Sleeping Beauties

Annie and Maddie are (nearly) always together.  We have a set of bunk beds, but usually I think we would be fine with just one bed in their room.  It's always fun to see them together when we check on them before we go to bed at night.  

 I often wonder what exactly they are doing when they finally fall asleep.

Maddie had that knee locked, and it was supporting weight.  And she was asleep.

Hippie Birthday

 For my uncle's 60th birthday, my aunt threw him a Groovy 60's birthday party.  Some of the guests really went all out in dressing up for the occasion.

 Aunt Linda, Grandma, and Uncle Tom were definitely getting the groovy vibe.  Uncle Tom lost the beard soon after the pictures.  I guess fake facial hair feels as good as it looks.

 Aunt Linda, Grandma, and birthday boy Uncle Ron.  Uncle Ron and Aunt Jeanne made their own tie dye shirts for the occasion.

Then there was us- not feeling very groovy.

 The kids attacked the desserts with enthusiasm.

 The adults were only a tad less enthusiastic.... 

The dads and kids went outside to play Four Square.  Melissa and Scott did join in.  Melissa was playing hardcore, and didn't take it easy on the 5 year olds.  I was lucky enough to stay inside and chat and catch up with my cousins.  Girl talk.  I need that sometimes.

At about 9 pm, we packed the kids in the car for the trip home.  It was a late night, and we didn't quite make it to sacrament meeting this morning. 

(And a thank you to Aunt Jeanne for letting me "borrow" these pictures from Facebook.)

Franklin Falls

With 5 weeks to go until Ryan is done with his Masters degree, I'm not sure we are going be able to squeeze in a proper family vacation.  I think we will have to make do with some little day trips.  Yesterday we took one to Franklin Falls, which is about a 1 mile hike in to the falls.

Here we are waiting for Daddy to come back with the checkbook for a parking pass.  Apparently the Discover Pass we bought doesn't cover all the recreation areas.  Bummer.

 We found a cool tree that needed a picture.

 When I told Ryan he needed a picture by a cool tree, this is the one he picked:

  Thanks to some stranger in the woods, we have a family picture. :)

 If you look in the top left corner of the above picture, you will see part of I-90.  Who knew there was a cool waterfall under the interstate?

There wasn't a good place to sit and eat a snack next to the waterfall, not to mention it was pretty damp from the spray, so we headed back on the trail a little ways before stopping for a snack.

 There was a good spot for throwing rocks in the river.  It isn't a proper walk without throwing rocks in a river.

 Ryan tried to splash water at the girls.

The kids did so well on the hike.  This year is the first ever that no one needed to be carried at all.  And there was no whining about how tired and bored anyone was.  Amazing. 

Peter Pan

 This year's drama camp performance was their own rendition of Peter Pan.  This was the first year that Ryan and I sat in the audience alone to watch all of the kids.  But to ensure that we didn't get too lonely, Ryan's parents drove down to watch with us. 

Mr. Murphy introducing the play:

 Elizabeth and all of the "Indians."  The kids are divided by grades.

 Kennedy, Maddie, and Annie as fairies.  The boys got to be stars, so that they didn't have to be girlie fairies.

They were so stinkin' cute.

 Peter Pan besting Captain Hook.  (Captain Hook had a little trouble remembering his lines, but he was so funny about it.)

Emma and her group of pirates:

 The end!

Wacky Day

Sometimes, there are just no words, and pictures explain everything.

Drama Camp Begins

 With the end of school comes Drama Camp.  Ryan may or may not have pulled a few strings to get Annie and Maddie to go.  The high school drama teacher owes Ryan a favor or two, and I get to have several hours to myself while the kids all go to Drama Camp, as a preview for next year.  Technically, kids don't go to Drama Camp until after they've finished kindergarten. 

Today was Favorite Costume day. 

I have three princesses, and Dora the Explorer.  Notice how Emma has crammed herself into Maddie's Halloween costume from last year. 

And these are our "dramatic" faces:

Happy Father's Day

I'm so glad I get to share this crazy life with you, Ryan.

Tree Trimming

We don't own a tall ladder, and we had an over grown tree over our driveway in need of some attention.  When Bishop R came by one day with a load of things he was giving Ryan after selling a piece of property (fence posts and such), Ryan asked if he could use the lift on the truck for a few minutes.  Ryan has been known to get creative with his methods sometimes.  He fired up a chainsaw and took care of business in a matter of minutes.

Afterwards, the kids all wanted a ride on the truck.  Sean was over to check on his bees that we are babysitting for him, so Charlie got a ride too.

