Soccer and Dance

Ben and Isabelle

Hailey and her teacher Caelee and Hailey

Ben started outdoor soccer this fall with his "twin" Isabelle. They have the same birthday and have been friends since they were 1&1/2 years old. Isabelle is the only girl on the team, and always looks super cute! Ben has loved outdoor soccer so far. He played indoor soccer twice this last year. The only "oh man" about outdoor soccer is that there are no goalies, and that was his favorite position to play when he did indoor soccer.

I decided it was time for Hailey to participate in some kind of sport. We have put Ben in t-ball a couple of years, and swimming lessons, and soccer. Hailey has not been in anything yet. She is my girly girl so I though dance would be a perfect first choice! I signed her up for a tap/ballet class with her friend Caelee. September 1st was her first dance class and she was so excited to go. They do half tap then half ballet. At the end of her class she came running over to me, and I asked her if she had fun, and she said "yes I had fun but are we going to dance now?" I think she was expecting to rock out to "Party in the USA" like we do at home. Well, since then she understands what tap and ballet are and has loved dance class!

Go, Go Power Rangers!

So, my kids watched the old-school Power Rangers on Saturday morning cartoons a few times this summer and loved the show. So, I checked out a couple of DVD's from the library and they are hooked! They decided to dress up as power rangers (complete with helmets, belts, and weaponry) and show off some of their power ranger moves!

Skate Park

Ben loves his Razor scooter! Here is one of our many outings to one of their favorite parks, the Skate Park. Hailey has done so amazing riding her bike this summer, she is a natural! Ben learned to ride without training wheels this summer also, if we can ever get him off his scooter. In August we asked Ben if he wanted to go on a walk, he said "walks I don't like but parks I like!Yeah, let's go to the park."

We ride by Ben's school on the way to the skate park, and Hailey said "that be my school when I turn 5!" She is so excited to be just like her big brother and go to school, and do everything he does.

Friend's Birthday

We were able to go to Caelee's birthday party, a friend of Ben and Hailey's. Ben is whispering something to another Hailey on the tramp, girl trouble already??? The kids had a great time running around and jumping on the tramp.

Peekaboo with her Kids

Eliza loves her kids (Ben and Hailey). I always call them her kids because she can get them to do just about anything! When Eliza was little, Hailey didn't really seem to notice her too much. But, know that Eliza is getting older and loving to play games and with toys Hailey loves playing with her. Ben and Hailey can always get the best laughs out of Eliza. I don't know what I would do without Eliza's kids to entertain her!

Hailey has loved this I-Spy Christmas book all year. There is this one page that she always wants to look at. One day before naps, Hailey shared her I-spy book with Eliza and they sat there pointing to the Christmas pictures and having a great time.

The Joy of Eating

My cute little Eliza is 6 months old!!! She has now discovered the joy of eating! She has tried most fruits and vegetables and loves them all! We took her to her 6 month appointment and she is doing great. She weighed in at 18.4 pounds, which makes her 85% for weight and height and 50% for head. While we were waiting for the Dr., Ben picked up a Dr. Seuss book and started reading it. Ben started reading in preschool, but he only likes to read his "Bob" books. When he read the Dr. Seuss book it made me realize how big he is getting, my little boy is growing up so fast!

Back to Eliza, she is such a sweet girl. She has the best smile, and can make just about anyone smile back! She can now sit on her own, and can roll over from her belly to back. I think I will have another vocal child, because she talks to us all day long. Her new trick is crinkling up her nose and snorting! Her two favorite people in the world are Ben and Hailey. They can always make her smile by doing the silliest things. Eliza has been my great sleeper, and has slept through the night since 3 months. She sleeps about 10 or 11 hours at night. When she was tiny I would rock her until she was almost asleep, but since she turned 4 months old she just wants in her crib. I sing her a song and she goes to sleep on her own. She is always smiling and talking when she wakes up. We are so blessed to have Eliza in our family, she brings so much joy!

