for us...because we were treated to lunch at Steak 'n Shake followed by renting a movie from Blockbuster. (Which I might add, was not picked by us...we wanted Gnomeo and Juliet but somehow our cries were ignored and instead we ended up with The Goonies which Mommy and Daddy ranted and raved about because it was from the 80s, which basically means it's ancient and they are just trying to recapture their youth.)  Anyway, we watched the movie and have to admit that it wasn't half bad.  I mean it had pirates and a pirate ship and this really cool guy called Sloth!  For dinner, Mommy and Daddy decided to try out fondue with us.  No...they didn't take us to their favorite restaurant.  They told us we have to prove we are ready to go to the real place, so we practiced at home.  It was really fun getting to cook all of our food on sticks.  And I think we really impressed Mommy and Daddy with how well we ate and didn't mess around.  Maybe there is a trip to The Melting Pot in our future.

Sunday afternoon we got together with a bunch of our buddies over at their pool.  I don't think we have to go into all the details here...you know we had a blast.  Check out the pics for proof!

 

The actual 4th of July was a great day.  It started out with Daddy making us donuts for breakfast.  Yes..you read that right.  Daddy made us donuts right in our oven.  I have to admit, they weren't half bad.  Now they were no Dunkin Donuts donut, but the chocolate icing on top tasted like a big chocolate chip.  That's goodness in my book!  Maddie wasn't that fond of them.  It might take some creative baking on Mommy's part to get her to like them, but I have faith in Mommy.  In the meantime, Maddie not liking them meant more for me!

When Mommy got home from running her race, we headed out for our annual 4th of July tradition:  the Round Rock Frontier Days parade.  As always it was great....and the candy we scored this year was amazing.  There was even a float that was throwing out stuffed animals.  I managed to get one and shared it with Maddie.

After the parade, we came home and helped Mommy finish decorating the 4th of July cookies.  She iced some all white and let us draw our own designs on them with food markers.  Here's what we came up with.

Later that afternoon, we went over to our friends Jake and Clay's house.  Their mom and dad were so cool because they got them a big slip and slide to play on...kinda like the one Mommy and Daddy got for Maddie's birthday party last year, but even better because it had racing lanes.  It was SO MUCH FUN.  Even the mommies and daddies got in on the action and raced against us kids!  Of course, the party was full of your standard picnic foods....which meant no fights from Mommy and Daddy to get us to eat.  And of course, Mommy brought some new yummy desserts.  I have to say, Mommy makes the best desserts....we sure are lucky to have her.

 

Hope y'all had a safe and happy 4th!!!!