Timpanogos Falls

The weekend after Labor Day we were finally able to get together for a fun evening with some friends from the MBA program.  We'd been trying to coordinate a camping trip with these families, but 2 of the families had been in another state doing their internships over the summer, so this was the first chance we all had to hang out.  With so many people and so many kids playing sports and attending birthday parties and yadda yadda yadda, we settled for an evening of hanging out in the mountains instead of a full camp-out.  We hiked to Timpanogos Falls, then had a potluck campfire dinner near the parking lot.  It was lots of fun and we were so glad we were able to make it work!

The hike!  Once again, Ben ended up carrying two children at a time for a good portion of the hike.
It was labeled an "easy" hike, but it was somewhat steep and uneven.  It took longer than we thought it would, especially with all of those families (two of the families, who have the youngest kids, decided not to do the entire hike).  In our case, having the other kids around seemed to motivate Cat and Jack to have a better attitude and hike more ambitiously than they do when it's just us.  That's what I call positive peer pressure.

We made it to the waterfall!

So pretty.

The whole family, with Jack enjoying his must-look-as-spastic-as-possible phase.

When I finished the hike I saw this funny looking bug and wanted to show the kids.
It took some work, but I was able to get it onto a stick without touching it - I had no idea if it was poisonous or anything - and the kids thought it was pretty awesome.  It kept their attention for a while.

We took exactly one group picture using the timer on my camera and look how
well it turned out!  Pictured here, in addition to my family, are the families of Matt & Lindsay,
Krista & Eric, and Tiffany & Troy, plus their kids.

We all cooked our hot dogs over the campfire, except Eliza, who pretty much just sat
in that chair wrapped up in that blanket.

At about this point in the evening, the kids discovered an old outdoor theater near where we were eating and it was hard to get them to eat dinner because they just wanted to run around and play in the theater (which had two levels - so cool).  There was even a box of costume pieces someone had left out, which made it all the more fun.  I didn't take any pictures, but just imagine 11 kids (okay, maybe not the two young toddlers) running around, having a blast, and their parents not wanting to leave the warm campfire to round them up.  I think it was probably the highlight of the evening for all of them.

Then, of course, s'mores!  The reason for a campfire dinner.
Mmmmmmm.

So, I felt quite Utahan after this.  Because this is how you're supposed to get your kicks when you're 20 minutes from amazing hiking trails in majestic mountains, right?  Well, I think these Utah folks have the right idea.  It doesn't get much better than being in the great outdoors, getting a little exercise, and enjoying good food, all with a group of good friends.

Labor Day

We had a great Labor Day, which included fresh fruit, another reunion with friends from Tallahassee, family togetherness, and America's favorite pastime.  What could be better?

In the morning we headed down to Mapleton to meet up with Misty and Colby, a couple who were in our first married ward in Tallahassee.  Back then Colby was working on a PhD at FSU, Misty was my VT, and they just had two little toddlers.  This was the first time we'd seen them in 7 years, though we have exchanged Christmas cards and seen pictures as their family has grown to include 2 more children.  It was still a bit surreal to see those two little toddlers as bonafide big kids though.

First, we met up and picked raspberries at a U-Pick berry farm near Misty and Colby's neighborhood.  Then we all went back to their house for lunch, playtime for the kids, and a good catch-up visit for the adults.

Jack and Eliza decided they'd had enough of raspberry picking after a little while, and hung out in the sandbox instead.  Cat even joined them at one point.  Cat and Misty and Donna enjoyed cutting some flowers to take home once we'd collected as many raspberries as we could.

We had a great time hanging out with friends we hadn't seen in so long.  It turns out that Colby now teaches
in the same building where the majority of Ben's classes are held and they get to see each other occasionally.
After a long visit at Misty and Colby's house, we came home and I washed the raspberries while trying (unsuccessfully) to keep Jack's hands off of them.  Then I froze them for later use in smoothies.  Yum.

That night we decided to finally use the free tickets we get to our local minor league baseball game (part of the water park passes we got).  It probably sounds weird, especially for someone who doesn't follow baseball or anything, but it kind of nagged at me all summer that we hadn't seen a baseball game.  It's just not summer without a baseball game!  So thank goodness I was able to cross the last item off of my bucket list on Labor Day.  Go Orem Owlz!