Yuba Lake and Ben's First Day of Kindergarten

This was the craziest weekend! So, Ben's first day of Kindergarten was Tuesday August 3rd. Mike's family was heading to Yuba Lake for some fun camping and boating. I decided to let Mike take Ben and Hailey, since Eliza isn't a big fan of the heat or wind or camping. They headed down on Sunday after church and spent the evening with Mike's family. Monday was all about boating! Ben loves to knee board, and knee boarded all day long! Mike wake boarded and they all went tubing. On one of Ben's knee board runs he flipped over and got tangled up in the knee board straps. Mike's mom jumped in the water to help him get untangled, but in the process caught her wedding ring on the side of the boat, which made her wedding ring embed in her finger to the bone! Ouch! They got everyone in the boat and headed for the ER in Nephi. The blade of the metal cutter at the ER was dull and wasn't able to cut through the ring to get it off her finger, so they had to call in a local contractor to bring in tools to cut the ring off. After the ring was cut off, and about 36 or more stitches my mother-in-law's finger was put back together! It will be a long road to recovery and possible plastic surgery, I still can't believe how crazy this story is! So, they stayed Monday night then helped clean up Tuesday morning. Mike pulled the boat home, since his mom was on pain-killers. Then they headed home. Ben got home at 12:15, just in time for us to quickly feed him and send him off to his first day of Kindergarten (which starts at 12:37). I was able to hang out with my friend Kristy and her cute kids during all this craziness. It was so much fun to see her and her adorable kids!

Ben is in Mrs. McKenna's class this year and loves it so far! He had a fabulous first day of school, and loves going every day. Our neighbor Leah who lives 4 houses down is in his class so they commute the 2 blocks to school together. I take turns taking them to school, then they ride their scooters home with the older kids from our street.

On August 12th he came home from school and said, "Today was the best school day ever! I made 3 light sabers out of blocks and had an extra recess! The bad part was that we couldn't play our tag game at recess anymore because one of the kids pushed the teacher down!" At least it wasn't Ben who pushed her down!

Mike went to back to school night, and got the report on Ben. His teacher said that he is far above what they expect someone coming into Kindergarten to be, but so is a lot of his class. So, she is able to teach his class at a higher level which is great. She said that he is also a social butterfly, and that is great. He makes friends with everyone, and has been able to get some of the shyer kids out of their shells.

This sounds exactly like my cute Ben. He has always been the talkative one, the one you can hear above all the others singing in primary programs!

Wedding Dress Shopping and Gateway Fountain

Yay! Bri is getting married! All the girls were able to head down to Gateway for the wedding dress shopping extravaganza. It was so much fun seeing Bri all gorgeous in her beautiful wedding dress! I have a friend from high school Jana who has her own photography business. I was checking out her blog and I saw a photo shoot in March that she had done of her single brother Jacob. I sent her a message that my cute sister Bri and her cute brother Jacob should be set up. So with a little help from Facebook, Bri and Jake started chatting and are now engaged! They are getting married September 30th! Thanks for letting us join in on the fun of wedding dress shopping Bri!

Mormor, Nicole, Eliza, Aly, and me

After the dress shopping we headed for some fabulous French pastries, and then I met up with Mike and Ben and Hailey for some fun Gateway time. Ben had so much fun in the fountain!

My Kids Say and Do the Darnedest Things

I used to keep a journal of all the funny things Ben said and did when he was little. Then cute Hailey came along and life got busier and I rarely kept my funny kid journal anymore. Now I try to put little notes of funny things in my phone so I can keep track of them. Here are the last few months of funny kid things:

6/27 Eliza is on the roll again! She rolled over from 3 weeks to about 6 weeks and then she chunked up and wasn't able to roll anymore. But, she learned to roll over from her belly to her back again. I think she learned how to do it just because she hated her tummy time!

7/5 Hailey was playing with a toy gun and running around the room saying "I'm going to shoot you Eliza". Ben was playing by himself in the other room and yelled "DON'T SHOOT MY BABY!" It was so funny because Ben was so serious, and wanting to protect Eliza. Ben and Eliza have a special bond. Ben can make Eliza laugh by just looking at her, and he loves to make her happy.

7/8 Hailey likes to "read" me books. Ben has learned how to read, so we are always practicing. Hailey has picked up on it, and sounds out words while she pretends to read. She makes up great stories to whatever picture book she is looking at. Hailey read me books before her nap. She chose Cinderella. Hailey's version included the song "If your happy and you know it" and a stepsister that let Cinderella go to the ball. I love my cute smart Hailey.

7/12 Ben's friend Isabelle was playing at our house. Ben asked Isabelle "Do you know what a galaxy is? It is lots of planets and stars together. Do you know where we live? We live in the galaxy milk!" I asked him where he learned about galaxy's and he said he learned part at preschool and part from Super Mario Galaxy 2 Wii game. Got to love the Wii!

