First day of school!

Today was Miss Emily's first day of Pre-K! We are so excited to have a school girl! It has been hard for me to come around to the idea of having a kid in school, but she was ready and excited, so who am I to hold her back? Whenever I tell her I don't want her to grow up, she comes back with the same response: "Don't worry; I'll still love you even when I'm gone."

Here she is on our door step.

We compromised on her outfit. She wanted to wear her Disney princess shirt because "what if there are other girls in my class who like princesses?" and I really don't like that shirt so she went with the pink shirt with a sparkly scooter and a beautiful hair bow.

And here she is on the steps of her school.

We feel lucky to have a neighbor in the same class so Emily has a familiar face there. She was able to jump right in without feeling shy for a second.

 

Well, little girl, it's the beginning of a long road, but a great one.

Four years old!!

Our stay in Utah was extra long because we celebrated Emily's fourth birthday while we were there. I was terrible about taking pictures but our friends were kind enough to send us some.
Things worked out so that a family of good friends that had recently moved from Austin to Utah was able to join us for Emily's birthday party.
We had fun playing in the freezing wading pools (Orem hose water is so, so much colder than Austin hose water), decorating cupcakes, and touring Joseph's family's orchard.

 Elinor ate a whole cupcake before anyone else had finished decorating theirs. She's definitely a good eater.

Emily was excited to receive a pair of rollerskates from Grandma Cooper.

She has been wearing them pretty much non-stop since then and is getting pretty good!

(She'll be waiting for you in a year, Cory!)

Emily was so excited to turn four - I think it was the first birthday she actually anticipated and understood. We felt lucky to be able to celebrate it with family and friends. Lately I feel like Emily is so grown up. She is helpful, asks many (many, many) questions, and works so hard to do what she understands to be right. 

I can't believe she looked like this when we first began blogging! I need time to slow down a little bit.

 

The trip

Well, it's been a while since I've blogged, but it hasn't been for lack of things to write about. August was a busy month. The main event was our family's trip to Utah for Aunt Nancy's wedding! It was a long drive, but it was worth it to escape the 100+ temps here in Austin for the lovely 75-degree weather in Utah. Utah has also somehow been stealing our rain - it was greener there than I've seen it in a long time and Texas is just drying up. I ran outside a few minutes ago and took this picture just outside our apartment:

Sad, huh. We're living in a wasteland. But we did get to escape this ghastly weather for a couple of weeks to the much greener pastures in Utah.

We met Cousin Paige for the first time. What a cutie!

She and Elinor seemed to hit it off, though Elinor is looking pretty solemn in this picture. They played a lot and it was so much fun to see them following each other around. We will have to visit frequently to nurture this friendship.

This is Emily and Caleb waiting for Nancy to come out of the temple. No, Emily's smile is not forced at all! :)

 The DVD player kept them entertained... until the batteries died.

Then we had to be a little more creative.
Caleb got grumpy.

 So I gave him the camera and sent him off on assignments to get shots of different people.
Here's Emily.

This was probably Paige or Gabe.

Here's me.

Take two.

 Emily was kept happy by being asked to "be beautiful."
Isn't she a sweetheart?

Grandma made matching dresses for the granddaughters, so here are Emily and Elinor together.

And the three of them here. Caleb may have been holding El in a headlock.

And, just because we were kept waiting outside the temple for so long for Nancy to glam up, I will leave you now, wondering if you will ever get to see the lovely bride in all her glory.
Plus this post is getting a little too long for my liking.
xo

By the Skin of our Teeth

Amanda has been spending some time in New York with her mum and sisters.  While I'm excited for her to have that opportunity, she's sorely missed.  I think I made a rather piteous figure wandering the grocery store aisles with all three kids, two days' stubble, and a black eye.  A few people asked if Elinor did that to me.

Still, we're moving forward.  We filled out the paperwork for Emily's Pre-K.  It took a long time and I had all three kids wreaking havoc in the office.  The principal brought out coloring books and matchbox cars to try to restore some order.  It only worked for a short time.  We also went to the library and children's museum.  We've spent some good times on the miserable hundred-plus degree playground.

We've  been trying to deal with the tough problems and questions that come up in an appropriate way.

