Awards, Dance class, and Potty talk

Kendall all ready for dance class

the back view of her outfit and her bun

Avery before her class

posing with her bear David

showing off her arabesque which she already learned at gymnastics

The past few weeks since I last wrote have been fairly eventful around our house. To start off, shortly after we returned from our Colorado vacation, Scott found out that not only was he named a Top Dentist (periodontist category) in Ft Worth for the second year in a row, but he was also named by his peers as a Texas Super Dentist! His name will appear in Texas Monthly Magazine this fall. . . I forget which month exactly. I am extremely proud of him of course. He is doing so well in his practice and it is growing steadily now. He has four full-time employees and one part-time now, which has made his life easier and less stressful. That's always a good thing! Avery has been busy all summer with gymnastics and swimming lessons, and just this week she and Kendall have both begun dance class. They are each taking a ballet/tap/tumbling combo class-- Kendall's is Wednesday mornings and Avery's is Wednesday afternoons. They were both SOOO excited to wear their outfits and shoes and have their hair done up in a bun like real ballerinas. Kendall said her favorite part was doing a back roll, and she kept saying that she had "Super Duper Fun!" Avery's favorite part was dancing around like a butterfly. When I went in to get her at the end she said,"But I don't want to leave yet!" I guess we made a good choice of an activity to enroll them in. Another bit of exciting news is that Kendall is now potty trained! The plan was always to do it right after our Colorado trip, but I was procrastinating a little because I thought it was going to be a huge battle. Boy was I surprised! We went and got a princess potty that plays music, let her pick out panties and got a big bag of M&M's for rewards and by the second day she had it down! She has still had some accidents here and there of course, but even then she tells me she has to go and we just can't get to the bathroom quick enough. The best part is that she has been keeping her pull-up dry at nap time almost every day as well! Those things are so expensive, so the fewer we can use the better! And the icing on the cake is that now that she is potty-trained, it seems that she views herself as a big girl and is becoming more independent in other ways as well. She wants to put on her own shoes, buckle herself in the car seat, walk rather than be carried when we go places. . . now if we could only get rid of her lovey and stop the thumb-sucking! Oh well, at least she has 3 more years before she goes to kindergarten!