Summer Fun

It seems like we've been on summer break for months, but it's only been not quite two weeks! We haven't even done our huge summer vacation yet (Colorado and Utah for a month). What we have done so far is played with friends, including having Victoria's friend Bethany over for a "late night", gone to the splash pad, swimming, swimming lessons, birthday parties, So You Think You Can Dance parties (for Victoria), a bike ride, and Vacation Bible School at our church.

After some really hot days, Erik found the only way to get happy was to get wet. He didn't even have his bathing suit on yet!

Slip and slide with our neighbor friends (Erik's favorite girls to flirt with).

Erik loved the splash pad too

New favorite line-up place for vehicles.

Movie time

The trampoline is always good for a fill-in when "there's nothing to do!"



That is joy on Austin's face, not sadness.



They made these little grape stress balls at VBS and have been playing with them since we got home.

I didn't have a chance to get a picture of swimming lessons yet and I may not since we only have one more tomorrow and it's tricky with Erik around, but the kids have done great so far. Karissa has made the most improvement and that's mostly because of her confidence level. She's more confident on her bike too. We also have one more day of Vacation Bible School, which the kids really enjoyed today, though Austin got tired at the end and Erik and I joined his group to help him out.

Summer has been fun so far, but Victoria misses her teacher and going to school. When you have as good of teachers as they had, you would miss your teacher too.

Mrs. Murphy

Mrs. Dennison

Hooray for great teachers!!

Busy Dad

Jason has been very busy lately with his already busy job, a new calling in church (Elder's Quorum President), and the projects here and there around the house. Some of the latest projects have been re carpeting the house (we didn't do this ourselves, but we did put the old carpet in the basement and Jason cut it to fit perfectly, which took a very long time!)

Here's the new carpet, plush and dark!

 We also finished the girls' room. Months back I blogged about "Phase I" of the room (basically just taking the bunk beds down.) Now phase 2-5 have been completed, including new carpet!

Painted the walls and made new curtains

The girls painted their names to match the bottom of the wall and we spiced up an old bulletin board.

Jason was making a new shelf, but we found this baby at a garage sale with Grandma for $5!

New dresser from IKEA

Jason also set up the trampoline with my dad, as mentioned before, and has been doing his usual yard work along with a nicer vegetable garden. He wanted to try Square Foot Gardening this year and I think it's going to be our best garden yet! We'll take pics as the garden grows more.

We had a great Father's Day celebration yesterday with friends from church, who also work with Jason in his new calling.

Happy Father's day to a great dad and our great dads too!

Go Diego Go!

Since Austin loves Wild Kratts, and watching Dora with Logan is also a favorite, we decided to have a Diego party for his birthday party with his friends. (Diego rescues animals and he's Dora's cousin, in case you don't know the connection between the three). Our very good friends, carpool buddies, and babysitter family has a 13-yr-old son who wanted to throw parties to earn money for scout camp. This being my first "boy" party, I though he would be perfect.

He planned the party, we reviewed it together, we both provided materials for the "adventures", I made the cake and put together the goodie bags, and he made the pinata. At the party, Zarin was in charge of most of the activities and Jason and I got to oversee and manage fussy Erik.

As the kids arrived, I led the animal charades game. Zarin then whipped out a song on the piano about a skunk, which wasn't part of the plan, but it was cute, though the kids never caught onto the words. He then led them outside for the animal rescue. From the swing set platform, they had to slide down the slide, go under the trampoline (cave), leap over the stream (jump rope), step on the stones (plates), and find an animal (stuffed) in the bushes. Then they put the animal in a sled and raced it to the table under the platform and performed the doctor duties needed on the animal.

Austin is ready to go. We never did get a good picture of Zarin with his hat on.

Owen and Austin saving their animals.

Jasmine and Logan to the rescue!

Logan and Dallin with their aniamls. Dallin is Zarin's brother.

Next, we went inside and split the kids for a matching animal memory game led by Jason and me. We tried to teach them the animal names in Spanish, but I didn't know all of mine and I think Erik was in the way of Jason's group, trying to take the cards, so I don't know how much Spanish they learned.

Zarin then led the group down to the dark basement where they crawled through a tunnel and went into a tent, set up by Zarin, with their flashlights. Victoria read them a Diego book and Zarin made interesting noises and effects. Our picture of this event didn't turn out b/c it was too dark.

Afterwards it was cake and presents.

Austin had helped me make his monkey cake.

Zarin thought it was Diego, close enough.

The birthday-candle-blow-out picture didn't turn out b/c the setting was messed up from trying to take pictures in the dark.

Erik helped me take this picture during the present opening.

Then the much-awaited pinata! He made it look like a flashlight. It wasn't very thick, but some of those kids didn't hit very hard. They were very patient in the process to knock that candy out!

Victoria gave it some good whacks.

The kids are waiting for the second round of candy to come out.

Our new trampoline was a great waiting place for the kids while their parents arrived. I'm so glad I hired Zarin to do the party! He had great ideas and integrated the right amount of low activity and high activity into the party. Also, those boys, and the two girls, needed an extra person to keep them under control.  I highly recommend people use a young teen for a young party!

The Big Four

Austin celebrated his 4th birthday on Sunday with Grandpa Dave and Grandma Mary Lou. They happened to be out here for his birthday. We also had his friend/brother Logan along with Logan's mom and brother. Per Austin's request we had pizza, salad, and watermelon. He also wanted a strawberry cake.

Besides Grandma and Grandpa being here, another surprise was that Jason and my dad ended up setting up our new trampoline the night before. The first thing he wanted to do the next morning before church was to try it out.

Still in pjs.

Many more jumps on the trampoline, swings with his new t-ball set-up, and presents from friends and family kept it a happening "party".

Even Erik figured out the t-ball in no time.

BFFs

We even got to celebrate Grandpa Dave's birthday earlier this week with a special yummy cake!

 Austin is a very lucky boy. He gets to play with his friend Logan every Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday while Logan's mom goes to work. They get in their tifts here and there, but otherwise get along great and Austin always asks when Logan is coming. He is obsessed with numbers and loves watching timers, the numbers on the cd player, numbers on a tape measure (hence the tape measure b-day gift), and numbers on Karissa's number grids for homework. He can actually count to 109 forward and backwards, sometimes even higher.

He loves music, stories on cd, riding his bike, dancing with his sisters, and watching Wild Kratts. He's my big helper at home and will help in the yard, with the laundry, vacuuming, and baking/cooking. We even signed him up for a preschool cooking class for a few weeks that he loved! He's taking a beginner dance class with his friend Dallin since they have been so patient while their sisters have danced the past few years. I think I'll sign him up for gymnastics this fall since he's getting a pretty good handstand already.

The girls got to be the "demonstrators" for the dance class last week.

The pizza he made in his cooking class.

His recent graduation from preschool.

He just found out that the Gordon he was trying to tell me about who's not the train, is Gordon B. Hinckley, the last prophet.

He's my sweet boy who loves to hug people and rub Grandpa's hurt shoulder. He makes me smile every day!