UEA

We were excited to have 2 days last week that were completely free--no school, gymnastics, or preschool.  We are't super scheduled as it is (except T/Th), but it was still nice to have a complete break! Thursday we went to Gardner Village for our annual see the witches trip. Luckily we were there early enough that we missed most of the hoards of other people enjoying school off too. This year the girls were really excited to have their pictures taken with each and every witch. 

 Luke was not so excited to have his picture taken. Here's the only one I got. I'm not sure if he was wary of the witches or was just enjoying his stroller-less freedom. It's so great to be able to go on short outings with no stroller now-- I love it!

 Luke got the cutest grin in this picture, even if he's in the shadows-- I tried to recreate it with him in the sun, but he vetoed that idea. 

Our good friends Heather, James, and Samuel invited us to their house on Friday for a fall walk and a spooky lunch. I loved walking on the Farmington Creek trail with all of the huge mature trees. Maybe someday we'll have trees like that in Herriman! 

 The girls were especially excited to spot the pink leaves on the ground. Luke loved being stroller-free once again, to pick up rocks and leaves of any color. His favorite thing was to throw the leaves off the bridge into the creek. 

Heather made a delicious lunch of mummy dogs, jello ghosts, apple mouths, and the kids decorated sugar cookies at the end What a treat! To top off our fun day we visited Kissie on the way home. It was a good fall break!

21 hours in St. George

We took a super quick trip to St. George last weekend. We were supposed to stay a few days and explore, but of course, the Primary program got scheduled for the same weekend a few weeks after I bought our tickets. Oh well! We had a great quick trip and were still able to participate in the once-a-year program that Cora was so looking forward to. 

On the way to Tuacahn we stopped by the St. George temple. The Visitor's Center was fun to explore, and the girls loved seeing where Aunt Jen and Uncle Kurt got married. 

See how thrilled Luke is with all the picture taking?

He actually thinks it's pretty fun for a while, and will walk around the house with the play camera demanding we all 'say cheese'!

We had a 'Little Mermaid' dinner at Tuachan. The girls loved the pre-show entertainment too-- especially when they threw out toostie rolls. 

Little Lukey was too young for the show, so he got to hang out at the 'showcare' center for the show. I had mixed feelings about the service-- I think we might do things differently next time. And a next time there certainly will be! The show was amazing! Great for both kids and adults! It made me wish I had seen Tarzan last year, and so excited that they are doing Aladdin next year. We will definitely go. We had terrific seats because I booked so far in advance--they said our performance was the 53rd sold out performance in a row, so it's worth planning ahead. Violet fell asleep about three-quarters of the way through, but Cora held on strong through the whole thing, even though it went waaay past her bedtime. It was a terrific night and well-worth it. 

You would think with the late and exciting night, all of the kiddos would have slept so well in the hotels. Little Lukey just isn't a great sleeper away from home yet. We survived, and took advantage of the free breakfast and swimming pool before check-out. We also did a stopover at Cove Fort on the way home. IT really is a neat place, and perfect stretch your legs point. 

All in all, a great little trip! 

Alpine Loop

 We were a little late this year, but we finally made it up to the Alpine Loop for a leave looking trip. The girls loved looking for pink leaves. We stopped for a walk around Cascade Springs-- it was a bit too late for fall colors there, but we did see a snake, a fish, and a fuzzy caterpillar that made things interesting too. 

 Violet had her turn with Brinkley, the preschool dog, and she was excited to tote him around on our walk. 

Next year we will need to make time to go earlier in the year! 

Coming this April....

Cora is a kindergartner!

Cora started school on September 6th. She was so excited for school to start, and had been counting down the days. Here she is on her first day of school!

Kevin and I walked her to school the first week and a half, now she rides her scooter to school with our next door neighbors. I love living a 5 minute walk from school! Another neighbor also has morning kindergarten, so we take turns picking the kids up from kindergarten, which is so convenient. I often pick her up in the car because pick-up is at the end of my 1 hour and 45 minutes twice a week I have with just Luke-- prime errand running time! Plus Violet gets done with preschool 15 minutes after Cora is done on those days, so we are in the car anyway. Walking is a great option though!

