Kindergarten

Did i really just type that up there?.....Kindergarten. 
Wow, it still is amazing to me that my first born BABY girl is in kindergarten. When I say the word, type the word, hear the word....it brings tears to my eyes. I was uploading pictures of her first few days at school onto facebook and tears were just rolling down my face and wouldnt stop. Ive had the pure joy of having Kambria home with me for the past 7 months and even then before that she barely went to daycare and every chance I got I would take her RIGHT before I had to go to work and even leave work early to go pick her up..I had that freedom of getting her whenever cause it wasnt technically 'school'.
 Her first day of kindergarten was Monday August 16h. Oh were there SO many times last week i wanted to just go scoop her up and pick her up early.... ditch day is what i like to call it. My mom let us have those days starting in about 7th grade so maybe ill start it in kindergarten.... KIDDING people.... hold onto your panties. My kid will stay in school and will learn it all :) start to finish.
For about a year now i have been thinking about kambria going into kindergarten, weve talked about it so many times and i THOUGHT i had myself all ready for her to go.....nnooopppeee.....

The night before her first day, josh & i blew up balloons, set out her flowers, got her card and made her a little goodie bag, along with her packed lunch with an awesome heart shaped peanut butter and jelly sandwich. That sleepy face is so dang cute, who couldnt get happy when they see that?

 We had her clothes all laid out for her first day, she picked her blue dress. :)

and i must say, kambria rocks her uniforms... she looks better than a fresh baked apple pie with a scoop of homemade vanilla icecream on it, drizzled with caramel sauce.. mmmm and doesnt that sound tasty??
kambria looks tassttyyy in those uniforms, i could squeeze her and gobble her up.

 so back to us having talks about her going to kindergarten and being a big girl... she knows kindergarten means the start of her life, growing up, learning so much more, getting new friends, having homework, being responsible and dont get me wrong she is so pumped to grow up and do all of that, she is also sad she has to leave me all day...which both break my heart... #1 that she is growing up so quickly right before my eyes and i cant stop her and #2 that she just wants to hang with me all day...
although i make it very apparent to kambria that i am the mother she is also my best buddy... i didnt sugarcoat anything to her about being sad and i never will... i want her to know feelings are okay, not to hide them, to always express herself. and if expressing myself means on the first day, heck even the first week of her going to kindergarten i cry like a baby, then so be it. this is a journey we will get through together.

i explained to her why i was sad, that she was growing up and how different she is now than how she was when she was a little baby, who sat in my lap while i rocked her to sleep, patted her back while i waited for her to burp, crawled into my arms and pinched my face like crazy,  held hands with while she took her first steps...
and now she takes her first steps into her new big girl life

when i saw her walking up those steps my heart melted...she was miss independent. 5 and a half years ago this baby made her first appearance into the world...she melted my heart then and she melts my heart now.

i didnt start crying until i walked her over to her cubbie, where her lunchbox and backpack sat with her name on top... i lost it. i couldnt even talk or realize what was going on around me, it was such a blurr...i forgot what we were there for... i thought to myself "pull it together bristol, pull it together.." because kambria didnt even know i was crying, until her big watery eyes looked up at me.. we both felt that rush of sadness at the same time. eventually i did pull it together, we pulled it together. :)

I dont care if josh, berlyn and i were the only ones in that class that werent the teachers or the students..lemme say, we fit in perfectly now.

and by the 3rd day there were happy faces all around..

after berlyn and i dropped kambria off and hung out for a little bit, she wanted us to come back for p.e and to spend more time with her at school... do you think i said no?... noo way!!
above is berlyn and i waiting in the car for big sissy to come to p.e!!

i love my kindergartner, whether she is 1 years old or 5 or 50, she will always be my baby and her little wrinkled butt will still fit right into my lap :)

BUSY!!

I haven't had ANY time to do anything.... and when I mean ANY time, i quickly hurried to the nail salon today, with sweet potatos and carrots all over my shorts, paint and blue on my shirt and some spit up on my sweater.... yeahh.... life is that good :)
 havent had a break to do anything but im loving every minute of it!!
this is a post, to let you know a great big fat post will soon follow...


in the mean time, ill leave you with some pictures...
we've been  having TOO much fun.

our days have been filled with;
trips to the ice cream shop, library, wedding receptions, big bounce, park bbq's and house gathering :)

the last week before school started was awesome....



more to come ;)

it's a world of laughter

a world of tears
its a world of hope
its a world of fear
theres so much that we share
that its time were aware
its a small world after all




this post gets to be written in many colors, because it reminds me of the ride at disneyland, it's a small world after-all... that it is and its a world of many colors.. :)




