Madalyn's preschool debut

Her preschool had cowboy days and they did a song and dance, ate griddle cakes, dressed up and made vests. Fun Fun Fun.

music class

I am going to experience Carver's first time of going "off track" so to keep us in the mode of doing class type things, I am going to start doing the music class again --2 times a week during the time when he is off track-- I'm thinking Mondays and Wednesdays at 10 or 11 am. I am going to be letting people in my ward know and a few friends. So if anyone is interested, please contact me. The kids really learn a lot. We'll see how much they remember from the beginning of Summer.

the Toyroom

The whole reason that I have a toyroom is to make sure that the toys have a place and that the children know where that place is, meaning they can play with nearly everything in the room, make a mess and mom won't get mad and make them clean it up everyday-- or every other day. My problem is that I hate a messy room. I have to tell myself multiple times a day and several times during the week, "don't open the door" or "don't turn on the light" or "just keep walking" when I pass the room. And most of the time I breathe deeply and follow my own instructions, but other times like yesterday, I get in a frenzy and just have to hurry and clean it up. "It will only take a minute, if I'm fast," I tell myself... and then an hour later everything is back in the rightful place, I'm a sweaty mess and out of breath. Why do I do this to myself? Well, it usually takes twice as long if I have the kids do it-- or it takes half that long if I let them do it by themselves (and then everything is in the wrong bucket or basket and I end up fixing it later myself). But, I have decided that it is ok for that room to be a little messy and if I choose to clean it up without asking the kids for help, well, that is my own fault and should be considered exercise. Even if I haven't quite taught my children to clean-up the toyroom very well, I am making progress. They know exactly what to do with their dishes after meals and are very good at knowing exactly where to put their dirty clothes, Clint on the other hand, well, that is a different job entirely!! Love you baby :)

Madalyn's hair

Some people have mentioned that maddie gets haircuts a lot-- well that is not exactly planned. She happens to love them and anyone who will give her one or help he give herself one. And for those of you thinking "man, don't you watch your kids?" or "why don't you hide the scissors" little do you know my children and their sneeky minds. I don't know where they get it. However, to my dismay, this time it involved some friends and what ended up was a huge ball of brown, black and blond hair on the floor-- it wasn't at my house, so... make sure that if my children come to your house, you had better hide the scissors (and any electric razors, scrapbooking things that can possibly cut anything, gardening sheers, etc.)

cousins at play

Carver, Jack and Madalyn

Deer Creek on Labor Day

The Family decidedto go for a day of water fun and we were telling the kids how much fun we were going to have, well Carver wanted to draw a picture for us. A little while later I went to check out his work. He had drawn a picture of a boat, someone driving the boat, a person waterskiing, someone swimming in the water, and then underneath everyone in the water-- a huge shark-- very detailed especially the sharp teeth and dorsel fin. I would have kept it and posted the picture, but we had to have a little discussion about sharks and where they live and where they do not live--- he's too much of a jaws fan (yes, and probably too young to have seen them-- bad mom).

LAGOON CONT

family fun

LAGOON

We wanted to take the kids for a fun day at Lagoon for about 2 months and postponed it because of Madalyn's health things... anyway, it turns out that we didn't have that many plans for the Labor day weekend and we decided to see if that would be a good time to go. Turns out that it was. We had very mild weather (yippy, I hate amusement parks in the extreme heat!!) and Lagoona Beach wasn't too crowded so I wasn't all that concerned about being, well, not in the best shape of my life. Turns out that Carver and I had the time of our lives-- I was able to have some 1 on 1 time with him and we rented tubes and raced down the slides, then relaxed (well, as much as I could in the FREEZING cold water) on the lazy river. We went with our good friends the Youngs and with them having 5 boys, Carver couldn't have been happier. They did their own version of "The Boys are Back". Cousin Jack also had a birthday party that day so Madalyn, Clint and Nicalee did a little shuttling to fit everything in, all in all it was a great day.

The Zoo

Yes, we have to go to the zoo at least a couple of times a year or we will somehow fall apart. Last week we just happened to choose the best day possible to get up there. The weather was perfect, there were very few people visiting, and all the animals were out and about including the mama tiger and her new little kittens, the snow leapard, cheetah, cougar and all the monkeys so my children thought we were in heaven. There were also workers with snake petting displays and the bird show was still going even though no one was really there to see, talk about perfect time for me. Love the zoo.