Brooklyn's 1st day of 1st Grade!

Brooklyn loves school and was thrilled to start 1st grade. Her teacher we have heard great things about, her name is Miss Spadafora. Brooklyn kept asking me to tell it to her over and over. Then after the first day of school she came home and told it to me no problem. I'm guessing her teacher went over it a bunch the first day of school so the students could say it :)

Summer at PG Pool

This summer I decided I'd get a pool pass to give us something to do. My kids are at such a great age to go to the pool, because Brooklyn can swim really well and I don't worry about her drowning at all (even though I still watch her like a hawk). Gavin is really cautious and never leaves the shallow part, so I basically just sit and watch my kids play, not a lot of effort really. It was so great this year we loved it! Brooklyn is such a fish, she just sits and dives for hours with her little diving rings. The problem I did have with her this year is that she constantly wanted to swim in the deep end and I don't let her unless I'm there and Gavin doesn't like swimming there because he can't touch and I have to hold him. So, we'd take turns and Gavin and I would sit in the deep end and watch her jump off the diving board for a while, then we'd go back to the shallow part, it worked pretty good and I'm proud to say on the last day we went to the pool Gavin was putting his face underwater! This is really a huge accomplishment for him. He is not anything like Brooklyn when it comes to swimming, he wouldn't even let me put him in lessons this year, so hopefully next year he will ;)




Brooklyn doing her "twistie" off the diving board, it looks freaky in this picture cause it looks like she'll hit the board!

Fruits of our Labors

I haven't done a garden for a few years, but this year I was determined to, so my lovely husband worked hard to get some soil and dumped it into our spot, then our wonderful neighbor brought over his tractor and tilled it for us. Spencer put in some drip lines and I planted it. I was so excited, the plants looked great until...the squirrels came! Our neighbors have a shed right on our property line, right next to our garden and underneath it a momma squirrel had babies this spring...8 to be exact. So, they wreaked havoc on my garden. They ate all the cucumber plants, zucchini plants and pumpkin plants. I replanted some of them but they were way delayed. Then as my tomatoes started coming on they started to steal them too! We tried all kinds of repellents and even gas bombed their hole, nothing worked. Desperate times call for desperate measures and I read somewhere if they feel threatened (like are shot at) they will move their home. So, I bought Spencer a pellet gun and after shooting after them a couple of times ( none were killed btw), they left! Sadly they moved across the street to our neighbors and are driving them crazy now. It was a good learning experience and my garden did somewhat survive. This picture was taken in July when I got my first few vegetables, now I have tomatoes coming out my eyeballs! If anyone wants some feel free to come get as much as you like.

My Son the Storyteller

Gavin walks out of his room this morning looking a little damp...

Me: "Gavin did you wet the bed?"

Gavin: "No, I just got squirted with some water...(with the look "as if" mom I'd do that)"

Me: "Well then how come your wet pants smell like pee?"

Gavin: (very matter-of-factly) "I got squirted with a pee-pee hose"

Me: "In your bed? by who?"

Gavin: "Brooklyn"

yes, yes of course you did son...

Birthdays

August is a busy month for Birthday's we have my Bro-in-law Chris who's was this past week and we threw him a surprise party, my mother-in-law's, as well as Brooklyn's. So we have had some birthday cake. I also plan on making Brooklyn a barbie cake for her birthday. Anyway Gavin really wanted to make a cake today and decorate it (mostly because he loves my "frosting gun" aka pampered chef frosting tool). I told him it wasn't anyone's birthday today and lets wait a couple weeks till Brooklyn's and we'll make a cake for her then. He wasn't satisfied and asked if we could just make a "Friday cake" of course since we weren't making a birthday cake. I'm not sure if he really knew it was Friday or took a stab in the dark, either way I thought it was pretty darn cute.

Where does all the time go?

This is Brooklyn her first week home from the hospital.

As school approaches (less than a week away!), I am all ready the kids have their clothes, backpacks, school supplies, etc. This is pretty amazing for me considering how much of a procrastinator I usually am, but thanks to the internet I made very few trips out of my house! At the beginning of the summer I was dreading Brooklyn going back to school, because I knew she would be gone the whole day. The thought gave me anxiety. I could manage 2 1/2 hours at kindergarten, but could someone actually take care of my little girl for over 6 hours and return her safely to me? I know this sounds crazy, and that is because I AM a little crazy to be honest.

This summer has been so busy, and I know this is what most people say, however for us it really has been probably ten times more busy than usual. We've been camping to Monticello, Moab, Hurricane, Fairview and Oak City Canyon. We got a pool pass and went swimming a couple times a week, there was Strawberry Days, 4th of July and the 24th. We went to Nauvoo and on a Pioneer Trek. It has been a lot of fun, but I'm ready to slow down and get back into a routine and so are my kids. Unfortunately I think my kids are starting to suffer from the lack of structure we have had in our home. Going to bed at 11 p.m., sleeping till 10 a.m., and now Brooklyn has to be at school at 8 a.m.! Luckily she gets up pretty easily. If it was Gavin there would be blood and gnashing of teeth!! He is NOT a morning person to put it nicely :)

So as I ramble on I guess I am just having mixed emotions. I know that everyone says that time goes by really quickly and that is because it does! It seems like only yesterday I was bringing home Brooklyn from the hospital thinking about someday when she would be in school, and also thinking how far away that seemed. Now we are here and she is my big "thirst grader" She can say her "f" sound but I have to remind her. She is such a doll and I love her so much. So naive going into this big scary world. I'll just savor the time I have.

Adventureland Park

We took some Cafe Rio to Adventureland park the other night with the Heelis family. Brooklyn loved the ducks and geese of course, too bad we forgot to bring bread to feed them, next time. We just let the kids play by the water and then took a little stroll around the little pond.

Brooklyn feeding the ducks leaves, she was pretty sure they loved them :)
Gavin doing what he does best...throwing sticks!!

24th Weekend at Fairview

We had a pretty fun weekend on the 24th, we went up to Fairview. We usually like to go camping there at least once a year. Of course we had to pick one of the busiest weekends of the year to go! Of course not on purpose, it has just been so busy this summer it was the only weekend that worked out. We went with the Heelis family which is always a fun time.
First on the agenda: exterminate massive biting ant colony, they had infested this big log right by our fire pit. I don't know if you can see all the ants on the log, but there were hundreds, and ten times more on the inside, eewww!
Here we are being ultra safe with the gasoline and blowtorch...action shot of Matt jumping away from the flames
Goodbye Ants! Not really, there were still a bazillion crawling everywhere! Look at this flower!

There were so many wildflowers blooming everywhere, they were beautiful! Morgan and Brooklyn were in seventh heaven, posing with all their bouquets.
The Fairview lake was hopping and we took Matt's little boat out to the middle of the lake on this little peninsula or so he called it. The kids had fun getting really muddy and catching some fish.

My kids are braver than I...touching a fish...yuck!