Back to School

The kids were all ready to go back to school after a fun summer of playing our hearts out. Janie was starting third grade. She has Mrs. Joachim. Jane's class is cool because they don't have regular seats, they have different kinds of options like exercise balls and stools etc.  She was excited about that. 

 She didn't seem nervous.  It was nice that one of her best buddies Maxim is in her class again.

 Lizzy was excited to start seventh grade and is already looking so much older and grown up, I only have pictures of her and Nellie at home because that would be really lame for me to take them to school in middle school.

 Nellie is starting sixth grade and Middle school!  She was so nervous and worried about how hard it would be compared to elementary school.  She won't have a problem, she is so smart!  It reminds me of myself when I was her age though. I was so scared to move up to the next schools too, but it ended up not being that big of a deal, and that is what I told her.

 Clara just had to be in the picture with Russ, so I had to take one with him alone too. It seems like I had a picture of me on the first day of kindergarten with one of my little brothers too.

 Russ doesn't really seem to get nervous for things so that is nice.  Either that or he just doesn't let on about it.

 Russ was excited to see his friend Rylee in his class.  It made him not as nervous to have someone from his TK class with him.

 Russell had a great first day in the owl class.  I love his cute owl hat.

I went and picked them up and rode home with them to make sure that Russell would do okay and he did great.  He is such a  rule follower that I had nothing to worry about. haha!

End of Summer Fun

We seriously seemed to pack it all in this summer.  We did so many fun things, took a really great trip and had many days of fun swimming. 

 Annie and Clara have a good friend Piper and her Mom just had a baby, and the girls were absolutely enthralled with him!  They wanted their picture taken with him.

 We love having our family movie night and Clara has started to be big enough to stay up with all of us and watch the movie.  She thought she was a hot shot getting to have her own popcorn adn candy and watch the movie.

 We had to go shoe shopping before school started so the kids would have some shoes to wear to school.  It seriously stresses me out taking all of them because they act so crazy and are all over the place.  They all have to look at what they want and they want my attention and need my help, all at the same time.  It's pure craziness.  But these two found the same shoes and were just so dang cute with them that it made up for the craziness.

 We did some major hair chopping before school started. They watned a fresh look and I think it turned out great!

We alwasy get to celelbrate this awesome guy at the end of summer. We are sure happy that he is ours.  He always asks for the same cake, yellow with chocolate frosting. He is easy to please.

 We discovered this summer that our little Annie girl is a runner.  She wanted to go running with Lizzy and i and she made it almost a mile easily!  She is super cute out there just running her heart out!

 We a great time keeping cool at the pool this summer. Even the little pool in the backyard got some good use.

I just cant get enough of these crazies!  I love having the summer with them and doing fun activities.

Clara was killing us because she got up on the counter and started eating raw onions.  Yes raw!  She loves them!  Such a silly goose.

These tow are seriously the best of friends and worst of enemies.  I sure do love that they like being together, when they aren't beating each other up. Haha!

I was dying when I came in the room in the morning and found Annie asleep like this!  So crazy!

Clara has turned into such a big girl lately!  We love that she can do so much more with the other kids and it isn't like having a baby anymore.

Temple Outing

One of the things on our summer bucket list was to have a picnic at the Temple grounds. We haven't really ever taken a trip to just visit the temple with the kids on our own before, We have done it other times with the ward or for a Wedding or other events, but never like this. We packed a lunch and at on a bench because there weren't any tables to sit at. It ended up being a pretty hot day so it was not quite as great as it could have been. We still had fun though even if we were mostly just trying to find shade to be in.  It also happened to be a flex day for Kevin so we got to bring him with us which made it extra fun. 

 Annie had fun finding lots of acorns and collecting them.

 We had fun walking around and admiring all the beautiful plants and flowers and just what a pretty building it is.

I feel bad because I realized I didn't get any pictures of Lizzy even though she was there with us too!

All about Nellie-11 years

 Nellie didn't get a birthday party this year because it is an odd year, but that meant going on a little date with mom and dad.  We took her to Cheesecake factory, and then to see Spiderman Homecoming. and we celebrated with a skor bar cake on Sunday with the whole family. 

Nellie has grown up so much this year. She decided to grow out her bangs that she has always had, and she is looking so cute and old without them!  This year was really the year of grandma for her.  She became so close to her grandma and it was so hard for her to say goodbye to her.  Grandma and Nellie have very similar personalities so Grandma really helped Nellie a lot when it came to conquering some of the anxieties that she has about things.  In turn it has caused Nellie to be a lot easier to be around and she has been a lot happier than she has been before. 

