Brandon My Buddy

My youngest, Brandon started preschool this school year.

On his 1st day (pictured below) he told me,

"Mom, I think I'm a little taller today."

I think you're right, Brandon.

You are a little TALLER.

A New School Year

 The 7th grader, middle school

English, Band, Algebra, World Civ, Spanish, Art

 The 3rd grader

with Mr. Braerman, who has a mohawk.
Crazy, right?
There was something about it, though,
that made me feel like
 he and Tate will get along great, which is a good thing.

 The 5th grader with Mrs. Harvey

 The 1st grader with her lunch box!

Her teacher is Mrs. Marshall.

Chris said, "Oh my" when he saw

Sadie's outfit for today.

I've enjoyed cleaning our house after summer today in quiet.

Brandon is home with me this year,
he likes to talk, but doesn't get too loud.

Brandon wanted to make cookie cutter cookies today,

and is taking a looooong bath.

Dying to hear how these kids day has been.

Our 2014-15 Back to School Year Theme

And just like that another summer is over.

School starts Monday for my kids.

I do hope to blog about our summer.

Elder Bednar's recent talk,

has re-inspired me

to do better at keeping up on our family blog.

I get to hear Elder Bednar speak

tonight and tomorrow for our Stake Conference.

I'm excited.

If you feel like reading,

here's some fun online reading links:

I loved Sara's advice about the simple, mundane moments of motherhood:
"When in quiet moments I let my mind wander to the things engraved upon my heart, it’s a different set of memories entirely.  I remember as clear as day how she’d let me pull up a chair and play “ice cream man” while she did the dishes.  I remember her “letting” me match all of the socks in the laundry basket and making a game out of it.  I remember the feeling of her hands as they rubbed my back when I was scared at night.  I remember her talking to me and asking me about my day and my life when we’d drive around on endless errands.  I remember her favorite meal of canned tomato soup and slightly burned grilled cheese because she always sat down with me for lunch when we’d have that.  What I remember, what I treasure, are moments stemming from the most mundane moments of motherly duties: laundry, errands, bed time."  Read More.

This is quite possibly the best thing I have ever read about our bodies, health, and exercise:
"My body doesn't conform to the standards of fitness of my community. . .I exercise to thank my body, not change it. . .if I were to focus my time and energy toward weight loss management, I actually wouldn't have much energy for much else. . .In our home 'health' has a very simple definition:It means to love your body. It means to love it enough to take care of it, exercise it, feed it good food, nurse it when it's sick, rest it, move it, dance when it wants to dance and clean it when it needs cleaning."
Read More and More

This was all over facebook last June, but I still think and giggle about it,
especially as we're starting a new school year:
"I’m so tiiiiiiiiired and I have five kids and that is just too many to educate well. I can only handle around two, so I’m going with Sydney and Caleb because they both like to read and the other three are just going to have to enroll in Life Skills Class one day and develop a trade.

Yesterday Remy brought her books to me at bedtime – an hour notable for its propensity to incite rage and trauma – and chirped, “We need to read for 20 minutes!” and a little part of my soul died.

“No, we don’t have to read tonight.”
“YES WE DO!!! MRS. BURKE SAID!!! WE HAAAAVE TO!!!”
“We already read.”
“NO WE DIDN’T!!! YOU ARE FAKING ME, MOM?”
“When I talk to you during the day, that’s like reading. You have to listen to the words I am saying and then make sense of them. It’s really hard work for you. It’s called auditory reading. We’ve been practicing all day. I’ll write the minutes down in your log.” Read More

MiddleAged Mormon Man's Blog Post about
The First Presidency and the Apostles joining Facebook.

I love this new missionary video about incorporating missionary work
as part of our daily routine. It doesn't need to be something extra,
it can fit naturally in with the flow of our life.


I liked this mom's thoughts on the missionary age change.

I love this Utah Mother of the Year's insight on mothering, her blog is fun too.

Happy Reading!

Be Believing

This is our family's 2013 school year theme.

It's from the scripture, D&C 90:24

"Search diligently, pray always, and

BE BELIEVING, and

all things shall work together

for your good"

Back to School Jitters

Another school year is underway.

Hip Hip Hooray! I survived the summer.

Tate, 2nd Grade,

Mrs. Makaafi

Tate's new runnin' shoes.

Kyle, 4th Grade,

Mrs. Schwer

Kyle wore a super bright shirt, so everyone could see him the first day.

His new 'cool' shoes.

Lindy, 6th grade,

Mr. Fife

This is Lindy's last year as an elementary student.

I had to force her to take this shot.

She was in a hurry, and felt it wasn't necessary to

take a 1st day photo.

She also has her 1st pimple this week.
I did not take a close-up that for you.

Sadie, Kindergarten,

Mrs. Coslett

Sadie, was more than happy to

pose for her photos.

She requested that we put sparkle dust on her face for the first day.

She also used her sparkle lotion and sparkle perfume.

Sadie has afternoon kindergarten, which is quite a bit after lunch.

She has been ready to go every morning with her backpack and shoes on. 

Sadie's fave shoes of all time.

Glitter, sparkle shoes.

We're on her 2nd pair already.

Brandon, the stay-at-home kid.

What will we do all day together?

Shop?

Organize?

Decorate?

Blog?

I can dream, right?

Sadie's First Day

Sadie has looooooong been waiting for her turn to start pre-school.

Today was FINALLY her day!

She picked out this new little shirt to wear her first day.

I thought she looked so cute.

