Winner!

I've never won any kind of drawing.  From coloring contests to survey drawings I've never won.  At my high school senior party, everyone had their name entered 4 times to win all kinds of prizes.  They drew all but 4 pieces of paper that night.  Yep. All mine.

So when The Boy came home with the Walk More in 4 2012 challenge I didn't get my hopes up.  UDOT/SNAP had kids throughout the state fill out a chart with the days they walked to school during the first four weeks.  The charts were turned in to a drawing for prizes, including bikes, scooters, and water bottles.  The Boy was very excited and hoped to win a scooter.   Knowing how impossible it is to win these kinds of things I tried to prepare him for the inevitable.

For four weeks we loaded the girls in the stroller and walked to school, filled out his chart, turned it in and forgot about it.  Last week I received a phone call letting me know that The Boy had been drawn to win...a scooter!?  Really?  Needless to say he was thrilled when the principal and a UDOT/SNAP official walked into his class at school and presented him with not only his scooter but a pretty cool helmet too.

 

It was good timing as we've had perfect weather and 2 days off from school.  He's been "scootering," as he calls it, a lot.

 

Glad the stars have aligned for you, honey. You deserve it!

I Owe This Girl A Birthday

Things started off well enough with a birthday party Saturday morning.  We had a pj party and the girls (and The Boy) enjoyed muffins and chocolate milk while watching a Hello Kitty show.  We then made the rounds with nail polish and Hello Kitty tattoos.

 

 

 Her birthday started with curlers and making her birthday cake.

 The Primary Program was that day and she enjoyed getting all dolled up (I enjoyed getting her dolled up too).  She was the star of the Sunbeam's song as she was just about the only one singing.  Have we mentioned how much she loves to sing?

 After church the combination of Diyah's stairs and the excitement of getting down them quickly resulted in a tumble.  She wasn't able to enjoy much of unwrapping presents or eating cake.

We did get a few smiles.

 

 

After it was clear she was not cheering up, we hustled to the Insta Care for some X-rays.  Turns out she buckled a bone in her arm (on her birthday, poor thing!).  The next day she chose a purple cast and here she is sporting it for her first day of Preschool. 

Her first day of school went well.  She didn't even want me to walk her to the door!  We got to do her spotlight and she is VERY excited to go back on Thursday.  Such a trooper!

The Queen at 4
Favorite Food: noodles (Mac 'n' Cheese especially)
Favorite colors: Pink and Purple
Favorite Book: Silly Sally by Audrey Wood
Favorite Movies: The Princess and The Frog and The Incredibles
Favorite TV Show: Curious George
Best Friends: TyTy, Tricia, and Lexie
Favorite things to do: Sing, do puzzles, pretend

Imitation is the Sincerest Form of Flattery

Oh, What Do You Do In The Summertime?

Every week our local movie theater played kid's movies for $1 in the mornings.  We went to several.

Mommy's favorite: Kung Fu Panda 2
The Boy's favorite: Yogi Bear
The Queen's favorite: Whinnie The Pooh
Junebug's favorite: Puss In Boots (mostly because that's the only other movie we watched)

Afterward they really enjoyed watching the fountain (which was choreographed to music)...

 ...and playing in the park just outside.

 

We spent a morning at The Children's Treehouse Museum.

 

 

 

One day I decided to scrub the baked on Pam from my bakeware.  Everyone thought it was a great activity.  Who knew?

There was a lot of this...

The Boy with Construx

...and this...

 

...and this.

I don't know what we'd do without these guys.  The Boy and The Queen look forward to playing with them EVERY week.

The Boy and Bennett excavating toys and coins out of ice

The Queen and Asher

 

We were able to spend a day boating with cousins.

 

 

 

 

 

The Queen and Ty

I love this last picture.  The Queen just can't get enough of her cousin.  She frequently asks, "can we go to Oregon today and play with TyTy?"  When I took her out for her "Back to School Lunch" I asked her who her best friend was.  Her eyes lit up, she smiled big and yelled, "TyTy!"  Wish he could be around more often!

