A Mommy-Daughter First!

I waited years to have a daughter and I finally got to paint her nails! Drew and the boys were watching the series premier of Star Wars the Clone Wars, and playing XBox. Megan and I were not interested in doing either of those things, so we headed upstairs to paint our nails! She loved it. She walked around showing everyone her "ink" nails. Then she had to get all dolled up. It's fun having a little girl who loves to dress up girly sometimes!

Happy Birthday Jared!

Jared turned 6 last week! For his birthday, we took him to Build-a-Bear workshop and he chose a black teddy bear, dressed as Darth Vader, of course. His first real day of school was on his birthday, so he got to take treats to class. And that night we took his friend Steven to Chuck-E-Cheese for a night of games, pizza and cake.

It is fun to see his personality emerge. We are quickly discovering he is good at sports - t-ball last spring, swimming this summer and soccer this fall. He loves soccer - and he's got a great coach this year (thanks Drew!). His coach says he is the best player on their team! =)

Happy Birthday Jared!

First Day of School

Back to school! Cameron and Ryan started school on August 31st, and Jared's first day of school was September 3rd (our district does a slow start for Kindergarten - orientations, meet the teacher, etc. during the first few days of school).

Cameron is in 6th grade this year and started Middle School! He has PE, Math, Band and is in a multi-age program for Language Arts, Science and Social Studies. It has been an adjustment getting him out the door at 7:20 every morning. I've heard we can survive Middle School with a few tears and a lot of ice cream!

Ryan started the PAT program at Carnation Elementary. He is in 4th grade this year and is loving the new challenges in this class. His class is a 4th/5th grade split class, and his teacher is Miss Isler.

Jared is in PM Kindergarten at Carnation Elementary school this year. He is loving school so far - we are lucky to have a good teacher, Ms. Crane, and a small kindergarten class. I have to drive him to school every afternoon, but he rides the bus home with Ryan.

Summer Wrap Up

It's been a good summer and I am sad to see it come to an end. But we have survived the first week back at school, and today was my first afternoon with a quiet house while Megan takes a nap. Maybe I can get used to this new schedule!

We threw in a few last minute summer adventures in August. First we attempted a day trip to Bainbridge Island in search of good ice cream, pizza and state parks to explore. We made it as far as the ferry terminal in Seattle, where Megan tripped, fell, and hit her head on the corner of a vending machine. She had a nice gash on her forehead, so after manuvering our way out of a line of cars waiting for the ferry, we spent the next 3 hours in the ER at Swedish Medical Center. 4 stitches later, we tried to find something to do in Seattle so it wasn't a total waste of a day. We ended up at the Aquarium and Red Robin for dinner.

The next week we tried again, this time with much better results. (We all stayed in the car at the ferry terminal this time, to avoid any repeat trips to the ER!) The ferry ride was fun, the ice cream was super yummy, and pizza was good, and we had fun exploring.

Beautiful Seattle!

On the way back to Seattle, we had all the kids lined up for a picture, when the horn on the ferry blew just as Drew was taking the picture. I LOVE the look on Jared's face - it makes me laugh every time I look at this picture!

Yummy ice cream! It's a good thing we have to go all the way to Bainbridge Island to get it, or we'd get really fat eating it all of the time!