last day of school!!

Today ended Miss Emily's first year of school. While she had a great time and really enjoyed learning new things and interacting with so many other kids, we are both ready for this break. The biggest challenge during the school year was getting those kids to bed by 7 every night so Emily could get up at 6:30 in time to catch the bus at 6:48.

Her teacher sent out a few pictures today. Her message said,
"Summer birthdays! I still can't believe school is out. I miss them already!"

After school we had the traditional end of school celebration.
Here is the story of how it happened.

Emily was the first one out, so I couldn't get a shot of her actually getting off the bus.

"Hey, what's this table for?"

Elinor: "Here are some cookies. See?"

"Oh, I get it. Now I can smile."

It was a pretty well-attended party. We do like student housing.

We took off early to say goodbye to our good friends who were leaving. They swooped their daughter off the bus and 15 minutes later drove away forever. We will definitely miss them.

And so it begins. We will see at least six other families leave this summer.


And then Elinor came really close and stared up at me into the sun, showing off her big lips.

Getting to know Elinor

Time for an update!
Let's talk about Elinor for a minute. This girl has character. She is opinionated, strong-willed, super loud, and even holds her own against Caleb. She definitely has the most expressive face of all of our kids.

Her smile here cracks me up.

Here's Joseph's pet ceramic bird that Elinor secretly loves, but mostly for the thrill she gets from being freaked out by it. It's funny how cautious she is when that bird is near. The first time she saw it she wouldn't go near it, even to grab a hard-earned pack of Smarties. She still won't touch it without an adult there to reassure her.

The other day we went to this super random 25 cent sale at a nearby toy store. Caleb loaded up on cheap little treasures; Elinor dragged this doll around the whole time. She wanted nothing more than this single toy for 25 cents. I really didn't want it in our home, but she really loves it. It has a flattened, melted head and a discolored body. And it's in a swimsuit. I am hoping her adoration wears off soon so I can sneakily throw it away.

So, this one time it was mother's day and Joseph ordered me a box grater from Kohl's. When I opened it they had sent the wrong thing. So he returned it and reordered it and they sent the wrong thing again. Now we hate Kohl's and I got a new present tonight for Memorial Day.

Joseph told me he chose the wrapping for how beautiful it is. It did make me smile.

We live in student housing and this year we are experiencing a major exodus of families, which makes me really excited for everyone else, but really sad for me. We had a little potluck the other day to say goodbye. Here is a picture of our kids and my tummy and everyone else's backs.

 Isn't my baby (elinor) getting huge? Good thing we have another baby on the way. Too bad this one might be born huge. Based on the way I am feeling and looking right now.

Fountain park

So, I'm trying to figure out why I've had such a hard time blogging lately. Is it because I'm pregnant? Because I've been blogging for four years now and I'm out of steam? Is it because kids are old news so I don't take delight in seeing them do fun things any more? Or is it just because we stopped doing fun things?

Well, guess what?! We did something fun today and I actually took a few pictures that I am excited to share! (hmm... maybe I just need to buy myself an expensive camera for some blogging motivation... yes, I am sure now that that's what I need.)

We boycotted this fountain park last year due to unreliable fountains, but decided to give it another try today. My friend Reianna told me she was taking her boys, so we decided to join them. The kids had a blast! I love that they are old enough to enjoy these things now. Two years ago Emily was a lot younger and more timid and Caleb was crawling. Now they are not afraid to show those fountains who's in charge!

Okay, so I guess I didn't get many good shots. A nice camera would be wasted on someone like me. The important thing is, though, that these guys were running around and laughing non-stop the whole time we were there.

And then there's this girl.
Here she is pre-most-daring-moment-of-the-day:

 And here she is post-most-daring-moment-of-the-day:

She's still not wet, but she did touch (or almost touch) that little jet of water behind her with one of her hands. Wahoo! Go Elinor!


The only downside to the whole thing was that we got home at the same time as Joseph so we had no dinner ready for him.  Aw, who am I kidding? That happens every other day anyway.
All in all, a satisfying experience. Bring on summer!

but not really because I'm happy with these cooler temps and rainy days.

For Smiles

Amanda was trolling Craigslist one evening and found someone had decided to pull the carpet and pad out of their rarely-used guest room. It's a pretty good fit. It's nice to be able to lie on the floor.

