Back To School

It happened. Again. Summer ended. School started. Again.

Actually, my kids were really excited about going back to school this year. Great time of year.

A few nights before, we had our annual Back to School Dinner. We used to decorate by hanging Matt's school supplies on the walls - pencils, crayons, etc. We've since stopped doing that has giant binders, calculators, and reams of paper don't hang so well. :)

Seventh Grade?? Can you believe that? Matt likes middle school and has done exceptionally well. He has made some great friends, loves Math, has dicovered that he really enjoys playing trumpet, and had proven to be a pretty great middle school-er.

Kindergarten. This one's a biggie. (How did that happen??) Rachel adored preschool and has been a little apprehensive that she might not like Kindergarten as much. I kept assuring her she would love it as much -- if not better, since she gets to go 5 days a week.

Matt's first day of school. He didn't think it was fair that Rachel didn't have to go for another week. Rachel didn't think it was fair that she had to wait. Matthew's first day went well. He just wasn't too sure he was ready to plunge right back into the routine.

This was Rachel's back to school openhouse. It was great. She got to meet her teacher and do a little "scavenger hunt" to locate all the things in the classroom.

Rachel's first day of school! She was sooo excited and a tad nervous. Steve arranged to work later in the day, so we both got to walk her to school.

It's so hard to believe that my second baby is in school! It really only seems like yesterday... yah, yah, I know. I always say that, but this time I really mean it. Again. :) Kindergarten is the big time. She was so ready, though. Proud of my girl!

When I went to pick Rachel up, she came running to me and said, "Mom! Kindergarten is a keeper!" She LOVED it. Bailey sure missed her, but was happy to pick her up and play on the playground for a few minutes.

Daddy and his Kindergartener.

That night we took the kids out for a celebratory back to school dinner. I sure adore those 3 little mugs!

Summary

Warning: picture overload. This post is a little bit of a purge, I mean, summary.  'Just trying to catch up.

Like I said before, we did take a quick road trip to Arizona to see Grandpa, but other than that, we just spent the summer hanging and playing.

One fun day the girls spent playing and swimming with cute friends.

Here's Bailey showing off some pretty tricky maneuvers in the wading pool. Those are some mad skills.

Grandma Bailey is wonderful and comes to spent the day with us in Logan as often as she can manage. My kids LOVE having Grandma come and love the attention! This day she brought candy and Bingo. My sister and her kiddos were here, too and sweet Grandma had them all playing. Rachel and Bailey were die-hards and played long after everyone else was done.

Our Pioneer Day (July 24th) was a fun one! We started the day watching the parade in Logan. Steve worked a closing shift and was able to join us.

Bailey has come to adore parades. She was anxiously awaiting the action.

One part of the parade she can't get enough of is the "parade princesses." Check out that wave.

After the parade, Steve had to go to work (bummer), so the kids and I went to the park for a big 24th celebration. Rachel's preschool class had a little reunion, so we went there first, then headed to check out the rest of the festivities. After having the obligatory snow cone, we joined our first "Family Fun Bingo." It was hysterical! It was a giant bingo game, but they stopped after every handful of numbers they called and played games. It was total audience participation -- games, contests, etc. So stinkin' funny. We had a blast and became tight with everyone at our table.  :) It really was loads of fun and my girls even won some pretty impressive prizes. Next year, we're totally there... and on the front row!

We ended that evening by meeting Steve at a little Chinese restaurant. The kids LOVE Chinese and it was a good way to end a super day. (Look at those sweet, tired faces.)

To fulfill summer tradition, we made the trek north to the Pepperidge Farm factory and Caspers ice cream. We had some super yum shakes and watched Bailey and Rachel do some serious sugar rush dancing.

Of course, living by so many great parks, we made a point to visit many times. We are seriously so fortunate to live by some fantastic, safe, clean, and super fun parks.

One afternoon the kids came with me and the cub scouts to the fire station. Yes, I said cub scouts. That's material for another post and another day...
Matt and Bailey took a little try at "driving" the engine. It was actually pretty funny 'cause we'd visited the fire station on campus another time during the summer for a fun activity sponsored by USU. My kids waited so patiently for their turn to sit in the driver's seat. They were literally climbing in when a call came in and we had to clear out. It was pretty cool for them to see everything happen and everyone spring into action, though. So, when we went with the scouts they were all talking about their other experience and just 2 minutes after they got their turn, the engine got called out.
(So I have to back up and say that it wasn't really funny, like "ha ha" funny. Someone in trouble is never funny. Ironic may be a better word.)

