Wiggly Tooth

Look who lost her first tooth!  For a couple of weeks she has been telling and showing everyone about her "wiggly" tooth.  When we were in Island Park she really wanted it out.  She was biting into taffy and apples trying to get it to come out on its own.  She didn't want anybody to touch it or pull it out.  After while she gave up and went downstairs to play games.  A few minutes later she came running back up, so happy, announcing that her tooth came out!  And it didn't even hurt!

Another milestone.  Good job girlie!

KiNDeRGaRTeN!

At this very moment my little Q is at school!  I can't grasp it.  I'm so happy and so sad at the same time.  Yes she has been in pre-school for the past 2 years, but there is something about kindergarten that makes it official.  And even though she is only away for 2 1/2 hours everyday, it's still EVERY DAY!  My buddy has left me!
If she was a stinker or whiny or high maintenance I'm sure I would feel differently, but she is such a sweet and easy kid and we love hanging out and we love our outings together.
But, she was so stinkin excited that I can't help but be excited too!  It was so fun watching her put on her backpack, get on the bus, and see so many of her friends at school.  She is SO READY kindergarten!

So excited to FINALLY ride the bus!

Of course she picked out the kitty backpack

Her teacher Mrs. Westover {at Back to School night}

She will get to ride the bus for another week or two, but soon we will live close to the school and I am looking forward to walking with her to and from school!  Or ride bikes!

Gotta Go Back to School

I can't stand it.  Another summer come and gone.  And now the kids gotta go back to school - something I never look forward to. Time seriously needs to slow down.  If only...

But the kids were super excited and ready to get back in the groove.  Especially Millie....because it was her first day of JUNIOR HIGH!  On Monday they had a day that is just for 7th graders so they can, you know, find their classes and figure out their locker combinations.  They only went for a few hours. We were in Island Park the week before and got home the night before her big day.  I went to school early with her to help her get it all worked out {because we missed Back to School Night while we were gone}.  She was glowing and so excited.  And nervous too, but not as nervous as most.  Being in Student Council makes a big difference because she already knows a ton of older kids in the school.  Doesn't she look beautiful?

So much cuter than I was in 7th grade!

Top locker....yes!

 Here's the kids on their REAL first day of school {Tuesday}:

At the bus stop - I offered to drive the kids to school but they wanted to ride the bus!

BS followed the bus to school and snapped some pics of the boys with their teachers:

Mrs. Park and Mrs. Easley

After school Millie went to her friend's house to "hang out."  Her friend's Mom took these cute pictures:

It's starting already....the whole BOYS thing!  But aren't they cute?

For dinner we met BS at Tepanyaki for our Back To School Dinner.  With the move and everything else going on I just couldn't muster up a fancy dinner this year so this was their 2nd choice:

Sambo trying to catch a shrimp

And now Will...but he missed - it's on his chin!

After dinner we came home for YW and Scouts.  But not before we had dessert:

Rice Krispy Cake!

Here are some pics of the boys on Monday getting spiffed up for school.  They talked me into going to "Sports Clips" for haircuts and lunch at Firehouse Subs.  No wonder they like this hair place!  They got the MVP treatment with steamed facial towels, head scrub, and massages!

Lookin good!  Goodbye summer buzz

Lake Powell!

 Another summer, another awesome trip to Lake Powell!

We were so happy to be with the cousins from Minnesota {who will be moving to Oklahoma when they return home}.  There was lots of swimming, sliding, water skiing, wake boarding, knee boarding, tubing, exploring, Sea-Dooing, crafting, relaxing, laughing, game playing, and eating!

