Random stuff

Me and the kids went down to Tiff's house on Monday to play.  I got to watch Damon and Tessa while Tiff took Rockwell to his Kindergarten assessment.  I can't get over how happy Damon is.  You can't help but feel happy around him.  I love it!

Hallee and Wyatt love going to Tiff's house.  They both fell asleep quickly on the way home.

On Tuesday they came to our house to play.  The kids had a great time playing while I visited with mom and my sisters!

I'm going to start keeping Katelyn after school three days a week.  Jenna offered to pay me to keep her so that is nice.  We always do their homework after school and then the girls get to play until Ammon comes to pick Katelyn up.

Caitlyn had her last horseback riding lesson on Friday.  I thought her teacher knew what she could do on the horse, but I guess she didn't.  Caitlyn showed her how she could trot on her own so she moved a lot faster on Friday than she has in any other lesson.  They said Caitlyn doesn't need private lessons anymore, so if we decided to put her in regular lessons she could do group lessons.  Group lessons are cheaper, but it is still so pricey. 

Katie had a baby shower on Saturday.  I'm so excited for her.   She looks so beautiful.  I'm so glad she is back in Utah, I can't wait to hold that baby!

Today we met Emilee at Liberty Park to play.  It was good I got out because I woke up feeling grouchy.  I know I have to get out on those days!  The kids had a blast so we ended up staying until it was almost time to pick up Caitlyn and Jonah. 

Hallee and Kenzee had fun playing in the water together.

I love how much fun kids have with water.

Wyatt had fun racing boats with the boys.  I didn't get anything done today, but we sure had fun!

Seven Peaks Provo

I keep thinking that it is our last time at the water park, but we keep going back!  Saturday was so hot so we decided to try Seven Peaks in Provo.  We wanted to invite Tiff, so it worked out perfect.  Tiff, Tessa and Rockwell came with us.  The kids had so much fun together.

Me, Keith and Tiff switched off watching the little ones so the other ones could go on slides.  It was a lot of fun.  I loved Provo so much better than Salt Lake.  I thought it was a lot cleaner and had a lot more slides.  It was packed though. 

Hallee loved the kiddie pool. 

Jonah is such a great kid.  He played with the kids and made them laugh.  He would let Tessa and Hallee splash him and he would pretend to fall in the water.  The girls would laugh so hard and he did it over and over for them.  He played tag with the boys and when I asked him if he wanted to go on some more slides he said, "No, I like playing with Rockwell, he is fun."

Wyatt and Rockwell loved chasing Jonah around.  These two either like the exact same things or take turns like pros because they very rarely disagree and are always happily playing together.

Caitlyn and Jonah loved the boomerang slide.  We all liked going down on the slides where we could race each other.  

Hallee and Tessa had fun running around the pool together.  I had fun playing with them, they are just so cute!

I'm so glad that Tiff and the kids came.  All my kids love to play with Rockwell and Tessa!

Now take a picture of this!

A few weeks ago I had to take pictures of Caitlyn after church.  She looked so grown up.  I can't believe how much she is growing up and changing.  I don't know if I'm ready for a tween!

Caitlyn loves to have her picture taken and she loves to pose.  She kept telling me to take pictures of different poses, she is so funny!

Caitlyn is still the sweetest girl.  Caitlyn got a new student in her class on the second week of school.  She noticed she was playing alone at recess so she invited her to play with her and her friends.  Daisy, the new girl, wrote Caitlyn a note saying she was her best friend.  On Sunday a lady in our ward had her granddaughter with her at church.  Caitlyn sat by her and introduced herself and took her back to her grandma after primary.  Marlene gave her a hug and thanked her for being so sweet to her granddaughter.  I told Caitlyn that she is the answer to a lot of mom's prayers. 

Hallee wanted in on the pictures.  I love these girls.  Caitlyn has been a little frustrated at school because her teacher yells a lot.  I guess there are a few boys that disrupt the class and get the teacher pretty frustrated.  I reassured Caitlyn that the teacher wasn't mad at her and to just keep following the rules and she would be fine.  Today when her teacher was frustrated Caitlyn told her that she is a great teacher. It would have been great if she didn't follow it up with, "no matter what anyone says."  Whoops, she meant well. 

I love watching my kids play together.  Hallee and Wyatt are so cute when they play pretend.

Jonah still needs some practice on playing what other people want to play.  Caitlyn always gives in and plays Pokémon with him.  Cute kids.

Family Pictures

My mom wanted a new family picture this summer while we were all together.  I hoped it wouldn't happen at first, I'm not happy with the way I look so I'm not lining up to get my picture taken.  I love pictures though, so once I realized it was going to happen I got more excited for it.

 

 Kyle will probably leave for his mission next summer so this will probably be our last picture with every one for a while.  This is my favorite group shot.  We are quite the group now!  It was a little tough that it was our first picture without Jen.  I know it was tough for mom, that is why I wanted to give them the picture of Jen on the same day.



I am not good at putting colors together so I went shopping with Katie and Tiff and I hit the jackpot at Ross and our outfits came together.  