DISNEYLAND, CALIFORNIA!!!!!


hold up, did someone say disneyland? yesss, i did!! after we had some great times at the beach MORE great times were about to happen... we had the next two days planned out for quite some time now and as much as i was so excited to see the california coast, i was even more excited to take kambria to disneyland and surprise her.. the first day we went(monday) was my birthday and it was the best birthday ever.. seeing her face glow when she finally realized where we were going..
she's been asking to go to disneyland for over a year now..and her smiley face changes to a sad frown when i tell her "not yet, sometime when berlyn gets a little bigger"... she is so into all the fairies right now and all the characters that we figured this is the PERFECT time ever...
some say she may not remember it... well she remembers the moment and let me tell ya it was a bigg freakin moment for her :D and she still remembers it ;)... we will have pictures to always keep that memory special..


we woke up early monday morning and had everything packed and ready to go.. we told her we had to leave for the beach early so we could go walking on the beach and to see the whales.. she was excited.. not as excited as she was when we were at disneyland, tho!.. soo here were off to go hop on the tram to get to disneyland..and she still thinks were headed to the beach!

i tried to get her to wear tennis shoes..BUT she thought we were going to the beach and she wanted her toes to be in the sand she said.... cant blame her..


we all got on the tram, there were so many people waiting to get on, she was looking around, asking question after question about why there were so many people, why we had to get on the tram to go to the beach, why we didnt bring her sand toys with us on the tram and why we didnt have our bathing suits on...
WOW GIRL... i tried to answer each question so she wouldnt get suspicious and still believe we were headed to the beach... my stomache was in knots the whole tram ride.. it was like i was headed to my interview or my wedding day... i was so anxious to get there and surprise her with the best surprise yet for her.... 


the questions didnt stop... until..............
drum roll...
the tram driver said "WELCOME TO DISNEYLAND RESORT"

she said.. "Mom, where are we???"


she knew, she just wanted to make sure.. look at the smile, you can see it across the united states! 
i said."where do you think we are?"... of course she said, "DISNEYLAND?" and then it happened, she was the happiest girl EVER..and couldnt wait to get inside.. the tugging and the pulling in every direction didnt until our two days of disneyland ended..and when i saw two days i mean TWO FULL DAYS... the first night, we went back to our hotel for dinner, josh stayed with berlyn to bathe her and get her to bed while kambria and i headed back to the park.. the first night she lasted until 10:30 pm... until she fell asleep in line waiting for indiana jones... the second night her and josh left the park at 12:15AM...
we are disenyland die hearts my friends :)

Kambria Adison Walkup. Disneyland 2010
a face that can light up the dark

disneyland has never looked better :)


when we got into the park it felt like you left reality and really went to the happiest place on earth.. so many smiling faces, so many different people, SO MANY people and with each unique place to visit..tomorrow land, fantasy land, critter country..etc.. it was pure bliss and i was so glad to have josh and the girls with me to feel it all and embrace it.

we didnt stop.. the fun never ended and kambrias smile never got wiped off of her face... 
we went from end to end.. over and over.. ride after ride.. walking after walking, meeting after meeting, churro after churro :)


bliss... like i said before. berlyn must have known we were at the happiest place on earth because she was the happiest baby on earth :) it was so easy with her right along.. and a score for kambria, we would do a 'baby swap' some rides would give us a blue card to hold which would let kambria go up with either josh or i, ride the ride come back down, get the other one who didnt go the first time and hop on the ride again :) orr some of the rides let us all wait in lines together and just do the switch right when the ride got back...
she got DOUBLE the fun...
thanks berlyn :)

as much as everyone knows what a big baby and scardie cat i am... 
when the pirhannas came out to give us a visit i jumped and screamed and last thing i knew i was on the floor... along with kambria... and berlyn started crying cause we scared her.. :( poor babIES... :)  and yah folks, imma talkin about the jungle cruise where everything isnt real... buttt what the heck, those snappers were still scary, fake or not!

the happiest place on earth..
ahhh.... i am still taking in all the great mome
nts we had there together and alot of everyones 'firsts' it is so nice to do it as a family and make memories..
cant wait to go back when berlyn is big enough so she can enjoy it even more.. i am sure big sissy will show off on showing her around and explaining to her about the rides.


as much as i was sad to leave disneyland, when we left those gates it felt nice... 
we accomplished a family vacation all together..
and gosh golly we walked the heck out of our feet and i was ready to get some REST for those puppies!!