Bishop R wanted a picture with the kids to show his wife. 

Last Day of School

This is the very last day of preschool, 3rd grade and 5th grade.

Father's Day Craft

Today preschool was at my house.  Tiffany accepted a kindergarten job for next year, and has been using preschool time to get ready.  So instead of always meeting at Tiffany's house, the rest of us have been trading and Tiffany gets the time off.

We did a Father's Day craft and I liked how it turned out.  The paper bags are hiding some prepackaged cookies, mostly just because they will save until Father's Day.  I got the idea from Pinterest, and used my Silhouette to cut everything out.  

Father-Daughter Bonding

Nothing says a "good time" quite like shooting an old pop can with the BB gun.

Emrys

I mentioned a while ago that our "male" cat had been showing signs of pregnancy.  Ryan (jokingly) said he was not willing to believe it.  One of the reasons we chose Merlin was the fact he was a boy, and if we were a little late in getting him fixed, well, not too much harm done, right?

Well, on Mother's Day, Merlin gave birth under our wrap around porch.  And while Merlin can get in and out easily enough, we had to peer through the wood boards to figure out how many kittens there were.  From our disadvantaged point, we guessed about 4 or 5 kittens.  

Fast forward to 4 weeks later.  For a while we thought all of the kittens had died.  Merlin is a young, new mom, and not especially fond of just hanging out with the kittens.  We think some of the kittens may have been eaten by a skunk or something too.  So we were excited to find the one remaining kitten.

 The kids want to name it Emrys.  They think it goes well with Merlin.

And we can thank BBC and Netflix for this family friendly show that we all love.

Activity Days

Over the last month or two, we've lost both of our Activity Day leaders to moving.  It fell to me to make sure we at least had one more activity before breaking for the summer.  I chose the easy route, and we invited ourselves the Gardner's pool for a couple hours of fun.  (I did ask first.)

 Below- Emma is actually below the water.  Three of the girls tried to jump in at the same time and make a huge splash, but as you can see, they weren't quite in sync.

Pizza Picnic

We've been seeing less of Ryan lately.  We've had to come up with some inventive ways to pass the evenings.  Tonight's idea was a pizza picnic.  The kids liked it with our new picnic bench.  (It didn't sell at the FFA plant sale, so the HS woodshop donated it to Ryan.)

Pool Party

This is how Annie and Maddie spent part of their day while I was at BizTown.  They spent the morning with Kaylee's mom, and went to Sean's house in the afternoon for a pool party.

JA BizTown

The 5th graders in our school district do something called JA BizTown.  It's a whole unit about learning how to use checkbooks, and how to run businesses, and all kinds of things.  The town has many businesses and a fast food restaurant (McDonalds), a tv station, and even a mayor and town hall.  Pretty much the 5th graders take over a whole "town" for a day.  They even apply for the jobs that they will have.

The adult volunteers are required to attend a two hour training.  (Although I should be set for the next time I get to go...?)  In addition, we also get to arrive an hour before the kids do, and it's about a 35 minute drive.  That's fun to arrange when you have kids in school.  Just sayin'.

I arrived, got assigned to a business next door to Emma's Copy Center.  I was in charge of the Supply and Delivery business.  They told me everything I needed to know would be in the binders, and I would be fine.

This is me, all anticipation for the kids to come.  Like my green volunteer smock?

The kids arrived, had an intro, then were turned loose to their business to get their business set up.  We were supposed to have a little start up business meeting, but oh wait.  We are Supply and Delivery, which means we were interrupted with demands for the other business' inventory during that whole 45 minute period.

Then it was time for the Town Meeting, where the Mayor spoke, and each of the business CEOs could say why the kids should check out their place during breaks and spend their paychecks.  You can kind of see Emma giving her speech below:

Over the course of the day, I decided all the information I needed was NOT in the binder.  But we blundered through, and the hectic day passed quickly.  It was fun to see Emma be the CEO of her business.  She was glad that Kendra was her CFO.  Emma didn't spend all of her paycheck during her breaks, which does surprise me a bit.  Everyone, students and volunteers, had the same chicken nugget and applesauce lunch courtesy of McDonalds.  The volunteers had a JA BizTown "dollar" in the smock, so we could go buy ourselves lunch.  I was starving.  I don't usually eat breakfast as early as I did that day.

This was almost at the very end of the day.

I checked Emma out during the closing meeting, so I could just take her home with me.  The good news was announced that all the businesses paid off their business loan, so the day was a success!