My parents are remodeling their home and we got front row seats to the demolition with the backhoe.

I picked up the Summerfit workbooks at Costco this summer.  They were terrific.  Each day had a reading worksheet, a math worksheet, and a set of exercises.  Each week we discussed a value and played a new sport.  As a reward for finishing the entire thing, we took the kids out to dinner.

What's a summer without a trip to the zoo?

 

 

 

 

 

Our last day of summer we finally squeezed in the activity the kids asked to do most.

 

 

This is what we did today.

The Boy's first day of First Grade

After the chaos that was "Back to School Morning" he reported an excellent day.  His favorite things were eating lunch at school and getting two recesses (today was early out.  Imagine his excitement tomorrow when he gets three).  He loves his new teacher and is looking forward to a new year.  While it was nice to get into a schedule and let The Boy and The Queen have a bit of a break from each other, as the day drew on, we all missed him.

Oregon

We were able to spend time in Oregon a few weeks ago, thanks to the kindness and patience of Mark's sister and her family.  Here are a few highlights.

We stopped about an hour shy of Portland and met cousins to hike to the top of this:

Multnomah Falls is gorgeous and gave us all a much needed break.

The Boy and The Queen asked if we were in the jungle.  Nope.  Just out of the desert.

The next day was predicted to be the coldest and rainiest of the week, so we spent the afternoon at the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (OMSI).  The Boy's favorite part was a model of how cars are crushed and recycled.

He also played Connect Four with Dad using buttons to control robotic arms.

Meanwhile, The Queen spent hours playing in the water.  Her favorite feature was the whirlpool.

Junebug had fun, too.

We started our Fourth of July celebration at a parade...

...before heading west to the coast.  We started at Cannon Beach.

The cold and the wind chased us inside a warm pizzeria for lunch.

We then headed to Seaside.  It was much warmer by then, so we hauled out the toys and blankets.

We had hoped to watch fireworks over the ocean, but as the evening wore on it grew colder, the crowd grew rowdier, and Junebug grew tired, so we decided to head back early.  Maybe another year.

Thursday was spent in downtown Portland.  I think just by being there we made our contribution.

 We sampled Portland's famous Voodoo Doughnuts.  They top these things with everything from cereal to bacon to candy.

I don't have any pictures of possibly the best bookstore in this world, but we did visit Powell's Books.  It takes up an entire city block and I could have spent hours in it, though the kids should not.  They were in awe and a little overwhelmed at first, but quickly threw themselves into the task of choosing a book for themselves.  We spent time looking and reading, then looking again to make sure we had what we wanted!

Next up was Jamison Square for a picnic lunch and cooling off as the afternoon temperatures reached into the 80s.

Our last day we decided to do the 4 T's.  It consists of a trail, a train, a trolley, and a tram.  We thought The Boy would be in heaven, and he probably would have been if it weren't for an upset stomach that decided to show up part way through the four mile hike.

 Great views at the midpoint of the hike.  Mount Hood is behind us between the trees, albeit it is hard to see in the picture.  Mount St. Helens is to our right, and is really hard to see since it is not in the picture at all.  It was here we realized The Boy was having some serious issues as opposed to just having a bad day, but at this point, it was faster to finish the hike than turn around and walk back to our car.  Poor kid.

 The train was next, but The Boy just couldn't enjoy it.

The trolley

When we reached the tram his stomach finally gave up.  Literally.  Twice.  After that he perked right up and thoroughly enjoyed the tram ride.

After that adventure Mark took a nap and we left Portland at 8:00 pm to make the drive home.  It took me three days to catch up on sleep, but it was a much quieter drive than the trip up!

A HUGE thank you to Katherine and her family for letting us invade their lives for a week.  We are so excited to come back!