First Day of School for Two Smiths!

This year, we decided since Covenant was such a wonderful school, to let Christopher go for 3rd grade and Kaebrie go for first grade. Here they are about to leave for their first day!

Hog Hunting!

Sam and Collin had the chance to go hog hunting one night with Kelly Peeler, and hunt they did! Using infrared equipment and other special things, they had a successful time!
(These pictures were taken with a cell phone in the dark, hence the poor quality).

The Garden

We tried again for another garden, moving it back into more shade this year.
It was so exciting to see things grow!

Sam and Collin installed an electric fence to keep all the deer out.



But it didn't keep out all the rabbits and they destroyed everything. We will try again next year!

The Flood

The above picture is the final result of hours of labor from 35 church family members for one of our church family members.

The highest flood in 100 years was predicted to hit in the next few weeks, so we helped Pro and Metts try and safeguard their home. I can not remember how many hundreds of sandbags we filled!

Below, the muscle boys: Collin, Austin, Noah and Christopher!


Even little Kaebrie could help!
Tiff filled lots of bags!
Kaitlynn tied hundreds of them and did a great job.


A good job for Kaebrie was opening the bags for everyone.

In the end, the glass still broke and water did get into their home, but not near as much as would have if we had not placed the sandbags around to help. Our church family is incredible, if there is a need, they will help. A true showing of love.

Kindergarten Graduation

Little Bo Peep, I mean, Kaebrie graduated from Kindergarten! She was the lead in their adorable graduation play and her best buddy, Benjamin absolutely stole the show. Click on the pictures to see nice and big and CLEAR.
Getting her diploma...
Kaebrie and Mrs. Dixon, the BEST Kindergarten teacher EVER!
With her Beek, also known as Bekah.
It's official! She is a FIRST GRADER now!
Daddy wanted a picture with her, but Yazzi wanted a hug too.
Finally a nice one with a crazy dog!
Kaebrie had a really great year. She LOVES school, is a great reader and is begging to learn cursive writing. We do a lot of work at home in the afternoons using old first and second grade workbooks and she eats it up. The girl is a sponge!

We are proud of you Kaebrie! We love your enthusiasm and your hard work! WE LOVE YOU!

The Dominator !

We are a STORM CHASER watching family. Well, except for the little two, they are to young right now, but the rest of us never miss an episode. And that was BEFORE the Dominator was here is Yazoo City and ended up getting of giant tornado and its aftermath on film. Reed Timmer, the star of the show, came and spoke at a neighboring church for a city wide remembrance a year after the tornado and we got to meet him and take pictures with one of the coolest automobiles ever!

Reed, Chris and Joel with the 4 Smith fans!

Collin LOVED this, but thought it was funny that they had a giant container of Cheetos in the back seat.



It was an unexpected thing to happen on a Sunday afternoon. We will keep watching Storm Chasers, but we hope they don't ever need to come and film in our neighborhood again.

Washington D.C.

The 6th grade class of Covenant school has gone to D.C. for the last 13 years ( i think). This year was no different. Along with all the curriculum and the homework and the projects, the kids and parents have to fund raise all year long to make enough money to go. It always seems like it will never get here and we will never raise the money, but April 25th finally arrived, we raised MORE money then we needed, and off we went! We had to get up at 4am to take a 6am flight out of Jackson, but we all made it, and by 1pm we had already checked into our hotel and were on top of the Old Post office tower taking in the view!

Then it was on to Ford's Theater.


Next was the International Spy Museum, a big favorite among the kids.
Kaitlynn really got into and wore this hat the rest of the trip.
Hard Rock Cafe for dinner!! Because we had extra funds, the trip coordinator said this dinner would be her treat, so the kids could order whatever they wanted to. We had 11 kids on the trip. Ten kids ordered cheeseburgers. 1 child ordered a big steak. Any guesses who that was?

We did a LOT of walking. We also saw so many statues and eventually we quit taking pictures in front of them.

With her great friend, Nettie Taylor.
With both teacher, me and Mrs. Nettie.

Earlier in the year I had the class memorize the entire Gettysburg Address. They recited here in front of the Lincoln Memorial.

Mount Vernon was a great place. We enjoyed a lot there.

Yes, Kaitlynn is really tall.
She took the Oath of Office! (Not that I would ever want her to be President though).
Arlington Cemetery was special.


With Mrs. Nettie and Sierra

We walked here. A long, long, long walk. We were so tired and hot I don't think we appreciated the memorial at that moment.
We got to go into ABC studios where they were broadcasting the 6pm news live. Then they had a tornado warning (we can't seem to escape those no matter where we go) so we could not eat on the roof as planned, but we did get some DC Cupcakes! (Kaitlynn likes that show).
We toured the Capitol Building.


Went to the Air and Space Museum.
The Natural History Museum.(and several other museums that I don't have pictures of on here. One of my favorites was the Holocaust Museum. I would like to go back there when I have a longer period of time to read things).
Then we had up front seats to the Washington nationals vs. the Mets. The boys LOVED it, but even the girls had a good time. Kaitlynn caught the shirt thrown by the Mascot and the boys were jealous! Sometimes being 5'9" can be a good thing!
We made it on the big screen!
They look like they are having fun!
The Newseum was high on list of personal favorites. I would go back there too. Here is the ONLY full group shot we got on the entire trip.
This is why I liked the Newseum. Every winning photograph with a back-story and interviews with the photographers. It was fantastic!
They even got to do their own newscast!
SO many more pictures, but not room for them all here. I put most of the ones of Kaitlynn on here. The previously mentioned 6th grade book has many others, and I will get that link posted when it is time. Everything must be chronological! :)

It really was a special time for everyone. I loved experiencing it with Kaitlynn and the rest of my class. I really fell for those kids this year. It is amazing how much you can pack into 5 days!

It was worth all the fund-raising! Thank you all so much for all of your who helped us out. The trip was a true blessing!