We were pretty sure our crew wouldn't sit and watch a game for very long, though, so we didn't worry about being there at the beginning.  But Jack's favorite song at the time was "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" so I insisted that we arrive before the 7th inning stretch.  When we sat down, it was the bottom of the 6th.  Gotta love it.

"Wow - that family must really love baseball.  They're even wearing baseball hats!"

"For it's one, two, three strikes you're out at the old ball game..."
I'm so glad I captured this moment - the kids' first 7th inning stretch.

As it turns out, Utah is pretty family friendly.  Have you heard?
And of course, there was a playground in the stadium (which is owned by UVU).
Don't tell my kids, but there was also a bounce house.  They deflated it before we got over there to try it out.
The kids didn't end up watching almost any baseball because they were either playing on the playground
or running races in the grass beside the playground.  At least they had fun.

We saw this mascot when we were walking around and I thought it would be fun to take a picture with her.
We waited for a few minutes and the kids noticed immediately that the mascot was swiping all the kids' baseball hats.
I love how Jack is holding on to his hat so that she can't take it.  And Eliza is trying to morph herself into Ben, who is sizing the mascot up.  Our 7-year-old neighbor told us during carpool that he has a friend whose hat was taken by one of the Orem Owlz mascots and he never got it back.  (Cue scary music.)  Good thing Jack was holding on so tight.

I'm not kidding when I say that Utahans love their fireworks.  We saw more fireworks this summer than I've seen in the last 3 years or so.  Unfortunately, Jack became more and more afraid of fireworks as the summer progressed.  By Labor Day, he refused to look at them, but instead laid down on Ben's lap with his head covered by his hood.  Poor guy.
The rest of us really enjoyed them.

It was a great Labor Day.

Hill Aerospace Museum

Ben and I have some friends from our singles ward days named Danny and Stephanie.  They got married shortly after we did and even lived in a condo unit right behind ours in Tallahassee.  They were fun neighbors and we've continued to exchange Christmas cards since then.  Well, Danny and Stephanie now live in the Logan area, about 2 hours from us.  We've talked about getting together a few times, but finally decided to make it happen Labor Day weekend.  Our original plan was to meet up at Antelope Island to experience the Great Salt Lake together, but wouldn't you know, the forecast was calling for rain.  SO we decided to meet in Ogden and take all of the kids to Hill Air Force Base to see the Aerospace Museum.  Many people had recommended it to us, so it was on our bucket list anyway.  And actually, Ben had taken Jack one day when he had an errand to run in the area, and really enjoyed the planes (yes, you read that correctly, Ben really enjoyed the planes).  Anyway, we'd been planning on going as a family, so it worked out just fine.

I thought this sign was cool.
Especially if you're wondering how far these places are from a random spot in Korea.

I had to include this picture because it shows Ben's favorite plane, the B-17
(green one on the left side), a WWII plane.

Cat was particularly interested in this little exhibit about women in the Air Force.
And, no, I didn't even try to pique her interest in this.  She just noticed it and wanted
to read all about it.  What do you think, Grammy?  A budding feminist?
I found it interesting that there were women pilots during WWII.  Very cool.

Jack's favorite plane.  Don't ask me what it's called.

A replica of the Wright Flyer.
The kids were more interested in the Wright Brothers' fake dog, ha ha.

Cat being Presidential.

Cat and Jack ready to march to duty.

The kids did a good job of walking through the museum and staying in the designated areas and trying not to touch things (other than the Wright Brothers' fake dog).  They thought the planes were interesting and even learned a thing or two.  But the real fun began when we found ACE, the Aerospace Center for Education.  It is a hands-on, made-for-kids, area, complete with costumes uniforms, flight simulators, and science experiments.  As you can tell, Ben thoroughly enjoyed it as well.

When we were finished at ACE we made our way outside to see the really big planes.
Jack and Eliza were more interested in the rocks...

I thought it was cool to see how big the tires were on the Globemaster II, a plane from the 1950's

And here is a group shot because we were, in fact, all together.
Danny and Stephanie have their two little ones, Parker and Paisley.
The Globemaster II is behind us.