I love that they wear uniforms! It's so easy to pick out what to wear each day, and they really weren't very expensive.

Cora's first day of school was also special because she had had a loose tooth for a few days before that was getting looser and looser! She's been wanting to lose a tooth for about a year now, and has been sure that just about every one of her teeth has been loose at one point or another. You can see her new tooth growing in behind the baby tooth, it made the baby tooth stick out into her lip, which bugged her. She was so ready to get it out!

I walked Cora to school the first day. For the first day parents were invited to walk the kids to their classrooms, they usually meet in the gym and their teacher walks them to class as a group. Cora was happy to pick a book and start reading after I said goodbye!

That night we got this nice email from her teacher about her first day.

I just wanted to let you know that Cora had a wonderful first day of school today! She is such a sweet girl and I am so glad I get to be her teacher. Today we had a friend in our class who was having a hard time and really wanted to sit in the green row of our rug. Cora was such a good friend and she, on her own, offered to let this friend sit in her spot and she found a new place to sit. I was so thankful that she was willing to be such a good friend to someone she doesn't even know yet! Thank you, Cora!

Her teacher seems great! Luckily I'll get to go into the classroom and help a few times a month. Another neighbor mom and I are switching off babysitting younger siblings so we can go. It's worked out great so far.

Cora's tooth was bugging and hurting her so much, after school the first day we took a trip to the dentist. He took it out fast and painlessly (with some numbing cream). In fact, Cora was so busy watching Tangled, she didn't even know when the tooth came out. He said it might have come out on its own in a week if she would be good about doing lots of wiggling, but this was a better option for us. He said it would likely move forward on its own (we hope!) and the x-ray showed that the other adult teeth are more under the baby teeth, instead of behind, so hopefully it won't happen again.

Cora is so proud of her holey mouth!
And proud of her pink treasure chest too. We did have a few tears when she lost her lost tooth. She tried to be brave and said the Tooth Fairy could just come get her next tooth (she didn't listen when I asked her to keep it safe on the kitchen counter). Thankfully it showed up about an hour later. She wrote a note to the Tooth Fairy asking to keep her tooth. But the Tooth Fairy in her wisdom (and desire to not have to search for that tooth again!) just left a note and a dollar. Cora got a trip to the dollar store to pick out a toy. She was thrilled!

So life is suddenly busier with preschool, gymnastics, volunteering at school, and kindergarten. I'm part of three different carpools, which is wonderful! But makes me a little nervous that I'm going to forget to pick up at the right people at the right place and time! It makes me want a smart phone. Oh well. We're getting used to the new schedule, and it's working well. I especially like having quiet time after lunch for us to work on reading and homework while Luke naps. And then we can go out to play afterward!

Lukey in the pool

Luke is such a little fish, he makes me laugh! I finally got a video of his pool circuit training at our last pool day of the summer. What a cutie!

Our latest adventures

We squeezed in a last trip to the zoo before school started for Cora. Luke loved the carousel this time! And the giraffes were really active and fun to watch. We also caught the elephant show, which we hadn't for a while.

We made our own volcano and watched it erupt... over and over and over again!

We did our annual outing to Silver Lake with friends. It was actually a bit on the cool side--fun! We had fun visiting with old friends, enjoying the walk around the lake, and especially duck watching. I think I even heard Luke say the word duck a few times! The kids loved watching the ducks at several points around the lake.

We did a family hike up to Ensign Peak. Violet wasn't excited at all, that was the only picture she'd let me take of her, but at least she made it! (barely)
And lastly, we had a night of family fun at the State Fair and rodeo. Elephant ears and corndogs for dinner, Luke mooing for the first time, cute baby pigs, a tiny four year old girl winning the mutton busting contest, sky divers coming down with the American flag waving behind them.... it was a fun night. The kids did really well too, and had a great time.

We did a pretty good job with our summer fun list this summer. We did most, but not all of the items, and that's ok. In retrospect, it was pretty heavy on the hiking, and we just didn't have that many free good weather Saturdays. We'll keep it up and maybe cross off a few more items this fall!