7/16 I was working and I got a call from Ben. He was talking super fast, and I couldn't understand all that he said. But I did understand that he and Mike had broken something and he was very sorry and wanted to tell me the truth. It was so cute! When I got the whole story I found out that Mike and Ben were having a butt-kicking contest, whatever that is, and broke this little wood sign of mine. Mike asked Ben if they should tell me that a bird flew in the window and broke the sign. Ben said no, trust is something you can't break, we need to tell mommy the truth. Then Mike asked Ben if kids always tell the truth. Ben said that mommy's and daddy's always tell the truth and kids tell the truth most of the time. Berenstain Bears books teach again!

7/21 Eliza was having tummy time and she kept rolling over onto her back. Ben was very upset and said "Eliza is supposed to be doing belly time not rolling over time, she is breaking all the rules!" Gotta love my Ben that always follows the rules!

7/25 Ben got passed a note from a cute girl Cierra in his church class. She had worked on it all through sacrament meeting. It had a little envelope with a heart drawn on it and a note inside. It said Ben I like you, do you like me? It had two boxes to check; one if Ben liked her, and one box if Ben wanted to be friends. Here we go!

Tour de Donut 2010

This was such a funny day! The Tour de Donut is a circuit style bike race. The bike racers go 7 miles then eat as many donuts as they can then ride 7 more miles and eat as many donuts as they can and then go 7 more miles. For every donut eaten, there is 3 minutes taken off their total time for riding the 21 miles and eating the donuts. Mike is a great bike rider, but not such a great bike rider and donut eater! The first picture shows him eating his first donut, and he is still smiling. The second picture shows him on the second lap eating his 5th and final donut, as you can see he is choking down the 5th donut! Ben has wanted to go see dad on one of his bike races all year, so this was a fun time to see Mike race. Ben and Hailey were great cheerleaders! Mike's friend Jake managed to down 17 donuts, and another friend Regan was the winner with 25 donuts eaten!

Dancing in the Driveway

Our kids come up with the greatest activities for family nights! This one was all Hailey's. Her family night was for the whole family to go out on our driveway and have a dance concert! Oh, what our neighbors must think! But, we all had a great time jumping and dancing and being part of the audience! Hailey was in charge of all the choreography and did a wonderful job. Needless to say I'm putting her in her first dance class this September.

The all important final bow!

(Notice that Hailey is airborne in the first picture)

Fun in July

Happy Birthday Aunt Elise! We were able to go up to a fun and fabulous birthday dinner up at Mike's Grandpa's house. Elise was actually able to hold Eliza without her putting up a fuss. My cute little Eliza is such a mommy's girl!

We had a high school friend get together at my house, and it was so much fun to see Jana and Katie and their cute families! It is amazing that it has been 12 years since high school. Hopefully next time we can get more of the old gang back together. The kids had a great time at the park across the street from our house. In September Jana and me will be related! My sister is marrying her cute brother Jake!

4th of July Weekend

Go Mike Go! This is one of Mike's many races this summer! He did 3 rides that were 100 milers. This was the end of the Tour de Riverton which was a 34 miler. The kids had a fun time waving in Dad at the finish line. After the race my sis-in-law Becky met us at Riverton Park for a fabulous time at the carnival. The kids loved all the carnival rides! Then we got a Little Caesar's pizza (which is Ben's absolute favorite) and went to a park and played. It was such a fun day!

Jaxon loved the train! He did not want to get off! He would have stayed on the train all day!
Hailey wasn't quite sure she wanted to ride this roller-coaster. She told me it was scary but fun. Ben and Donnovan loved every second!

Hailey was in heaven in her purple starship

Summer of Swimming!

So this has been a fabulous summer with lots of swimming! Here are just a few pictures of the many times we were able to go swimming. We have gone at least once a week. I decided it wasn't such a great idea to take my camera when we went swimming so I don't have too many pictures. We are lucky enough to have a pool just a couple of streets away from our house. We also had a lot of fun going to the swimming pool with friends in our old Riverton neighborhood. Last summer Hailey would usually just last 10 or 15 minutes and get cold, so we didn't swim a ton. But this year, both Hailey and Ben are my fishes and love to swim! They are both great jumpers and had a blast. Eliza was usually sleeping in her car seat on the sidelines while we were swimming. But, Eliza also did great in the water. One swimming day when my mom joined us, she sat in the water and splashed for 45 minutes.

Zoo with Cousins

This was a great day at the zoo with my sis-in-law Becky and her two cute boys. The kids all had a ton of fun, we love the zoo!

This was so funny, Ben loved was trying to get the elephant to squirt him and it took a few tries before it finally did. Hailey was not so happy when she got sprayed!