We'd planned ahead of time to have a picnic for lunch, but since the weather was, ahem, supposed to be rainy, which it wasn't, we opted to grab lunch out instead.  It was great to just sit and catch up with Danny and Stephanie and for the kids to have some more time together before we went our separate ways.  Danny and Stephanie, hopefully we'll get to see you a couple more times while we're in Utah!

The Juggler

I failed to take a picture of Ben on his first day of school like I did last year.  (Isn't that the way it goes?)  But we went out to the Orem City Center stage for a bit o' family fun that evening, so I do have some pictures.  Ben's not in any of them, though, ha ha.

A juggler and his juggling daughter put on a fun little show that was one part juggling, one part magic, one part balloon animals, and one part cheesy jokes for kids.  My friend JoDell and her kids met us there, and all 6 children had a blast.  Okay, the adults enjoyed themselves too.

sorry about the see-food...
I just love how all of the kids are laughing at some cheesy joke in this picture

Brigham City Temple Open House

Warning: this is kind of a long story, so feel free to skip down to the pictures.
I won't be offended.

As soon as I heard that the Brigham City Temple Open House was going on, I went online to try to reserve spots for our family to go.  There were several problems trying to find a date, beginning with the fact that Brigham City is two hours north of us.  The dates of the open house began while Ben was still working during his internship.  The week he had off, between his internship and his semester starting, was when Cat would begin school.  Then we were moving over the weekend.  Then Ben was starting school the next week.  I saw that Cat's school wouldn't start until Tuesday of the week Ben had off, so decided we should go on Monday.  I reserved a Monday morning spot for us and some friends.

Great.

Except I found out at back to school night, four days before school was supposed to start, that Cat's new school wasn't starting the same day as the rest of her school district.  I guess because it's a charter school, it makes its own rules?  School would actually start for Cat on Monday.  Cue panic.

By this time there were limited time slots available, combined with the fact that we now had a kid in school, with Daddy's school beginning soon, and we would be trying to orchestrate a trip to see something two hours away.  Sheesh.  I asked around to see if anyone had a reservation we could trade with.  No luck.  I called the office to see if we could get a later time, but that didn't work either.  I considered having Cat miss the first day of school, but with it being a new school, and Cat being a bit nervous, I felt like she needed to be there to begin figuring out where everything was and what the routines would be.  She preferred to be at school that day, anyway.

To complicate things, my grandparents were flying in to the airport in Salt Lake, and we had offered to pick them up, since we'd planned on spending our day in Brigham City and Salt Lake.  Should have been easy.  Well, after much deliberation we decided we would just chance it and show up at the temple in the afternoon without a reservation.

I felt like it was important for Cat to be at school through lunch so she would be comfortable with that much of the day.  We checked her out of school as soon as lunch was finished and drove straight up to Brigham City.  We had our printed reservation, which was for that morning, and were prepared to explain the problem to whoever would be checking the reservations, but nobody checked.  I'm not sure why.  Maybe they were too busy?  But it didn't bother us.  We were in.

LDS Temples are built for many reasons, but it seems like what my kids understand better than anything else is that Ben and I were married in a temple.  So they associate it with weddings.  Therefore, Jack asked me in every single room, "Is this where you get married?"  I'm not kidding.  He even asked me in the baptistry and in the entry areas.  He was really excited when we finally walked through a Sealing Room, where couples are married, or sealed, for eternity.

Of course, the temple was absolutely gorgeous.  There was an incredible amount of detail work, which reminded me of the beautiful details in the Nauvoo temple.  Below are a few interior pictures I found.

Interior Shots- 

I didn't take these pictures.  You can see them (and more) online here.

Baptistry

Celestial Room

Peach Blossom Window

Sealing Room (where couples may be married, or sealed, for eternity)

We had just enough time to watch the introductory video and walk through the temple before we needed to head back down to Salt Lake to pick up my grandparents.  We were a bit rushed, but were still able to have a good experience.  We had to hurry to the car once we finished walking through the temple, but I made sure to take a quick family (minus me) picture before we left.  Literally - I took two pictures of Ben and the kids and one of just the temple, then I took a couple more pictures of the temple from the car, as we drove away.  We made it to the airport in plenty of time, thank goodness, and were able to enjoy dinner with Oma and Opa before dropping them off at my aunt's house (my aunt being out of the country, which made it difficult for her to pick them up).