Our professional installation team is not satisfied unless you're not satisfied.

Once we got the carpet laid down, we had to have a dance party to test it out.

Emily loves rocks. She's also got phonetics down pretty well.

When Emily leaves for school in the morning, Elinor puts on her pajamas and gets ready to go as well.

What on earth will we do when our girls are old enough to date?

Mother's Day

Mother's day again!
Emily came home with this card for me

I love that the only accurate information on there is my name. And I love the stylish hoop earrings she adorned me with there at the bottom.

Church was good, though this 2-5 slot is hard on us. Joseph basically kept our home running this morning while I put together a YW lesson and then made dinner for the family this evening as well.

Joseph and the kids gave me this little mouse to add to my random collection of little things that I pick up at Savers or Goodwill.

It's nice to be the special person of the day. And it's nice to have sweet kids and a great husband.

ABD

Joseph has been working really hard at school. We are so excited that he was able to propose his dissertation a couple of weeks ago and now he is officially All But Dissertation!! We love Austin, but are also feeling ready to move on to the next phase in our life, so we are happy with this big step he has taken toward graduation. Congratulations, Joseph!

Father and Son

 I came home from school a bit early Friday to get ready for camping with Caleb. Emily was really put out at being left behind, but Amanda put together a good ladies night while we spent some manly time together.

We didn't have to look too far to find manly things to do. Enormous spiders are manly, right. Actually, this kind of gave me the jibblies. That's the Bishop holding his son's hat.  The spider is not decorative.

Because of our ward's interesting demographic, the oldest kid there was eight or so but Caleb had lots of friends to run around with. Caleb was a good camper.

We skipped rocks, ate junk food, and stayed up late singing hymns. I thought Caleb would be excited to stay up late, but he was more excited to have a tent. He kept on asking to go to bed.

It was nice to have some quality time together. We bonded.

I wanted to share this picture too. This was family scripture time. At least we're together and not... on the streets.

Decorations

Emily recognized that Mother's day was the next event coming up (I'm glad that we have the Cince de Maio festivities behind us now... sometimes the holidays can be so stressful). She asked for some tape.

She then proceeded to decorate the house for Mother's day. Plastic pots and dishes on the walls--they really add to the excitement of the upcoming celebrations. She also taped up the top of a baby-wipes container and a few other random things that still somehow evoke a strong sentiment of motherhood.  We're ready to get our party on.

Second trimester high

I love the second trimester. It is around this point in my pregnancy that I seem to get really ambitious for my kids and really into this mothering thing. This might be why Emily started gymnastics and then ballet right before Elinor was born, and why Caleb has recently started Sportball at WAYA and Emily has restarted ballet after a six month hiatus when she started school. Now I am ready to start teaching them piano. I tried teaching piano before Caleb was born because a family really twisted my arm, but I never really felt comfortable with it or confident in my role as a teacher. I am so excited now! I don't love any single piano curriculum I have found, but in buying a few different books and picking how I want to approach it, I am enthusiastic about giving it another try. Emily is set on Wednesday being lesson day, so we will see how it goes tomorrow!
I am also in love with cloth diapers. I'm not totally sure we've started saving money yet (it's been a little over 6 months since we started) but hopefully it'll make financial sense when we cloth diaper our next kid. It just makes me so happy to see my clean diapers drying in the sun and knowing that I don't have to be buying big boxes of diapers every couple of months.

These guys also make me happy.

Two year old Halloween costumes

Sunday afternoon naps. Em slept from 5:30pm until 6:30 am solid.

Cute Emily putting together a pizza.

And Elinor makes me happy too.

International Festival

Today was the International Festival at Mathews Elementary School. Emily was asked to represent Japan in the Parade of Nations, so even though she's only a quarter Japanese and I really don't know much about Japan, we were excited to dress her up.

Isn't she just so cute?

Look how little she is!

She did a great job saying "Konnichiwa. My name is Emily and I represent Japan. Sayonara."

After the parade was class dances. The pre-k did a Mexican dance that was really fun. Emily loved practicing it at home with Caleb. Caleb didn't love it.

Afterward they played silly music for the kids to dance to. It was nice to see Emily having fun with her friends.

We ended the evening with a group shot in front of the school of the three kids.

Aren't I a lucky momma?