9 Years

Victoria turned 9 on October 11. I think I've said this a lot over her last few birthdays, but I can't believe I'm a mom of a child that old! Around Mother's Day, she and I went to a mother/daughter activity and we had to ask each other some questions. I had the "mom" questions and she had the "daughter" questions. They were simple questions about the future, favorite things, and wishes, but I wasn't used to such "grown-up" questions and answers and found myself thinking I was the daughter and looked for my mom a couple of times.

Well, she is nine now and is acting older too. She entertained Erik during sacrament meeting at church on Sunday. She gets him from Nursery and holds his hand until they find me in the hall. She's been going to choir practice with me and loves it. Yesterday, she played the piano much longer than she normally does, simply because she was enjoying it. Last week she did the dishes for me after dinner, without being asked, and said, "Thanks for the dinner, Mom!" When I smiled she said, "My teacher was right, it worked!" It's nice to have some recognition from some of my children now and a little help without so much coaxing like I've had to do in the past.

This school year she's been taking ballet and tap on Mondays and a Cecchetti (strict) ballet class on Tuesdays. She takes piano on Thursdays and attends Activity Day girls at the church every other Wednesday. She enjoys going to school to learn and see her friends. She loves to write still, loves science, music, gym, and recess. She still has a great imagination and hasn't grown out of playing with toys yet. She enjoyed the two races she ran in and likes learning about animals. We've been reading the first Harry Potter book together which has been enjoyable for both of us.

For her party this year, she wanted to go to the local community pool. She invited her "besties" from school and it was a blast! We celebrated the party on her actual birthday since it was Friday. They came to our house for pizza, cupcakes, and presents, then I took the party to the pool for open swim and Jason took Karissa, Austin, and Erik to McDonald's to play so I could keep a good eye on the party swimmers without distraction. It was nice to not have anyone to carry around or leap after and rescue for two hours! I enjoyed watching the girls swim, jump in the water, go down the water slides, and float in the lazy river. I even participated myself in some things! It was different to go down the water slide without someone on my lap! Even the car ride there and back was more fun with our "teeny-bopper" music playing and happy girls singing and chatting in the back.

It was a very Happy Birthday for her and a happy day for me!

Before school

Goofing around before eating

That's Austin's bum, trying to be extra goofy

I made half cupcakes and half 8" round cake...

Megan, Brynn, Victoria, Bethany, Shannon, Janelle

kiddie slide

jump contest

up to the big slide

lazy river

Red October Run

On Saturday I ran another 10K. My friend told me it's a great race for the family because the kids can enter and run for free. Victoria loved the race she did with her cousins in Utah, so we signed up again. I was a little worried about my own race since the start time was 9:50 am, which in my book is a little late to run a race. It was great for the kids, though, since we didn't have to get up super early. Their race was first at 9:00. Austin decided he wanted to run it this time. Jason ran the mile with Austin. Victoria, nervous to run by herself, took a place at the front and nailed it! They didn't time the kids, so I guess I should have timed her, not that it matters. She was the second girl in and was definitely in at least the top 10 kids.

Austin did great and ran the whole mile, though he was pretty tired the rest of the day.

Excited for the race!

Look at that air under her feet- she's flyin'!

Austin means business.

Our cheerleaders

For my race, I started in the front, which I don't usually do, but that's where I ended up. Soon after I started I started to feel really nauseated and it never got better the whole 6 miles! At one point I thought I should stop, but I never felt like I would actually throw-up, so I decided to keep going. It was very humid that morning and much warmer than normal for this time of year, so that didn't help. My T-shirt felt super thick and I wanted to take it off, but decided I shouldn't run around in my sport's bra. I had to tie my shoe at the end, which was a drag that I don't usually have to do. Well, I added about 40 seconds to my last race, which wasn't my best either, finishing in 48 minutes. It was a 7:45 pace, so not bad considering, but it was not what I wanted. Since we're not in Utah, where the real competition lies, I finished 2nd in my age group and was probably in the top 10 women (they didn't have a category with the top men and women overall). I also had many people impressed with the fact that I have a "big" family of 4 kids, something else that doesn't happen in Utah. So, at least I felt better with my race and I never did throw-up. Maybe my worries of starting so late were justified. The best part of the race was when Jason and the kids found me around mile 4 1/2 and ran with me for a little while. Austin found some energy and went pretty fast and Victoria would have finished with me if she could have. Even Karissa ran a while. It was a great family event for sure! Then we got to relax and listen to General Conference.

Completion ribbons

I'm feelin' good the first five steps.

Not feelin' so good here...

Peek-a-boo

Face-painting at the end

Slush Days

If you remember, Erik is not the biggest fan of eating food. Rocks and sticks, yes, drinking milk, for sure, but food; not always. When we returned from our trip to Utah in late July, that very week, I started making slushies for the kids, with Erik in mind, since he likes to drink more than chew. I began with a recipe that my older kids always like. It's called Strawberry Watermelon Slush.

