First Day of School

Here is Audrey on her first day of second grade.  Unfortunately I didn't get a picture of her in the "usual" corner of our house.  She was very excited to go back to school and it was hard for her to wait until after Labor Day.

She had a great day at school and loved her teacher and class.  She wasn't too happy though to come home and find out that her fish had died. 

Here is Evan on his first day of preschool. He too was extremely excited to go back. 

Alivia on the other hand got bored with her siblings gone.  She decided to take on extra responsibilities around the house like feeding the fish. 

Last Hurrah

Being the good procrastinators that we are, we crammed everything into the last two weeks of summer.  First we finally went up to Boise to visit family for the weekend.  While there, we all went to the local jump house.

I didn't get very good pictures while we were there.

After we got back from Boise, it was time to hit all of the local spots before school started.  First up was the splash pad. 

Next stop, the zoo.  We hadn't seen the new polar bear yet.  The kids really enjoyed watching him; they wouldn't even turn around for me to take their picture. 

They were able to take their eyes off of the giraffe so that I could take their picture.

The kids don't think a trip to the zoo is complete without a ride on the carousel.

And finally we made a stop at the Alpine Slides in Park City.  Unfortunately Audrey was the only one that got to go down.  By the time Evan made it to the top, it had started to rain and there was thunder and lighting so he wasn't able to go down. 

After all of that, it was time to rest up for a few days before school started.

The Seven Year (St)Itch(es)

Seven years.  That is how long we made it without our kids needing stitches.  Last August I was cleaning the kitchen and Evan was playing in the basement when I suddenly heard a crash and I could also hear Evan crying and screaming.  I ran downstairs to see what had happened and I found him in my sewing room with blood running down his face.  He told me he was trying to climb like Spider-Man and he had pulled our Total Gym over and it had hit his head.  He had a cut right by his eye and another one on the top of his head.  After I got him cleaned up, I could tell the one by his eye was pretty deep and would require stitches.  So I packed up all three kids and headed to InstaCare.  Here he is after they put some numbing ointment on the wounds and we were waiting for it to take effect.

After that, they prepared him to get the stitches.  A sucker always helps.  He looks calm in this picture, but he was not calm while getting the stitches.  It was a four person job; the doctor doing the stitches, a nurse holding his head, another nurse holding his arms, and me holding his legs.  I don't think it would have been so bad if it had been farther away from his eye. 



Luckily he only needed three stitches and he only needed them on the one cut.  Here he is after we got home.

Six days later, we were back at InstaCare to get the stitches out.  That was only a three person job.  Here's hoping we make it another seven years.

Annual Fishing Trip

Usually the first Saturday in August is reserved for our annual fishing trip to Mirror Lake.  We look forward to this day every year.  We get up extremely early and often the kids don't make it out of their pajamas that day.  Colby gets to do all of the hard work and the kids just like to reel them in. 

Alivia was more concerned about wearing pink than she was about catching fish.

Here's my dad and Chris very patiently waiting for a fish to bite.  Waiting............

It is best if my mom casts my dad's pole out into the water.  He is certainly not known for his casting abilities, but rather the lack thereof.

Here is the final haul that we left with that day.  Sadly I don't have a picture of this, but I really did learn how to gut and filet fish that day.  I wasn't very good at it, but I did learn.  And I will probably have to relearn again next year since I haven't had any practice since last August.