Emilee came and took our pictures for us at Murray Park. This is probably my favorite family shot, but I like them all.  

I love this cute family of mine! I love how Hallee has her hands in her pockets.

I really like this one too.  I love how Keith has his arms around us and the look on his face.  He is a great protector and provider and that is what I think of when I look at this picture.

I love this one of the kids! 

Our kids are just so cute!

It has been a really long time since Keith and I have had our picture taken together.  I really liked this one. 

I love Keith's face in this one too.  I love shots like this, we do like to have fun and laugh together.

I love this one too.  I love that all my best friends are in my family.  I love how close we all are and that we genuinely enjoy spending time together. 

All of the grand kids are so cute, seriously they are all so good looking! I love how Jonah folded his arms in this one.

It must run in the family, look at this good looking couple!  Thanks for making us do family pictures mom!

And then there were two!

The good thing about school starting back up is I only have to worry about entertaining two kids instead of four.  It is tough to find activities that all four of my kids want to do so it is nice that we can do fun things for Wyatt and Hallee now since they were such great sports this summer.  

Number one on Wyatt and Hallee's list is playing with Tessa and Rockwell.  On Wednesday we did that.  My mom, Mel and Tiff took me to lunch for my birthday (summer is always crazy) so we all met at Mel's house.  Her kids hadn't started back to school yet so they offered to keep the little kids while we went.  It was wonderful.  Wyatt loved it.  EJ and Elijah were laughing while telling me about all of the crazy things Wyatt did.  He took off his shirt (apparently you have to when you are fighting) beat his chest like a gorilla and chased them around the house trying to fight them and throw Legos at them.  What?  I'm glad they thought it was funny. 

After lunch we went to my mom's house for a while.  Tessa and Hallee and Wyatt and Rockwell had a great time playing together.

I had a great time playing with Damon.  Look at that smile.  I love making him smile and it isn't hard to do!

On Thursday night Caitlyn and I had a mother/daughter activity for activity days.  I took two of the girls with us because their moms couldn't make it.  I was the only mom that showed up.  There was one grandma, but that was it.  It was still a lot of fun.

We played a game where you had to get M&M's out of a bowl with a straw.  It was fun being there with Caitlyn.

Friday, Caitlyn had another horseback riding lesson.  She had fun, but she was disappointed that she didn't get the same horse.  This horse seriously looked depressed and walked so slow!  She still had fun though.

We went back and forth, but decided at the last minute to go to Seven Peaks on Friday.  I wanted to get to an outdoor pool one more time this season. 

We took Katelyn Serr with us because I told her parents I would keep her after school.  Jenna is starting medical school so it might turn into a little job for me, which would actually work out pretty great.

Everyone had a good time.  Keith played with Hallee while I took the boys on some slides and then Keith and Jonah had a blast in the wave pool.  It was fun to watch them.  I'm glad we got there one last time.

Last night we had a girls night.  I arranged it because Keith worked yesterday so I knew he would fall asleep early.  We tried out a new place called Fizz.  They have all kinds of different sodas, snacks and treats that looked really good.  We went there after dinner and just sat and visited for hours.

I love that we never run out of things to talk about.  They had to kick us out of the lobby and then kick us off their patio furniture so they could lock it up, so we went to my van to visit until we were all so tired we had to head home. I love how much better I feel after talking to other women and realizing I'm a lot harder on myself than I need to be!

First Day of School

I am so sad that summer is over.  I remember being ready for it to be over last year, but I'm not this year.  I think it has helped that the kids are older and that I can leave them home when I go grocery shopping.  I also think we have had just the right amount of fun activities, trips and relaxation this summer.  We have had so much fun together and I'm not ready for it to end.  I'm also going to miss sleeping in.  I don't sleep well at night.  Most nights I am up during the night, but come 7:00 AM I can sleep so soundly.  Jonah would always get up and get Hallee and Wyatt breakfast and I would keep sleeping a lot of days.  It was so nice. 

Caitlyn is so excited for school.  She hasn't been nervous at all.  She is so excited that she is in the same class as Katelyn Serr.  They are in the 4th grade/5th grade split class.  I think it will be really good for her to get back into the split class.  Last year she wasn't in it and it was a rough year.  I requested it for her this year.  I thought after a rough year, she needed a good year.  All of the nice girls seem to be in the split class every year, so I think this year will be great.

Jonah has not been excited for school.  He came up crying last night saying he didn't want summer to end and that he was going to miss me.  I'm not going to lie, it was fun to hear that.  We talked about all of the fun he was going to have this year and I got him calmed down pretty quick and got him back to bed.  This morning he was excited and ready to go.

5th grade and 3rd grade!

Jonah has almost all of his friends in his class this year.  He is in the morning French class/ afternoon English.  I absolutely love the group of boys in his grade.  There are so many good boys.  Jonah switches around and plays with all of them. 

Caitlyn's teacher is new to the school this year.  She seemed really nice. 

Jonah's French teacher is also new to the school.  It took me a minute to find her in the class.  She is really short and looks so young.  I bet Jonah will love her!

Both kids came home from school and said they loved their teachers and they had a good day.  I think this is going to be a good year!