The most memorable thing on this trip was the nightly thunder storms!  The first night when we were on the slip there was a really bad wind storm which caused waves big enough to raise the front of the houseboat onto the edge of the dock!  We were tilted!  Of course Grandpa worked his magic and figured out a way to fix it.  Then, every single night for the rest of the week there were micro-burst storms that caused massive lightning and thunder storms for about an hour.  It was way cool to watch from the top of the houseboat until inevitably we would have to call "Operation Downstairs" and move our beds down because it would rain.  In all my life I have never been to Lake Powell where it rained every night!  It would only last about 30-60 minutes, but it was enough that we would get drenched!  Monsoon season I guess.  It was so hot that we almost didn't care :)

We made Sharpie Tie-Dye shirts, Duct tape pens, and T-shirt bracelets when we were needing a break from the heat which was fun for the girls and boys.

Will got up knee-boarding for his first time after only a couple of tries!  He loves it!  BS and I got to water ski and wake board a ton which was fantastic.  This Mama Duck and her ducklings would come visit us several times a day for vittles to eat.  We had fun watching and feeding them - so cute!

 We found a beach on Bullfrog Bay that had the most sand we have seen in a long time.  The kids spent hours playing and digging in the sand, especially Will!  He worked himself to the bone digging deep holes and looking for buried treasure.  He was a good helper when it came time to dig holes for the houseboat anchors.  Sambo snorkeled and discovered that he couldn't see much under water.

Quincy loved double knee boarding!  She is so brave and easy and will try anything!  She also thinks she is professional Sea-Doo driver, she insists on driving everytime.  Caitlyn, Millie, Sambo, and Will mastered 360s on the Knee Board - woot woot!  They also got really good going in and out of the wake {knee and wake boarding} and even tried to get some big air!  They don't really love water skiing on 2 skies, they think it is boring but they were good sports to do it anyway.  Maybe they are ready to try slalom next year?  Cambree had fun skiing and did awesome!

Date Night

BS and I had a date with this lovely young lady last weekend.  We went to the Draper Temple for baptisms and then to dinner at Pei Wei.  We really relishd our alone time with her. It was fabulous.  

Camp!

I still can't believe my Millie is twelve.
In June she went to her very first YW {Young Womens} Camp.  This year it was at Mutual Dell up in beautiful American Fork Canyon.  Every four years the whole Stake goes together and this was one of those years.  The group of YW in our ward is small so we were glad that there would be a lot of girls at camp.  I was so excited for her to have her first camp experience because I have great memories of camp when I was her age.  But I was a little nervous about sending her away for 4 days.  It was the beginning of June and the weather was really cold at night.  There is zero cell service up there but luckily it is only 25 minutes away and some of her leaders are my good friends so I knew they would take good care of her.

I was stoked when the Camp Leaders asked me if I would spend a day at camp doing crafts with the girls.  Of course I said yes, mostly because I knew I would be anxious to see Millie after she had been gone for a couple of days.  After browsing Pinterest she and I came up with some crafts that would be fun, cute, easy, and cheap.  That can be hard to find!

The girls left early on a Tuesday and I went up on Friday {they camped until Saturday}.  BS had volunteered to be the Priesthood leader for Friday so we got to go together and spend the day at camp.  I was eager to see how Millie was doing because she doesn't have a good track record when it comes to sleeping at other places without her Mom.  She is quite a home body late at night.  But when I entered their campsite this is what I saw:

Tatum {silly}, Mills, & Morann waiting to Zip Line

Wouldn't be camp without braiding and hair wraps

Team building activity. She's the smallest :)

 It was great to see her and the other girls having so much fun together!  Smelling smoky with braided hair, dirty hands and feet, dirty clothes, and happy faces.  I quickly knew that indeed my little girl is growing up.  She could handle this.  She had a great experience and came home with a stronger testimony.  Gotta love girl's camp!  I am so grateful for her awesome YW and Camp leaders!  They did a fantastic job!  And she said the food was delicious :)

Reina - Camp Leader.  We didn't plan the shirts {from Goldilocks Bike Event}

For the crafts we made Sharpie Tie-Dye shirts and jar lanterns.  Their theme was "Arise and Shine Forth" so the lanterns were perfect.  They both turned out really cute.