Rach took a spin on the fire pole.

As the summer was coming to a close, we headed to the "big city" to do some back to school shopping. The girls were NOT enjoying waiting for Matt to choose shoes and entertained themselves with my camera. This is Bailey doing "praises." (Yep, Steve taught them all that when they were all just little tiny. He enjoys his Gaither gospel music a little too much. )

Also with the end of the summer comes the county fair. Always a good time. The girls got to don tiaras and try out the princess carriage. Last year we won tickets to the Cache Valley Civic Ballet's Sugar Plum Tea. (It coincides with the Nutcracker). We entered again...come on, lucky ticket!

One of our last days before school started, we went to Ogden and spent the day swimming at a super duper fun aquatic center where my nephew worked as a lifeguard. We played hard and wore ourselves out. When we got back to Logan we went to a favorite pizza place dinner. (The pizza is pretty good, but the ham and cheese salads are what dreams are made of.) Poor Rach sacked out on this bench while we were deciding what to order.

Then at the booth. Sweet little sun-kissed, sleepy face!

Bay stayed awake - barely.

This was like the third picture I tried to take of Steve and Matt. Steve would smile, then open his mouth right as the picture snapped. Gross. Boys...

It was a fantastic summer. Like always, it went far too fast, but it was wonderful. I love having the kids home and just playing. It was good -- time filled with family, friends, sunshine, water play, parks, staying outside late in the evening, gardening, sleepovers in the living room, bbq's, and so much more unstructured goodness. Love it.

swimming lessons

One of the many highlights of the summer was swimming lessons at the aquatic center. Rachel had taken lessons for a few years and loves it, but this was Bailey's first run with lessons. I was actually going to wait until next year for a few reasons. One is that although the lessons start at 3, Bailey was barely 3 and seemed a little young still. The biggest reason is that she had been going through a whole separation thing and had basically been my little velcro baby. She wouldn't go to nursery at church and she really just didn't like to be left with anyone but me. I didn't imagine she'd even want to do swimming lessons. She went with me (remember the whole velcro thing?) the day I signed Rachel up for lessons and literally begged me to let her try lessons. Knowing the the fee was nonrefundable and knowing how she would barely let me out of her sight, I was skeptical. Being a sucker for my little girl, and a sucker for a learning opportunity, I signed her up, too.

Both girls were super excited the first day of lessons. Rachel jumped right into the pool. (Well, acted like she was going to jump, but at the last minute, dropped to her bum and slid into the pool.  For the record, she was jumping for real after a few days.) She was in heaven and loved every minute. Bailey was another story. The happiness turned to doubt. The doubt to fear. The fear to terror. Yep. It was sad. She cried the entire half hour. Now, it wasn't screaming-weeping-wailing crying, but crying all the same. In fairness, it was a lot of whimpering, but she was trying to be so brave. I so wanted her to be successful and she wasn't freaking out so I watched. I figured as long as the teachers still seemed okay and the other kids weren't wigging out, I'd wait. My sweet girl did it! She made it the whole lesson. (I have to interject here that her teachers were amazing and I was very impressed with them.) At the end of the lesson Bailey got out of the pool, smiled through her tears, and told me she liked swimming lessons. Go figure.  The next day it took her like 2 minutes to warm up, then she was as happy as a clam for the rest of the session of lessons. Go Girl!

I had to put this picture in even though Bay's hand is covering Rachel's face. Notice Bailey's choice of footwear. Nice.

We were so proud of our girls. What a fun experience it was for both of them and what a huge hurtle Miss Bailey overcame! Love those silly, wet mugs!

More Summer

Every summer it's the same, so I don't know why I act surprised when it zips past as fast as a blink.  Although we didn't necessarily do a lot of big, exciting things, we found lots of fun activities to keep ourselves running.  It's become a family favorite to "camp out" and watch the Logan 4th of July fireworks. Some fun friends met us to watch this year.

Sometimes waiting for the fireworks is the hardest part, but the kids did great. Treats and our portable dvd player = quite pleasant wait time.

The fireworks were great and we had a blast.