Here she is showing off her preschool bag to bring home all her important papers.

She also wore a ring with lip gloss.

You know, just in case she needed to shine her lips a little

while she worked at her preschool desk.

She had a fun first day, and is ready to give it a go again tomorrow.

After preschool today, she was anxious to learn the girls names in her class, 

and showed me each paper she worked on after school.

Today she traced her name, the letter A, and the number 1.

A Back to School Dinner

I've been inspired over the years from Nie Nie's Back to School Feasts.
I've always thought it was a great idea, but it always felt like too much work,
1 more thing to-do, and a tradition for her family, but not for ours.

To explain: before her kids start a new school year, Nie Nie's family has a nice meal, they give the school year a theme from the scriptures, give each each child a small gift (often something that has the school year theme on it), their father gives each child a father's blessing, and sometimes they'll do a fashion show with some of their new school clothes.

This school year, I was feeling impressed that this might be a good tradition to try for our family.

The Menu:
-Salmon (Bake for about 15-20 min at 350, season each piece of salmon w/ olive oil, dab of lemon juice, sprinkled w/ brown sugar, and a dash of salt & pepper. Easy and delicious every time.)
-Corn on the Cob
-Rice
-Crescent Rolls (My kids love them!)
-Martinelli's Sparkling Apple Juice
-Homemade apple pie with Homemade Ice Cream (Supper Yummy, the best part)

The Theme:
Lead from -2 Ne 21:16 ". . . a little child shall lead them"
(I'll keep this theme on our fridge to remind our family of it throughout the school year.)

I noticed there are some cute ideas about Leading from the September, Friend Magazine, p.24-25

The Back to School Gift:
A mini clipboard for each child.

The dinner went great, it was a huge hit. I was surprised.
The kids had so much nervous energy and excitement
that it was fun to do this dinner to give us a good activity to lead up to the first day of school.
We shared the family theme with them, before we ate at the dinner table.
Chris shared a couple quick thoughts of how he wants our kids to be good leaders this year.
We spent just a couple minutes on it, not too long.

It was a fun night together, and I would love to try it again, and make it a tradition.
I think you could do this anytime for your family in the month of September, or even as a FHE lesson.

5, 3, and 1

First Day of School TODAY!

Yeah!!!!!!

 It felt like Christmas Morning and Mother's Day for me!

I'll have 3 in all day school. 

Sadie starts Pre-school next week.

I'll be down to just 1 kid a couple times a week.

WOW, this is exciting!

Do you think I'll move past loading the dishwasher and loading the washing machine?

Maybe, I'll actually put the dishes away and fold the load.

Maybe.

Chris is wondering why I'm so giddy.

"Why are you so excited to send your kids off to school?"

 Lindy, 5th Grade

Mrs. Gilliland

 Kyle, 3rd Grade

Mrs.Makaafi

Do you like his new belt?

Kyle is also sporting his new bike lock.

 Tate, 1st Grade

Mrs. Pachner

Tate did his own hair, Actually, I think Kyle helped him.

Do you like the hairstyle?

I'm worried it made the wrong 1st impression for his teacher.

They're all back from school and were excited to say they had a great day,

were glad to be back at school, and made new friends.

Tate didn't like lunch, though, and he said the day was a little boring and babyish.

He already knew everything his teacher explained today.

At least, Tate had a sportin' hair-do.

End of School Year Activities

Lindy sang in the 4th grade choir.

She had to be at school half an hour early for practice once a week.

We're proud of her for sticking through it for the whole year.

She sang a duet with her good friend, Morgan.

Tate sang in his Kindergarten Choir.

Can you tell they are all doing a good job singing?

Then Tate held up the letter Q for the alphabet song in his classroom.

This song was very exciting!

I was invited to a Mother's Day Tea in Tate's class.

He made me that pretty hat.

I wish I could have worn it to watch the Kentucky Derby.

Here is Tate with his classmate Matthew.

They like to get into trouble together.

Can you tell by their grins?

Lindy participated in a Wagon-Ho Field Day at school.

Lindy completed her first Diorama of a River Otter.

Lindy was in her classroom skit of the Cheetah and the Sloth.

It's the same story as the tortoise and hare.

The Cheetah was confident and exercising with a lot of energy,

and Lindy the Sloth moved S L O W L Y for some light stretching before the race.

Guess who won?

Lindy, the Sloth!

I guess Kyle's class didn't do much at the end of the year.

I don't have any photos of him.

Brown-Bag It!

Lindy and Kyle both had homework the 1st week of school.
They had a Brown Bag assignment.
They each had to put several items that describes them in a brown bag.

Here are Lindy's items:

 1. A hobby she has is rocks. (shiny, green rock)
2. Her favorite music is Taylor Swift (cd)
3. She has a future plan to be a dog-sitter (small dog)
4. She would like to be a better soccer player (red t-shirt)
5. She'd like to visit Hawaii (sea shell)
6. Something special about our family is we all have blue eyes (blue button)
7. The best part of her summer vacation was our trip to the OR coast (toy shark, she got on the coast.)
8.  Going to horse camp is a memorable thing she has done in her life. (horse)
9. She dislikes wearing curlers in her hair (blue curler)
10. She has a talent for music (music paper weight)

Here's Kyle's:

1. He likes to play video games (mickey game)
2. He like to play music (drum sticks)
3. He likes to play sports (soccer trophy)
4. He likes nature (small shiny rock)
5. He likes the beach (broken crab shell)