lots of celebrating going on

There was tons of celebration going on Chez Slacker this weekend. A kicked off the festivities on Thursday by presenting John with the Father's Day card she made at school. She wrote all of the words on the card by herself. She drew a picture of her and John on orange paper since orange is his favorite color.

Friday was the last day of kindergarten for E. I mean, it seems like just yesterday we were sending her off to the big, bad elementary school...and now it's over!

She had an awards ceremony at 9:40AM. Which meant that I didn't have enough time to drop A off at school before it. So I had a buddy with me.

The award that E got was Computation Queen of the Year. Oh yes...she apparently is some sort of math whiz. Here she is with the rest of the Computation Royalty. She's circled in red and waving to her loyal subjects, obviously embarassed to be in front of such a crowd.

Then the girls twisted my arm and convinced me to spring E early from school. So they both came home with me. At 11AM.

John came home and took the girls to lunch. And got E an end-of-the-year present, a new pool. Can you say Redneck Pool Party?

Saturday was relatively low-key. We had to hit Lowes AND Home Depot for stuff for the basement. We then hit the pool. After that, we hung out in the cul-de-sac for the evening.

On Sunday, we celebrated Father's Day by having a day long picnic in the cul-de-sac. We set up the water slide. For lunch we steamed a bushel of crabs. Not before we raced them.

E and A didn't seem to mind knowing that the crabs they were eating were once alive. They had named their racer crabs Ariel and Princess, respectively. At bedtime, A noted, "We ate a lot of Awiels and Pwincesses today, Mama."

And if a bushel of crabs wasn't enough, we then proceeded to grill out for dinner. Ribs and steaks and hot dogs. Plus sides. (If you are looking for a delish potato salad...Ina's version the potato salad that my mom makes** can't be beat!)

All in all, it was a great weekend.

**EDITED TO ADD: The recipe I used on Sunday was my mom's. I'm sure she came up with it all by herself. And asked Ina Garten to post it for her on the Food Network web site on her behalf. I'm sorry for any confusion that this might have caused.