Our Weekend

On Friday evening we met some friends at a park in the Provo Canyon for a campfire picnic dinner.  We roasted hot dogs and had some fruit and chips for dinner, then s'mores and campfire bananas for dessert.  Mmmm.  We had a great time just playing, hanging out together in the park.

That night when I was putting Jack to bed he wanted me to tell him a story, so I told him all about a family who likes to go on adventures.  This family goes camping, hiking, exploring, all kinds of things.  There wasn't really a plot to the story, I just wanted to encourage his enthusiasm for fun outdoor stuff and before I was halfway through my story, he was exclaiming "It's us! It's us!"  Love it.

On Saturday we attended a stake missionary activity (referred to as a Fiesta) in a predominantly Latino neighborhood in our stake and had a fun time there.  The kids had hot dogs (yes, again) and watermelon for lunch and Ben and I had frijoles charros y tortillas con horchata.  ¡Delicioso!  The kids got face paint (on their arms), balloon swords (Jack had been holding out for a balloon shotgun but when he heard I would confiscate it as soon as he aimed it at a person, he decided a sword was a better idea), and played at the playground.  They had fun watching kids (even one of Cat's friends from school) get dunked in the dunking booth, then the Stake President got dunked.  As we were leaving, the Mayor arrived and said a few words before climbing into the wet seat.  We also got to tour a fire engine and ambulance on our way out.  ¡Que divertido!

The kids were almost as excited about Football Christmas this year as Ben was.  They got dressed up in our FSU shirts, the girls acting like cheerleaders.  I put up some festive decorations and of course we had Football Food.  Eliza wanted to help Ben prepare the burgers, so here he is teaching her how to pat them.  For dessert we had a Football Brownie.  You might just have to trust me on that - it doesn't look much like a football in the picture.  But then again, it didn't look much like a football in real life either.  :-)  The kids loved watching the game and hated having to go to bed at halftime.  Ben and I were on the edge of our seats watching the last quarter, but thank goodness the Noles pulled it out!

When Cat and I were getting the decorations out of the office yesterday, she grabbed the 12-month size cheerleader outfit we have and brought it upstairs.  She had it on her teddy bear for a little while, but when she saw it out today she decided Luke needed to wear it.  Luke didn't seem excited about his new outfit, but we all appreciated his willingness to be our jester for the afternoon.

Football Christmas

We had a fun weekend that involved a campfire, a fiesta, and this:

That's right.  Today was Football Christmas,

otherwise known as the day of the first game of FSU's football season.

GO NOLES!

More to follow.

In Other News

LUKE continues to impress me with his mess-making abilities.  Not that he's alone.  I believe most toddlers can boast that they possess this super power.  But still, it is something to behold.  I took a series of pictures of Luke during lunch the other day and the transformation is crazy.  He started out happily feeding himself with a spoon for the first time.  Then he started using his hand to get the yogurt.  Then he tried to lick it out of the bowl.  And when I gave him a cup with a bit of water in it, he began putting noodles into the cup.  Also notice that by the end, he had yogurt in his hair.

ELIZA was hanging around Jack the other morning when he was trying to finish up a homework assignment before school.  In an effort to give her something to do to keep her busy (and keep her from distracting Jack), I asked her to draw pictures on lunch bags for Cat and Jack.  Eliza jumped right in and really enjoyed the task.  The big kids loved having specially decorated lunch bags, too. Cat's had balloons and Jack's (not pictured) was a race car.

I brought a few packs of toilet paper upstairs from the storage room and left them in the hallway, planning to divide them up between the two upstairs bathrooms.  Before I got around to it, JACK unwrapped all 3 packages and built a toilet paper tower.  He was so proud of himself, and though I did not get upset with him, I also didn't want to encourage him.  So I had to snap the picture really quickly before he saw me.  Then I asked him to reassemble the tower in the bathroom and throw away all of the trash.  He did it all very well.

CAT was excited to run for Scholar Council this year.  We looked at ideas for posters on Pinterest and found a few concepts she liked.  Then I took the picture of her talking to one of the school's Knights (which is their mascot) and she had a friend come help her make her posters.  She had 4 different posters and they all turned out great.  The Knight picture one is my favorite, though.  Unfortunately, Cat didn't win the election.  (One of her competitors RAPPED her speech.  How can you compete with that??)  Cat was sad at first but she's had a great attitude about it.  I'm sure she'll find plenty of other ways to keep herself busy this year.

Cat was excited about having her current teacher because she has a tradition of teaching her class the table clap chant and the cup song.  Today Cat's class performed the table clap for the whole school as part of the mini-assembly they do every Friday morning.

Luke Learned Another Trick

ALS Ice Bucket Challenge

First Ben's brother challenged him.

And the next week, Cat's friend challenged her.