But we miss our mom.  We really miss her and appreciate all the more everything she does to make our home run smoothly.  We also miss her because we love her very much.

When she gets home, it'll be like Christmas.

Friendship

Emily has been friends with Eric for a long time.
They have good times...

And rough times...

 

"How 'bout I drive?"

But they get through them...

 And keep having fun together.

We will miss our neighbors.
 Photography by Kristen.

Big Plans

Amanda makes big plans. She works really hard and makes them happen. That probably deserves a couple blog posts, but that's not what this is about. Emily makes big plans too. She surely learned it from Amanda. We work hard to help her make her plans work out.

She loves to check out Christmas books from the library.  It doesn't matter what season it is.  She finds the Christmas books (and sparkle, fairy, princess books) and loads up her card.  I don't think I was allowed my own library card until the age of accountability.  Emily's advanced.  This Christmas book showed a plate of sugar cookies and that inspired Emily to action.

Caleb made a mess.

Elinor ran and hid.

But Emily realized her dreams.

She recently realized that one can hold a party without a reason. Armed with that fact, she decided that we needed to have a party. She made plans. Amanda wrote them down: "A big party, not a little party. This is not a party for anyone's birthday. It's just a party with food. We need two tables: the black table and the wooden table."

She turned to "The Wheels on the Bus" board book for inspiration.

For food, she listed:

A cake with candles	cupcakes
ice cream	chips & dip
lollipops	popcorn
cookies	hot chocolate
grapes	tomatoes
vegetables	popsicles

It was important to her that we have vegetables, tomatoes in particular. She said she doesn't like them, but she needs them to be strong and healthy.

In the end, it wasn't a very big party. We didn't have vegetables and the cake probably won't help us in the strong and healthy department. Still, she seemed to have a lot of fun.  We put up decorations and had a couple friends over to snack and visit.  Her guests graciously thanked her as they left. We did end up singing happy birthday to her, even though it wasn't a birthday party.  But she didn't mind.

If you're happy and you know it

Amanda loves to run. She's serious about her running. She casually runs seven miles in the morning to start the day off on the right foot.

A few days ago she came home with an extra spring in her step.

It made her foot squeak when she walked; so we took it out.

Catch Up

It has been a while since I've blogged, and since I don't want my mother (who is in France) to worry about us, here we go.
Mostly, we've been staying inside a lot because it is always so hot outside. Plus, with Katharine and Shiloh and Editt gone, what's the point of even getting up in the morning? :)
Anyway, here's a picture I liked of some sisterly bonding time while Caleb was napping.

Emily has also been taking swimming lessons. I am afraid we started her a little late because she has been pretty set against putting her face in the water. Being on her back makes her the most nervous.

It's a bad picture because I was zoomed in from the other side of the pool holding Elinor while fighting Caleb for the camera.
We did really like Emily's teacher. She was so encouraging and positive. I am hoping to sign Emily up for another session of lessons so we can come back next year and wow the old teacher with Emily's new and improved swimming skills. We'll see how that works out...

 Aah, cute Elinor. Playing peek-a-boo by herself in the picture above. She is now crawling all over the place and creating all kinds of mischief. She eats more than the other kids and is less afraid of the water than either of them. She has three bottom teeth and almost four top ones. I do love her toothy grin.
Caleb has recently decided to potty train himself. I was sort of dreading potty training him since I've heard boys are so much harder than girls. I was going to put it off until next year when he turns three, but it might happen earlier than that. We'll see what happens with him taking the lead.
Joseph and I have recently started watching The Office. We checked out seasons one and two from the library and are often left sitting on the couch wide eyed and in shock, not really sure how to react. That Steve Carell... he's almost painful to watch playing Michael Scott. Yeah, our accomplishments are not as awesome as learning to swim, growing teeth, or potty training.
Seriously, though, Joseph is working hard on that dissertation proposal and hopes to have it taken care of within the next couple of months. We are hoping his graduate career will wrap up quickly after that is behind us.

Happy Helper

Once Ellie started eating regular food, she lost most of her interest in purees and baby foods. It's hard to get her to eat the stuff.

Unless you're as cool as Emily, I guess. Then she seems perfectly willing to open up.

Happy Fourth of July!

Photo by Katie.