Normal October life

Life sometimes gets swallowed up with the laundry and cooking.  Thought I would try to remember a few fun moments that happened.

 We made a big sprinkle mess while decorating cookies.  There may have been one child (that one being William) that filled his cup up with sprinkles and tried them straight.  He got tired of them pretty quick.

 We tried to go to the Scarecrow Festival, but when we realized it was canceled we headed to Wheeler Farm.  We took a fun wagon ride, met a sweet week old calf (Caleb named it Milkshake) and collected some leaves.

 Halloween pumpkins....foam stickers make things so easy.  But the kids keep begging to carve them too.  Humph  We have a princess, a fox, a skunk, a raccoon, two bats, and Peter's crazy pumpkin.

 Caleb outgrew his old bike and passed it on to Peter.  Caleb was able to go to Pa's house and get one from Pa's yard sale stash.  It fits Caleb much better.

 

The boys put their creativity to use for the school's Reflection program this year.  The theme was "The World would be a better place if..."  Caleb did two projects.  One was in literature.  He wrote a poem about the world/nature.  His other project was in photography.  He took pictures of each of our family members and his statement was, "The world would be a better place if people smiled more."

Peter wrote up how the world would be a better place for him.  It was entitled, "The things that make me happy."

William did a diorama of donut falls.  He also had some animals that he loves to see at Scofield.  Of course he has a rainbow in there.  It was entitled, "If there were more beautiful places."  They all did a great job of using their creativity and were happy with their projects.

Well, last night was the "Night at the Museum" and surprise, surprise: Caleb won an award for each of his entries!  Wow!  He was pleased and we are proud of him.

 Up next, Halloween.......The Medieval Times

Happy Number 4!

Okay, I am so far behind.  But I must remember this sweet girl's birthday before we get to Halloween.

 She woke  up bright and early so excited that it was finally her birthday!  Walking down the stairs she asked, "Am I 4?"  Such a sweet little heart.  We went to Wheeler Farm the day before and explored.  Then Sunday, the actual day of her birthday, we went to Stake Conference and then the family came over for dinner and noise.

 Haley's birthday cupcakes.  Who knew I would ever use so much red (making pink pancakes/waffles, cupcakes, frosting.....) food coloring in the space of four years?!?

 The early risers!  It was not even 7:00am and they were up and ready to help.

 Helping Haley break in a new toy.  The game soon turned into something totally different from what the manufacture of the toy intended, but at least they were together.

Another of the presents she loved was this rocking horse from Pa and a mermaid from Granny Gray.

She is also really into musical jewelry boxes.  And if you could not tell, princesses.  

 

 Every girl deserves beautiful flowers on her birthday.

The evening ended happily with a wrestling match between Dad, Haley and William.  Crazy times. 

Haley is all girl. And is generally nice to her brothers.  She loves pink, princesses, flowers, spinning and dancing and singing and setting up picnics on the floor.  She has started to tell me she does not want that "boy book" at bed time.  She will happily try any new food and eat what the grown-ups are having, so nice.  In fact the day before her birthday she woke up from her nap exclaiming, "Mom, I really like tomatoes." She has started to wear shoes more often, always wants a dress so she can spin or feel like a princess, still loves "Pink Hermoine" and is now really interested in school-time and letters.  But most of all she is always thinking about her brothers and what they are interested in.  IF she is picking a flower she gets one for Peter.  If she sees rainbows in a book she mentions William.  And she knows that Caleb will listen to her sing and not complain, and that Caleb will always be happy to see what she drew or her pretty dress.  She is a sweet girl who loves her family.  

Fall Soccer 2014

Soccer is done.  The only thing I will not miss about soccer season is waiting through all those practices.  I love everything else about it.  Cheering, watching my boys do their best and sometimes do better than they believed they could.  

 Peter did great.  He was always where he needed to be.  He even scored a goal this year!  He would have scored more had the stars aligned.  He is a terrific player, gets in there and does not quit.

 William had fun this season.  He got a little better with each game and really had fun people to play with.  He did great.

All three of the boys together with their trophy.  They are awesome!  As we all know, Diedre does not take pictures at Caleb's games!  It is forbidden.  Call it superstition or what you want, but I do not do it.  So, I keep mental pictures to remember.  Like the ones where Caleb was the muddiest of the team and it was all because of terrific saves.  Or the one where they missed the goal box kick headed right for Caleb, but he was ready.  Or the photo of Caleb going in head first to make the save or running after the ball and clearing it from the box, then charging back to his spot as a top goalie -ready to make another save.  Or even the photo where they did score on him and he called over to me to say, "sorry, mom."  And all we could do was shake it off and make the next save.  Or the time when Rob texted me play by play of Caleb's game (because I was at William's game) and Caleb made at least 20 saves in the first half!  He is a star.  When I watch most teams that Caleb plays against they usually change out their goalie at half or even mid-play.  Caleb is consistently goalie.  There have only been a few times when Coach has pulled him out, and that is only because the team is winning by 3 points and he wants Caleb to not be bored anymore.  But for the last 5 or so seasons, Caleb has been back there in the box, improving with each season.  At the last game when his coach (who is terrific and awesome and so great) was handing out the photos and saying something nice about each player and he came to Caleb, he had nothing but good things to say.  What I remember most was that he said Caleb was the "most aggressive" player on the team and that was what they needed down in the goal box.  Coach said that even though he has worked with Caleb and knows Caleb is good, sometimes Coach would watch Caleb make a save and wonder, "how did he do that?"  He makes my heart proud.  All three of them do.  That is why I love watching them play.

Life keeps moving

I'll let the pictures do the talking....

