Grandparent's Day

Jane was so excited for both of her Grandparents to join her in school.    They've been practicing for months learning so many dances and one of Jane's friends from the ward's mom mentioned on Facebook that every Tuesday her daughter exclaimed was "Terrifying Tuesday" because they had to dance with a boy.    As Terrifying as it may have been they did fabulous.


First the Grandma's watched Jane dance a few dances and then they each took a turn waltzing with her.

Then they went into Jane's classroom and each talked about what they did as 2nd graders.  Grandma Becky talked about how in 2nd grade she liked to roller skate with skates that had a key and hooked onto your shoes.  She also said that back then they had to wear dresses all the time back then so her knees were always scraped.

Nona said that in Park City her school was a really high building with many levels.  So all day long she walked up and down some steep stairs to get to the playground.  She also said that each person was given only 1 pencil, they shared crayons, they each got one ruler and they shared scissors.

 They then came back into the gym and the 2nd graders sang some oldies but goodies songs.    Jane thought she had the best part as she got to blow bubbles during the beetles "Yellow Submarine"

Oh how Jane loves her Grandma's!

Glockenspiel

As reported by Emily:  "We are practicing for the 5th grade program and the teachers tell us to raise our hand if we've had piano lessons for 1 year.  A lot of people raised their hands.   Then they said 2 years and some hands went down.  They kept going until only my hand was up.  So guess what?  They picked me to play the Glockenspiel.

The next day I got a call from Emily saying she was bringing the Glockenspiel home and I needed to come get her because it was too heavy to take on the bus.  So the Glockenspiel came home for a weekend and Emily practiced "Oh Beautiful" so often she it had memorized in no time.
She also commented that some of the other percussionist did not practice over the weekend so the teachers decided to not let them play their instrument in the program.

Emily did fabulous on her program.  She didn't miss a beat playing the Glockenspiel,  danced so eloquently to the minuet  stood out from the crowd with her cuteness (maybe I'm a little bias) singing with her class and nailed her part like a pro.

May Emily always remember that sticking too something and putting in a lot of hard work opens many doors of opportunities to shine.   It's only the beginning for this girl!!!

Dress like a cowboy day

Aaron's preschool class had their cowboy day.    For a full week every day Aaron would wake up and ask if it was cowboy day and then be very disappointed when I'd say not until Thurs.     He was so happy to bust out the boots, wranglers, western shirt and a hand me down hat from Brooke's family.

For a brief moment I wondered why I never had any sort of "Cowboy Day" growing up.  Haha every day was cowboy day for me since probably 90% of the boys in my class wore this attire every day.  Made me wonder why we didn't have a "Dress like a Hipster" day.


Spencer also had his first cowboy day as the rocking horse came out from storage.

Yee-haa my boys!!

My trip with the boys

It was a cold snowy wintery day here in Utah (just like every other winter day this year) and I'm arranging to attend a conference the first of March and adjusting  my work accordingly and realize I have some flexibility the week before.    So I schedule a trip to California to visit my sister with just the boys.  

My sister had to work a couple of the days I was there while her nanny, Belle, flew home for a long weekend to celebrate her birthday.    So I became the live in nanny for a couple of days and had a blast with Ally's kids.  We busted out the shaving cream one day and I spent a lot of other times juggling naps and hanging in the backyard  

This girl Hazel cracks me up.  The entire time we were playing with Shaving cream she was so worried about it getting on her dress.    She spends most of day running around changing into new dresses and asking if you think it's pretty.  I joked with Ally that Hazel's brain is constantly running, mostly with thoughts about what she's wearing.

We made it to Legoland.   It was the best day to go there.  The weather was pristine. No lines whatsoever and the boys would get off the ride and if they liked it would hurry and get on it again.  We sat watching the boys ride the car ride over and over for like 40 minutes.  Aaron was so proud of his 7 driver's licenses he was able to collect.

A couple of years ago we walked through the Star Wars land glancing at the lego's and moved on.  I've grown a lot in the last 2 years mastering the lingo as Aaron has become a star wars fanatic and both of us were mesmerized by the lego reenactments. A huge portion of it was in the middle of a makeover,  I'm sure to include Roque One but we didn't mind.

Here is the moment when Aaron first saw the Death Star.  I think he stood and stared at it for at least 1-2 minutes.  (That's a long time for my busy body boy to be still)

We also took a few trips to the beach.  William was at a T-Ball kick off party which freed up his bike and we headed down to the beach on it.  To get to the beach you go down a series of hills.  It was there that I realize my self taught bike rider had no idea how to use the brakes.  It was slow going for a couple of blocks but Aaron's a fast learning and before long he was cruising down the hills.  We were stopped by a few adult bikers saying things like "Great work kid"  "Nice bike"  "Wow how old is he?"  One guy after asking that and I said 4 said "That's great you just don't see young kids riding bikes anymore."

I was really pleased with how well William and Aaron played with each other.  There wasn't a lot of fighting.  One beach trip while Spencer was sleeping back and Ally's place they entertained each other so well I was able to catch a few moments of quiet reading time.  Something I never get.

I took a few videos of Spencer and Clara together crawling around and playing together but the videos will never upload on blogger.   But here is a very content and tired little boy ready to board the airplane home.    I'm making a commitment that I hope I can keep to go back to California every winter.  It did wonders and to get out of a gloomy winter funk.

Spence's first swim

I took the boys swimming at Dimple Dell after way too many gloomy days inside.    This was Spencer's first swim.    Spencer has a very independent soul and for a while now hasn't willingly given me long lasting cuddles.    After a little while in the pool he started to shiver and with no resistance gave me the best baby cuddles I've had in a long time.

the water was very mesmerizing

It's the Nerds...

After school we drove and picked up Emily's new glasses.

After getting in the car and looking in the passenger's seat's mirror Emily smiles widely and announces  "Finally I'm a Nerd"

I love that Emily is so comfortable and confident.    I hope she always stays true to herself because she's pretty awesome.     I'm also glad she's taken to heart my mom's sage advice "It's the Nerds that make it these days"

Jane's turn

Remember the post  Ten years from 2014.  Here's part of it...

Our couch has about had it....  We bought this pleather couch set, a month after we got married with my, first year of  work after college, tax return.  The couch, loveseat, comfy chair and ottoman cost us $1100.00.   It's endured many leaky sippy cups, sticky fingers and gymnastics. Besides it looking rather worn,  there's a big hole on the side which causes the stuffing to come out.  Aaron went through a phase where he would stick his hand deep inside and pull it out and scatter it around the house.   A few weeks ago Emily was making a diorama of penguins in the Artic for school.    I was dreading that we would need to make a quick trip to the store for batting to use as the snow.  Emily saved the day by suggesting we use some of the stuffing from the couch!  

Fast forward 3 years and here we are again with Jane's 2nd grade Science report about "Little Blue Penguins".   It's amazing how far we've come in the craft world.  We had everything on hand and the "expert" Emily took over helping Jane.   I marveled at how simple this project was with Emily in the lead.  

As Jane was painting and Emily was glueing Jane looked up and said "I kinda hate to tell you this Emily but I think my diorama is better than yours was."

Emily's response " You think?  Well duh of course it is.  I didn't have a crafty older sister helping me like you do"