Also in July, Steve had a birthday! I LOVE birthdays. Steve doesn't so much. He's actually kind of a birthday Scrouge. Okay, in his defense, it's mostly HIS birthday he doesn't like. He goes along wih all the craziness for the kids' b-days, he'd just rather forget his own.  So this year was no different. He had to work  and no one at work even knew it was his birthday. The kids and I swung by the ol' dollar store to get banners, window markers, balloons, and treats. We decorated his car at work in hopes that his coworkers would see and realize it was his b-day. We filled the car with balloons and a banner, stuck a big banner on the back bumper, spread a big sign on the dash, and of course, wrote on all the windows. Along the back window I wrote, "It's my birthday, No big deal." We giggled our heads off imagining Steve driving his car all the way home. He HATES attention and we certainly created an attention-getter.
When he got home that day and told me what happened, I was crying because I was laughing so hard. Apparently his boss caught him on his way out the door and asked him if Steve could give him a ride. Steve, completely unaware of his spiffy ride, agreed.  (I was already laughing at this point.) He's not a very good story teller when it comes to his own embarrassment, so I didn't get details (though I tried) of the moment of realization. I just imagined them tossing balloons around so they could even fit into the car. Then, Steve drove this guy to a furniture store on the north end of town via Main Street.  I couldn't have planned it better because Main Street was PACKED with people lining both sides getting ready to watch the Cache Valley Cruise In parade. (I snorted at this point. Please, stop! I was begging him to tell me whether he got any waves or honks, but he didn't think it quite as funny as I did.) Apparently he dropped off his boss (who was a really good sport), and high-tailed it home by way of the most obscure path he could find. 
I really think he liked his birthday car. :)

On the 4th of July, we went to Hyrum for the parade. Good times. I love small town parades.

We got there early, but still didn't get a great spot. Go figure. Who'd have thought Hyrum would be so popular. A good friend was there with her family and invited us to sit with them. Thanks, Guys.
It was a fun parade -- even if Bailey did get a little torked at the "big boy" who "stole her candy."
(For the record, he just got there a little sooner.There was no real candy thievery involved.)

There is a little park and splash pad near where we live and we had really hoped to make it there much more than we did over the summer. We did manage to go a few times, though, and the gals really enjoyed it.

We are very excited about the LDS temple being built in Brigham City. It's been fun to see a little bit of the progression of the building as we pass by when leaving or returning to Cache Valley and we are eagerly anticipating the open house and dedication. When we heard that the Angel Moroni was being placed on the top of the temple, we decided to go watch. We found a little spot on the tabernacle grounds and waited in the drizzle with tons of other people. The weather was tricky and the wind was too strong for them to safely place it how and when it was planned, but it was  still a good time. We visited and had some really cool conversation about temples. After a bit, the kids were tired of waiting so we walked a few blocks to the home of my friend's sister. They had invited us to stop by and have lunch. We ate and the kids had lots of fun friends to play with. We were getting ready to leave for home when we walked outside and saw them finally placing the statue on the temple spire. It wasn't what we'd planned - to see it from a block and a half away, but it was still neat to see. 'Can't wait for the openhouse.

Summer Stuff

Wow! So I need to share something here. I hadn't posted anything for quite a while (before that last post) because summer was busy, but also because I was so frustrated with Blogger. It was so slow and I couldn't get things to post like I wanted. Thank heavens for my 12 year old. He simply pointed out that I was using the absolute dinosaur version of Blogger. Yep. I knew it had been updated, but I didn't realize it was THAT bad. Uh huh, it was that bad.  After tech support stepped in, I decided to try again. Nice. (Thanks, Matt)

After we got home from our Arizona trip, my sister and her family came to spend some time with us. We had lots of fun plans --which we mostly had to change due to the weather and rain. So we really just spent lots of time hanging out and playing. The kids rode bikes, watched movies, played wii, made a sweet fort out of refrigerator boxes, and had a blast. They live less than two hours away, so it's not like we never see them, but it was just so good to have time.

A few days after they headed back home, my cute niece from California came. She had come to Utah with some family and we were lucky to get her for a few days. Matt enjoyed hanging out with her and my girls ADORED her. She was a very good sport and didn't seem to mind having two adoring fans hanging on her about every waking second.
One afternoon we headed to the dam to enjoy some sunshine and feed the ducks. It ended up being pretty funny 'cause those darn ducks are so spoiled and fed waaay too much. They didn't want anything to do with the bread the kids were throwing to them. They were so disinterested, in fact, that it ended up being more like the kids throwing the bread AT them.

We couldn't have an out of town visitor without introducing her to Aggie ice cream. Sooo good. Lemon custard...Mmmm...

Another ice cream adventure was the phenomenon of the Kitchen Sink at Angies. I love the way the light from the window is shining -- looks kind of like a halo. Heavenly.

We made our best effort, but didn't quite "clean the kitchen sink." They gave us the bumper sticker anyway. :)

On our last evening, that sweet gal painted the girls' nails. We loved having her with us!