 We have had some very pretty moments

 We went to a fun car show together

Some sweet, happy moments 

 We went for a drive in the canyon to see some beautiful colors and sights

 More fall colors

School days

Caleb took his turn at Safety Patrol

 Haley is master of the spider web on the play ground.  Her favorite thing to do after we drop the boys off in the morning.

 Lots of soccer practice.  Soccer deserves it's own post but this picture of Haley being the supportive sister is too cute.  She has made some fun friends while waiting for her brothers. 

 Heartland Elementary has some fun school traditions.  The one pictured here is the Fun Run.  The kids make a goal of how many laps they think they can do, then they go run around like crazy out in the sun and heat, all the while being cheered on by their teachers and us crazy moms.   All three boys did great!

 Caleb ran a total of 2 miles for his fun run.  He was hot and tired afterward but felt good about his efforts.

We celebrated with fun run cookies after school.  These boys are awesome!

New school beginnings

And so it begins, another school year.  There were some excited kids, one grumpy one (summer was over after all), and anticipation at what was to come

 A Sixth Grader!  Holy cow!  Caleb has grown into an amazing boy.  Señor Meza will be his teacher for the final year of elementary school.  Caleb is excited!  After school Caleb's comments went something like this, "Señor Meza is HILLARIOUS!  We get to mummify a frog this year.  This is going to be a good year."  Yeah for good teachers and great kids.  

Peter's teachers this year are Mrs. Fiskell (english) and Señorita Villa (spanish).  If you could not guess, Peter was the one not looking forward to school.  He is an excellent student, great at math and homework, but he was not happy to go to school.  HOWEVER, upon seeing him after school his first words to me were, "Señorita Villa is the nicest spanish teacher I could have gotten.  I wish I could stay with her all the time."  Whew!  He enjoyed his whole day at school.  Yippi!  And Señorita Villa really is awesome.  It is her first year teaching and she is happy, upbeat, sweet and has a great smile.  She also has a strong accent and speaks fast, it will be good for Peter to learn from her.

 After school we had one last summer moment and got each other wet with water balloons.  A certain Uncle taught the boys how to throw water balloons so they would bust on impact.  Thanks to said Uncle Caleb was armed with power.  This is us before being drenched.

 Drenched and still smiling.  

William started the day after the others.  He is starting in the Spanish Immersion program this year and he seems excited.

 

Senorita Robles, the spanish teacher.

Ms. Garduno, the english side.  Both seem very nice and happy.  William only had happy things to report after his first full day of school.  The thing he seems most excited about is being able to see either Caleb or Peter at recess or lunch.

Little Miss Haley.  She has officially enrolled herself in Mommy School.  Her first day we talked about the letter P.  You know; pink, princess, puppy, pony....  Hopefully we will have fun along the way.  We all experienced a good start to the year, here's to keeping it up.

Summer's end

After Harry Potter World we only had a few days left of summer before school would begin.  We made one last trip to the cabin to enjoy it.

 We had "Family Lake Morning", thanks to an idea we heard in primary.  The kids got in the water, Peter swam around and we shared a quick thought from the scriptures.  Then we sang "Oh what do you do in the summertime."  Very fitting.

 On the last nice day at the lake (since the rest of the time it rained) the boys took advantage of the lake and journeyed across the lake.  There were no boats, no wind, glassy water and sun.  They headed out on their floater things and went to the other side.  Caleb was the super big brother and when he and Peter made it to the other side William decided he wanted to go too.  SO, Caleb came all the way back, got William and those two joined Peter on the sandy shores.  No sooner had they arrived than the wind picked up and they made their way back across.

 The girls waited and cheered on the dock.

 The great adventurers!  They made it back and loved it.

 We got wacky and ate under the table, ate candy for dinner and were just silly.

 Even though the weather took a turn for cold, wind and rain the boys made sure to get a few more jumps in.  Because they are awesome.

 We even spotted an osprey at the lake.  So, exciting!

 Haley's wacky hair and the faces of sweet kids.

One last summer activity, shooting rockets off with cabin friends.  Loving life before the alarm clock starts to ring.

In the beginning.....

 There was a trip on the plane.... and everyone stayed happy!  Yea!

 Haley did great!  She slept when she needed to, she colored, we read books.  No tears on the first leg of our journey.  Double yea!

 After we got settled into the condo, everything unpacked and we had gone grocery shopping and made a trip to the swimming pool we drove out to see the swamps.  It has to be one of our favorite things we did (besides Harry Potter).  When we first got there we saw some alligators in fenced off areas.  Then the boys started catching little lizards.  They loved it!  We named this one tail-less.  

 The boys were all so proud of catching them and holding them, they were fast little critters.  And can you see the beads of sweat forming?  Boy, it was hot and humid.  Our first day in Florida Haley was like a wilting flower, a sad wilting flower.  She got used to it though.

 We took an air-boat ride.  That was AWESOME!!!!  We got to see what Florida is really like.  Swamps, beautiful birds in their natural habitat.  Peter loved learning about Spanish Moss.  We were all thankful for the ear muff things they gave us to drown out the loud sound of the boat.  

 Haley at first did not want to go.  Tired, sad, hungry and hot.  But after eating a banana she was ready to ride.  And I am so glad she did.

 We found a real, live alligator who hissed at us and chopped at a stick and made a good show of it.  Then we left one swamp, and crossed the water over to another swamp.  At the halfway point the driver slowed the boat down and asked if we payed the extra money for a rain storm.  Sure enough the clouds opened up and down came the rain.  While speeding though the Florida waters, seeing sights never before seen, looking for gators and beautiful birds we were getting pelted with rain (that was warm but hitting hard).  And it was fun.  The rain was cooling us down, it was such a funny thing to drive through this rainstorm that none of us minded.  We were having too much fun!

After getting off the boat the boys had the opportunity to hold a baby alligator named Firecracker.  So exciting and fun!  The perfect way to kick off a family vacation!