It calls for 2 c. of watermelon, 2 c. of strawberries, 1/3 c. of lemon juice and 1/3 c. of sugar. After blending those, you add 2 c. of ice. Erik decided that he loved it! He would get super excited and do his little elbow dance that I'll have to video tape sometime. My kids would beg me to make it for all their friends who came over. They all started calling it my homemade Slurpee.

I decided to make it healthier. I reduced the sugar to 1/4 c. and since we had so much zucchini from our garden (if you'll remember from my garden blog), I started adding a cup of zucchini. The kids never noticed and loved them just the same. I added kale one time, they liked that too. It's been over two months and I still make them every day, except one day. Erik is not as excited as he was and even didn't drink them for a few days, to my dismay, but he's back to drinking them again and the kids love them as their after-school-snack. I have substituted other fruits when I didn't have enough watermelon and strawberries. I found the fresh fruits work best and it is best to have mostly watermelon and strawberry (and zucchini), even if I do add some other fruits, to get the desired taste and texture they like. I don't know how it will go when my key ingredients are harder to find fresh, but at least for now Erik is getting lots of fruit and veggies in his slushie drink. Cheers!

Erik eating sand at the beach

 

First Day of Preschool- Finally

Today was Austin's first day of preschool. He was a trooper and got ready, including eating breakfast, quickly, so that we could drop the girls off and then go pick up Logan to head off to the first day of preschool at Churchill High. They start a few weeks later so that the high school students, who are the teachers, have a chance to prepare their lesson plans for the year. Jason and I received the orientation from the head teacher and are excited for the year. They will have two hours full of great learning and activities with almost a one-to-one ratio of teacher (high school student) to child. It's extremely affordable too, making me even more impressed with this program. Though we were sad to see PCN close, (the preschool where the girls went, including Karissa's bilingual class), we were happy to find this little jewel where Logan can go with Austin and I don't have to be there once a month, as was the case with the co-op at PCN.

Austin's super-excited smile!

Austin playing with Rory, who's in his class at church.

When one of the teachers told Austin Rory's name, he said, "I  know!"

All in a Row

Erik likes to have order. He especially loves order with his toys and other items. He gets order by lining everything up. You can always tell where he's been by the path of lined up things.

trucks

Karissa's shoes

yard toys

more trucks

spoons

trucks...

and more trucks!

Bountiful Harvest

This year we tried our hand at square-foot gardening, or Jason did actually, I just followed his instructions. It seemed to work very well. The idea is that you have every square-foot taken up by something you plan on growing, leaving no room for the weeds. Obviously, some veggies require more room to grow, so you plan accordingly. It's also supposed to require less watering (something we don't need to do much of anyhow since we get so much rain).

 A handful of seeds never sprouted so we had some spaces and the zucchini was on steroids and about took over the cucumber and cantaloupes, but overall, I think it was a success!

The corn never turned out, but they say corn is hard to grow in small amounts. We did get broccoli, red onion, green beans, peas, radishes, zucchini, cucumber, cantaloupe (not harvested yet, but hopefully soon), zucchini, strawberries, a few kinds of peppers, basil, zucchini, and few kinds of tomatoes.



Austin loves strawberries, so he got to pick the first one.




The strawberries are next to the space where nothing came up, though we did have lots of radishes early on in this area.



The zucchini plant on steroids.

The zucchini on steroids that I had already cut a few inches from.

We had some pretty big beefsteak tomatoes as well and the flavor of the cherry tomatoes, were to die for!!

A Final Camping Trip

We planned a final camping trip for the summer with Jason's parents, who came out to visit the last couple weeks before school started. It was nice to visit with them and have them help me while I manned my four children along with an extra 3 year-old and 9-year-old, Logan and his brother Jaden, from 7:30am-6:00pm. We were lucky to be able to get away for a long weekend and use the facilities of their camper again. Unlike last year, we made it through without any stitches this year!

We went up to Petosky, MI. The beaches there are known for the Petosky stone which is the Michigan state rock (do you know your state rock?) Here is the only one we found, we think, but they are mostly found in the spring.

Playing at Petosky beach.

Austin loves wading in the lakes.

A hike in the forest.

We got to go to Mackinac Island, where we have wanted to go for a while. You have to take a ferry boat out to the island and there are no motorized vehicles allowed. We took the horse carriage tour around the island, but are hoping to make it back one day to do the bike tour.

Waiting for the ferry.

Mackinac Bridge

Carriage ride

View of Lake Huron



Add caption

 Other than riding bikes around the camp ground, the kids also enjoyed the heated pool at our KOA camp. It was the nice way to bathe them rather than fighting them in the showers. We had some good rain storms and thunder storms. Our new tent held up nicely over the night through about 4 or 5 thunder storms (thanks Abuelo and Gramms!)

Cooking in the rain.

Erik loves the rain and stood in it for almost an hour before we gave up and went in the pool.

3rd grade

1st grade

Now we're back in school and back to the grind. Good bye summer!