I'm really glad we were able to make it work, though the day ended up being much more hectic than we would have liked.  We loved being able to walk through this beautiful House of the Lord and help our children understand its significance.

And so, another school year began.

After a very busy summer, I think we were all ready for the kids to start school.

Back to School night for Jack - all of the kids thought Jack's classroom was awesome.

Jack has a spot in a half-day, 4-days-a-week public school preschool program.  I requested the afternoon class so that he would be at school while Eliza was napping.  That way he doesn't miss out on any fun morning activities we might be doing, and I get to have a couple of hours to myself (ideally) a few times a week.

Ready to walk in for the first day of school!

We noticed almost immediately what a difference school made for Jack.  He became more confident and independent, better at following directions, more curious and eager to learn, and more talkative.  He loves singing songs he learns at school, showing off art projects, and telling me about all of HIS friends.

Writing his name on the first day of school, with a student teacher.
The students always write their names on a strip of paper when they get to school, then
they go to the board and place their name strip under "yes" or "no," in response to the question
of the day, such as "Do you like to eat apples?" or "Do you like to play pretend?"

Jack's teacher, Mrs. A. has been teaching preschool for 25 years.  Now, Cat has been lucky enough to have several really good teachers.  But I think Mrs. A. is the best teacher we've seen yet.  She talks to the four year olds better than anyone I've met.  You can tell that she sincerely cares about them and she even seems to be genuinely interested in the things they are learning in their school, such as whether the spider will eat the fly that a student brought in today?  There are also several student teachers in the classroom (students from UVU) so there is typically one adult in the room for every 3 kids.

I let Eliza play with Jack for a few minutes when we dropped him off at school the first day.

Eliza has done pretty well with Jack being in school.  Last year, she cried the first time I dropped him off at our co-op.  I think she really missed him.  This year, she's gotten upset occasionally, but it seems to be more because she feels like she's missing out by not staying at school with Jack.  Of course, you can't blame her.  She sees a sand box, a big play house, paint, bugs, fish, and all kinds of other fun things.  I think it's actually amazing that she doesn't get upset more often about not being able to stay.

Cat's Back to School night - seems like 2nd grade is the year to start "real" school, is that right?
Check out that text book!  She's been learning about parts of speech, including predicate,
should I remember what that is...?  Probably...

We found out two weeks before school started that Cat got a spot at our nearby charter school.  (We'd been on the waiting list since April.)  I thought this school, which focuses on classical education, would be more academically challenging for Cat, and it's been a good move.  I liked her school last year, and they did place her in an appropriate reading level, but this new school uses testing throughout the year to place kids in various levels not just for reading, but for spelling and math as well.  

Cat started school before Jack so I wanted her to have a special First Day of School meal.  We wouldn't be eating dinner at home that day, so I made biscuits and gravy, her favorite meal, for breakfast.

She complains once in a while about missing her old school, mostly because of friends, but of course they all live close enough that we can still see them.  She seems to be doing just fine in the new school, though.  During our parent-teacher conference, I asked how Cat's behavior was and her teacher replied, "Great!  I wish I had 29 more just like her!" That's always nice to hear :-)

Too cool to smile at first, but then the laugh came out...

Cat's new school also has a modified school uniform, where the kids wear a collared shirt in one of 6 solid colors, with either khaki or navy pants, shorts, or a skirt.  Cat loved the idea of wearing a uniform to school and I keep waiting for her to rebel and complain about it, but really, she hasn't yet.  

Cat had a harder time containing her excitement once we arrived at the school.

It's funny how Cat will still make clothing choices that show her personality, though.  For example she really likes it when her shirt and her cardigan are the same color, and she will look around for all of the navy blue clothes she can find, so that she's wearing navy blue pants, a navy blue polo shirt, and a navy blue cardigan.  I tried to discourage it at first, but quickly realized that I needed to let her express herself in whatever way she wanted to within the parameters of the uniform.

I hope this year continues to go well for both kids.  And I'm looking forward to having them at the same school next year!  Wherever we're living...