Nellie is still our little cook and she really does a great job at cooking. She is especially great at cookies and we call her the cookie master.  She has managed to become better at making chocolate cookies than me!  Nellie has also become more into romance and aware of those sorts of things so she has become a bit obsessed with Romantic Comedies and watching them. But this is so similar to me at the same age that it is crazy! 

Nellie is going into middle school this year and is really growing up so much!  She is starting to babysit for us when Lizzy is babysitting for someone else and she is really learning how to do a great job. Nellie is still pretty obsessed with candy and sweets just like she has always been.  Haha! Nellie is such a sweet girl and so full of love and kindness.  We are so happy that we were blessed with our spunky Nellie belle!  

Saying Goodbye

After living near my parents for the past seven years it was time to say goodbye. When we moved here my Dads retirement seemed so far away. And then it seemed that we blinked our eyes and it was here!  We are going to miss them more than we could possibly say.  The older girls especially had gotten so close to my mom and dad and its going to be hard to be here without them.  No more Sunday dinners with them. No more gas station trips.  No more sleepovers. It will definitely be an adjustment.  But we are so happy that my dad finally gets to retire.  We will miss them like crazy!

My mom and Nellie have a special relationship.  Nellie thinks my mom walks on water and wants to be just like her.  She is really going to miss her Grandma a lot.  It will be really hard not having hr around because anytime that Nellie was having a hard time I could have my mom talk to her and it seemed to straighten her right up.  We sure love them and wish they could stay here with us!

Cooking Camp

Nellie and Jane were wanting to do a cooking camp, but being the person that I am, I forgot to sign them up early for the city ones. And of course they were all filled up. But then someone reminded me that Sister Cain from our ward did a cooking camp and so we signed them up with her and it was awesome!  They went for a week everyday and then on the last day they had one of us as a guest for dinner where they showcased their new skills. It was fun that they both did it because then Kevy and I both got to go and be their guests. It ended on Nellie's birthday which was actually kind of fun for her because she loves cooking so she got to do something she really liked on her special day.  They definitely want to do it again next next year, and I can't wait to go back and have one of their great lunches again. 

 It was a really yummy lunch, they did a great job making it!

 It was so cute because they made special aprons to have and they got a cookbook of all the recipes thy made over the week.  They would come home each day and tell me about what they made and how they made it.  It is so fun to see the kids getting older and learning new skills. Especially skills that will help me!

Day 6 Huntington Beach

After the night we had before we all slept in pretty late. Chanelle had parked in a different part of the parking lot at the game so she got to go back a completely different way and was able to miss the horrible traffic we got in so she got back much earlier than us.  She was nice enough to go and get some really yummy donuts for breakfast. After being lazy fora bit we headed to Walmart to get some food and lunch and then headed to Huntington Beach because we hadn't gotten enough beach in, hah! But seriously do kids ever get sick of the beach?  I know I was all beached out by this point, but it was fun to watch the kids have so much fun with tier cousins!  We parked in a parking garage but then it was quite a walk down to the beach with all our stuff and then to make matters worse they were doing a ton of construction on the beach for some surfing championship of something so it was quite a walk around. The water was a lot warmer though and the kids really had a blast.  The crazy thing is that I hardly even touched the water on the whole trip.  A little bit on my feel was all.  I guess I am getting old because it just didn't sound very fun to me.  

 Annie and Lucy were really cute on this trip, but I cant wait until next year when Clara is three and the three of them will be inseparable.

 Clara hung with me on the towels most of the time and then we went hunting for some shells.

 

 The big kids again made their usual trench like they did every beach day.

That evening we headed back to our hotel and got ready and went to dinner at Cafe Rio that Kevin scouted out, haha!  All the while Kevin cooked up a plan to take the big kids to an Angels game, since we were so close to the stadium and they were playing the red socks who happen to be Austin's favorite team. I couldn't say no to that! So Chanelle, Kristen and I took the little kids back to the hotel and we tried to watch a show in Kristen's room and let the little ones watch a show in ours, but you can guess how that went.  We did get a fireworks show from Disneyland that night though so that was kind of fun.  We got up the next morning and headed home.  It was a great trip and we really had a ton of fun.  It sure is nice to have kids getting older and easier to take places!