Eliza's Big Day

Eliza finally started school today.  She has been asking when she would start school for months.  Last year, I told her that she would start school after summer was over.  When summer vacation started for Cat and Jack, Eliza was anxious to start school right away.  She made it to the end of summer pretty well, but when Back to School night came around a couple of weeks ago, she was very disappointed that she didn't get to begin going to school right away - as in that night.  Then Cat and Jack started and it was sadness all over again.  But she survived and was rewarded for her patience today.  Thank goodness, it did not disappoint.

Ben and I dropped Eliza off and she was so thrilled to get started that she happily posed for a few pictures in front of the school, then skipped and sang her way to the door.  It's hard to hear in the video, but E's singing "I'm going to schoo-ool!  I'm going to schoo-ool!"  It was precious.

(We were looking for her cubby so she could hang her back pack up.)

We stayed long enough to help her do the first task (always writing her name on a slip of paper and taping it to a board up front in a "yes" or "no" column under the question of the day) and see her begin her first play time task: play dough.  She was in hog heaven.

She told us after school that in addition to play dough, she played at the sand table, did a song and dance with her teacher ("It was so hard!"), used the stamps ("They have covers on them so you don't get your hands messy!") read a book (The Kissing Hand), played outside during recess, and ate a cupcake.

We also had cupcakes for dessert tonight as a celebration treat.  Eliza helped me make them this morning, which was fun.  Luke woke up from a nap while we were working on the cupcakes and he wasn't quite as helpful... at one point he grabbed a knife and tried to stick it in the electric mixer.  Yikes!  So glad we all lived to see another day.

The other funny thing that happened this morning was when E and I were using my stamps, making cards together.  After a lot of work on one card (pink cardstock with feminine stamps in feminine colors), she wanted to write something and I grabbed a few pens for her to choose from.  I brought over pink, purple, and black pens.  She responded with, "Thanks Mom.  I don't need the black."  (You did notice her outfit and backpack, I hope.  Love that girly girl.)

I have to admit, it's a bit strange to have three kids attending school now.  Cat and Jack are both in school all day, but I'm glad that Eliza is only going to school for a few hours a day, 4 days a week.  It's nice to have her around as much as I do.  After all, she'll be all grown up tomorrow.

Family-Friendly Nightlife

We had fun things to do every night this weekend.  That doesn't seem to happen when you're a family with 4 young children, huh?  But we loved it.

Friday night we met up with some extended family at my cousin's house.  We enjoyed a yummy dinner and caught up with everyone after our various summer adventures, and the kids had a blast hanging out with all of the other kids - their 1st cousins twice removed, I think??  They ran around outside, chasing each other and collecting snails, and they ran around inside, playing with toys and dressing up in costumes.

Saturday night was our ward's summer party at a nearby park and we had a great time.  The night was off to a fantastic start with face painting.  Our friend let Eliza paint her face, once Eliza's face was complete; Cat ended up with a full dog face; and Jack had two Batman logos.  The kids also played volleyball and soccer and just enjoyed being with their friends.  After dinner, I let Luke have free reign on the playground and he had a BLAST.  We'll have to go back soon before winter hits.

Sunday night some friends invited us to join them for a free concert fireside at a nearby amphitheater. The headlining act presenter was Nashville Tribute Band, whom we've heard a lot about, and they did not disappoint.  It was the most fun I've had at a spiritually-focused event in a long time.... probably since I attended EFY.  The kids enjoyed it too (though Jack was just as entertained by the toys the other children brought as he was with the fireside).  It was also extra cool that our friends were related to the folks who planned the event, so we got to sit on the 4th row; there were several hundred people in attendance, so we were pretty lucky.

 

These are my favorites of the songs they performed:

The Rising

Emma

Somewhere There's a Mountain

He Walked a Mile in My Shoes

A few more...

Last night I received the following 1st Day of School pictures from Jack's teacher.  Cute!

Shortest Hike Ever

Yesterday we headed back up to Little Cottonwood Canyon again for a short hike to a waterfall.  We didn't have a lot of time as we were going to my cousin's house for dinner, but we were itching to do something cool and we knew Saturday would be filled with other things.  We tried to follow some vague directions I found online, but ended up going down the wrong trail.  (These things aren't exactly marked with big green Interstate-type signs.)  After dealing with traffic and rain on our way up there, we were a bit disheartened that the weather was not only rainy when we arrived, it was also pretty chilly.  But the hike was supposed to be short (thank goodness this one was also very short) so we grabbed jackets and blankets and towels, wrapped up, and started walking.

Within about 5 minutes, the large trail we were following ended at a closed gate.  So we scrambled down the rocks to get to a pretty little river, where we explored a bit and took some pictures.  Cat started walking in the water right away (we'd worn flip flops for this reason) but ended up losing one of her shoes.  I was sure it was a goner, but Cat hurried over the rocks and was able to catch it, falling into the water in the process.  She was soaked from the waist down, but was glad to have retrieved her shoe.

It was a good little excursion, and we're hoping to do some more exploring in that area soon.

Luke's Lessons in Etiquette: The Sliced Olive Edition

"Manners are a sensitive awareness

of the feelings of others. If you have that

awareness, you have good manners,

no matter what fork you use."

- Emily Post

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