Olive's 12th Birthday Recap

Olive turned 12 last week and we had the best time celebrating her with family and friends.  She made her own invitations that were so cute.  She wanted them to be pink and blue with bows and teddy bears.  Mission accomplished.  She customized the same invitation to work for my family, Kevin's family and her friends.  Then I texted it out to everyone to invite them.  We celebrated with her favorite foods, favorite activities and enjoyed the week with our favorite girl.

She requested bundt cakes and gummy bears for dessert!

We celebrated with Kevin's family first.  Olive was so ecited to get a GIANT Squishmallow.

The sweetest great grandmas + Olive.

Bundt Cakes and cookie bars for my family.

We gathered all the bear treats we could find for treat bags - Teddy Grahams and two kinds of gummy bears.

Olive helped me make the balloon garlands.  It goes so much faster when you've got an assistant to blow up all the balloons!  We made bows out of plastic table cloths, too.

My sister + niece made Olive the cutest teddy bear for her room.

Leo was there and was not interested in joining us for a picture.

These cute cousins are all 12 until July.

We celebrated her on her real birthday.  The cats loved to help her.

Could this mean they'd all be friends one day??  Maybe they'll bond over their love of wrapping paper.

After a slow morning at home, I surprised Olive with a favorite day.  I texted her one event at a time and she was surprised to end up at all of her favorite spots.

Pick out a new Squishmallow!

The brothers were troopers.

She picked Crumbl for her birthday dessert.

I always fall down a rabbit hole of baby pictures on the kid's birthdays.  It seems like just yesterday that one year old Olive was getting her pictures taken in Arkansas.

She's officially 12!  We loved getting a variety box of Crumbl cookies to try.

We celebrated a few days later with a best friend sleepover!  Lots of volleyball, pizza, gelato, gifts, crafts and skin care into the wee hours of the morning.

BFFs.

It was so fun seeing what all of the girls picked out for Olive.

We put together really fun favor bags for the girls.  I'll do a recap of them soon, but just know there were teddy bears, Tree Hut sugar scrubs, bows and more inside.

We did a craft.  Stay tuned for a fun teen tutorial.

I made a big breakfast of eggs, fruit, dinosaur and car waffles for everyone.

The table looked so cute.  Mr. Mittens agreed.

She loved going through all of her friend gifts and debriefing about her friend party the day after.

And that's a wrap on Spring birthday season at our house!  Whew!  3 kid birthdays in March, April and May is so fun and so exhausting.  We loved celebrating Olive with everyone that loves her.

She's 12!

Happy 12th Birthday Olive!!  These 12 years have flown by so fast.  You've been along for the ride of nearly all of our family adventures.  You lived in 4 different states, 6 different houses, different school, made friends in many states and have always been up for any adventure that came your way.  You have made parenting easy and helped us learn how to do the job.  We love you and are so proud of you!

Olive loves bows, teddy bears, volleyball, her friends and all the accessories.  She’s got a plan for everything.  If you need a shopping buddy or a helper, she’s your girl.  She works hard and sets her own goals.  The future is bright for our favorite girl.

Last Week of School Favorites

The last week of school was BUSY.  We all had events and we all finished on different days.  We packed in the fun and the memories.

My last day of kindergarten was also my 10th year of teaching milestone.  I learned to love kindergarten!  It's the sweetest age, the kids come in ready to learn and I'm so happy to be there.  I can't wait to not be a newbie teacher next year.

Last day of 6th grade.  She's ready to be done, but feeling sad to wrap up her elementary school years.

Last day of 3rd and thrilled for Summer.

Fletch won the friendliest friend award which felt like a big deal when you changed schools and had to make all new friends this year.  He's a sweet guy!

He had a great teacher this year!

Honor roll, Tech award and friend award.  Go Fletch!

Leo's PreK teachers surprised us with graduation pictures of the kids.  He looks so grown up!

Last day of school and ready for lots of home days!

Since all of our schedules were different, I was able to volunteer at Olive's school on her last day.  I helped serve pizza and worked a game station.  It was so fun to see her with her friends.

My favorite 6th grader!

The school planned tons of fun things for their last days.

I got some sweet end of the year gifts and gift cards.

Leo had an end of the year program.  He knew all the words and the motions.  It was adorable.

Big year for both of us - me learning how to be a teacher/mom and him learning how to be in school full days.  It was a great year for both of us.  We are SO excited to go to kindergarten together next year!

So proud of Leo and how well he adjusted to going to school this year.  He learned so much!

Whew!  We needed this week to recover from last week!  We are all so excited for Summer :)

6th Grade Graduation

Olive had her 6th grade graduation ceremony last week.  It took some serious scheduling to be there because it was my last day of school and a busy time for all of us.  Thankfully, we made it happen and Kevin and I were there to support our favorite girl.

It's hard to believe Olive is headed to juior high!  I only cried once during the ceremony :)  It was sweet to see her cute friends graduating, too.

I loved seeing the little kid + 6th grader picture slide show for each class.

Olive worked SO hard this year!

She earned a distinguished medal for earning straight As all year.

She took honors classes and still managed to keep her grades high.

She was on the Mathletes team and earned 2nd place in their division.

She worked in the preschool and was a 4th grade tutor.

She was nominated to be on the school Kindness Crew.

And she volunteered to do several Canva projects for her teachers.

Her teachers have always had the nicest things to say about her and this year was no different.

Olive is a super student!

She found one of her buddies.

Favorite teacher photo op.

Graduation nails.

Her homeroom teacher. 

Throwback to her 4th grade teachers.  We weren't allowed in the buildling much that year so I was thankful they took end of the year selfies with their students.

Her #1 favorite teacher of all time.  I could go on and on about this wonderful lady, but simply she inspired Olive to work hard, challenge herself and always believed in Olive.  5th grade was amazing because of her and her dedication to her students.

I planned a simple and sweet graduation dinner for Olive at home.  She didn't want anything big - her favorite meal with a few graduation surprises.

The graduation Squishmallow yeti was a hit!

She's so excited for the next chapter - junior high!