Treasures

Chances are these will be thrown out eventually. But I needed to preserve some memory of them here.

Thankfully I didn't have to ask what this was. Dillan was so excited to show me the picture he had done of Daddy's scriptures!




This is my favorite picture he has done of our family.
From left: Mommy, Daddy, Leah, and Dillan. And he says when I turn 30 I'll be too big for our house. HA!

Soccer

12:55 pm Home from school. Ice water all around.

1:02 pm "Mom, school's over! It's time for soccer practice!"

1:09 pm "Mom, is it time YET?!?"

1:30 pm "Mooooooom! We're gonna be LATE!"

you get where this is going...

All afternoon, distraction after distraction, but that boy had a one track mind: soccer. He pulled out his shorts, T-shirt, socks, shinguards, and shiny new cleats. He was so excited. Finally a real soccer team with a real coach, uniform, his own ball, games, the works! I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little bit excited either. Ever since I found out I was pregnant with him, I'd been imagining a day like this.




Too bad they don't stay this shiny and new

They practiced dribbling and shooting. Dillan did great. Props to Coach Paul for working so hard to keep a bunch of 4-year-old boys on task and having fun.


They started practice out right. Popsicles!

Shares

Shares at school start this week. The letter A. Dillan chose an airplane. Last year I tried to help him come up with clues to help the class guess his share. This time he thought of them all on his own:

Clue #1: It's something that flies in the air.

Clue #2: It is really loud and goes super fast!

Clue #3: My Daddy went on one this morning before I woke up and I didn't get to say goodbye!

We miss you already Daddy!

Summer Ends

Yup, we caved and got Sea World passes AGAIN! We couldn't help ourselves! Hey, when family comes to town and wants to go and the annual pass is only $10 more for the rest of the year, how could we refuse!



Leah got to ride the Flying Elmo ride for the first time. Unfortunately I didn't get a picture quick enough before the ride operator told me TWICE to put my camera away (pretty slow, I admit). Then Abbey's spinning ride (I passed and took pictures instead), then Leah was DEtermined to follow Dillan and Daddy up the giant cargo net-bridge-don't-lose-your-kid maze. I ended up carrying her most of the way, while trying to stay balanced and not lose a flip-flop. We tried to keep up with the boys, but they were so fast! She was of course too little to go down the supercool slide that all the big kids were going on, and she made sure everyone heard her frustration!


Before Shannon and the kids (minus Roxy) left, we got in as much park time as we could. It's finally getting to the perfect park time of year.
Fall is in the air late afternoon, and we head out.







We tried to get a picture of all the kids at the bottom of the slide, and this is how it ended up!

Soccer starts this week, stay tuned...
Football season is right around the corner! How can you not LOVE this time of year!

SCHOOL!...finally!

At the end of last year, Dillan was curious as to what summer vacation was. I explained all the fun things we could do and that he got to take a break from school. He didn't seem okay with that right away. He asked for a while when he would be going back. Eventually we got busy enough that I think he stopped wondering.

He was very excited to get back to school and his teachers, Ms Carol and Ms Melissa. We walked up, I grabbed his paperwork and name tag. Ms Melissa was there to greet him. He was perfectly at ease and walked into the classroom waving, "Bye Mom!" Ms Carol was at the big table with a few other kids and workbooks were already opened up at every seat. They got right back into it! I helped him put on his name tag, turned around to grab Leah and head out, but couldn't find her. There she was, blending in with the rest of the class, climbing into an available chair right next to Ms Carol. I picked her up and told her she was too little to start school, which she of course hated to hear. She screamed all the way to the car and fought with all her strength when I tried to strap her down.

We're looking forward to a year of reading, Shares, writing, Reading Logs, Book orders, and growing!

Ready for school

The ABCs for Dillan, age 4. A little game we play for those moments in the car. PreK here we come!

A is for Apple
B is for Bubbles
C is for Cake
D is for Dillan
E is for Egg
F is for Fox
G is for Gogurt
H is for Horse
I is for Igloo
J is for Jellybeans
K is for Kite
L is for Lollipop
M is for Monster
N is for Non
O is for Ostrich
P is for Pumpkin
Q is for Queen
R is for Roxy
S is for Slippery
T is for Tiger
U is for Umbrella
V is for Violin
W is for Wheel
X is for X-ray
Y is for Yo-Yo
Z is for Zipper

Can't wait!

Dillan also gave his 2nd talk in church today. This one went much much better than last time. He kept his mouth right on the microphone, swapping spit with the last kid that did that, and spoke clearly. The theme of the talk was "Temple blessings unite families." When preparing for the talk, Dillan and I were talking about how the temple seals families together forever. When he heard that he said, "Together Forever?!? So Daddy won't have to go to work anymore?!?"
We added that line to the talk because it was too good to leave out.

Summer Fun

Some of our summertime adventures...Sea World, the beach, cousins, big wheels, and Disneyland.