Back to School!

Just imagine me singing "It's the most wonderful time of the year".  Only I'm not refering to Christmas, I'm refering to the first day of school!  Yup, the summer ended and they returned to the class room.  I remember the days when I missed them....just kidding.  I do miss them.

 Kinda.

Jensen is in 2nd Grade and has Mrs. Ensign.  He and Logan are in the same school for the first and only time ever.  It's nice having them be able to walk to the bus stop together.  We just had parent teacher conferences and he is doing great!

Logan is in 5th Grade and has Mrs. Singleton.  He is turning into such a character and knows his own style. He loves his new purple shirt.  He is also doing great in school.  I am a lucky Mom.

Ally is in 7th Grade and is on the Student Council-hence the ugly green shirt.  She wasn't too thrilled to have to wear it the first day.  But she is loving the Student Council.  She got selected as one of the two students to be a school representative for the Governing Youth Council.  They have monthly meetings with all the schools in the Bear River District to talk about drug, violence and smoking issues in schools.  She even gets paid!  Quite an honor to be chosen!

*Side Note: I got to help out with the student council on the first day of school, so I was sneaky and took a picture.  I helped with the Back to School Assembly.  I went and watched it and there was a talent section and they had Ally play the piano.  She played part of Beethoven's Turkish March and did awesome.  She did so good, the kids in the audience thought she was faking it!  Too funny!

 

This was my first time not going to parent teacher conferences with Ally.  We've reached the "optional" stage and I know she does great so I didn't go.  I kinda missed hearing how wonderful she is, though. :)  I'm glad I still get to hear it about my other kids. :)

Before you think I'm too full of pride about my kids, let me just remind you that Holden will be entering school at some point and he makes me nervous. If you've met him, you know what I'm talking about. ;)

 

Willy Wonka

I knew we weren't going to be able to do much this summer so I knew we would be around for Ally to be in Willy Wonka. Believe me, it was SUPER time consuming!  Because she was understudy for Violet, she had to go to twice as many practices.  In fact, she probably put more effort into this play than any other kid.  She was Matilda, in the Cooks Chorus and Violet.  No one else had that many parts.  She is such a trooper and I was proud of her.  It was really hard to be the understudy-all the work with none of the glory!  I was glad she got to perform as Violet a couple times though!  She was awesome!

"When it comes to candy, Willy's the conquerer."

She amazed me with her singing!  She used to hate to sing, but her newfound acting talent has brought out a whole new side of her. 

Cooks Chorus.  She can dance, too!

Violet Beauregarde

"Is this some kind of joke?  We'll be crushed!"

"That looks like gum!"

*side note: Ally hates gum!  She had to do some real acting for this role!

Solo time!

"I'll chew it 'til I'm dead!"

Violet the Blueberry.  So fun!

It was so fun to watch her shine on stage!  Such a "Proud Mommy Moment" for sure!

I have a gazillion pictures and I made her a book for her birthday.  It was such a neat experience.

She tried out for "A Christmas Carol-the musical" a couple weeks ago.  Of course she made it in!  They had more of an "open" audition process and we were able to listen some of the auditions. After watching a few, I leaned over and told her to just go for it all the way.  She did and she blew everyone away!  I'm so glad she has found something that makes her happy!

Our Summer

So the summer of 2012 was not the funnest summer we have ever had.  To make a long story short, owning an extra house that we didn't want, seriously cut into our ability to have fun.  We spent A LOT of time (and money) at the other house fixing it up after it had been trashed.  However, we are making it through it.  Thank heavens we pay our tithing-I know that's the main reason we have been able to make it through this trial.  Anyway, we didn't have funds for a lot of extras this year so it was a summer of staying home.  And the kids did surprisingly well!  I was proud of them.

Kool-Aid Stands-they love them and they learned it's all about location.  Grandma Braegger's house is the best spot it town.  They also got creative with their products.  Homemade sugar cookies, cotton candy and fun-da-middle cupcakes were all hot sellers.  And the Kool-Aid, of course.

We made a trip to Kangaroo Zoo.  Two hours of running, jumping and playing wore them out!

 

Just a cute picture of Holden.  Sunglasses and a "tie" shirt.

Of course there was baseball!  We love our baseball nights!  Logan was on the Orioles again this year.  It's so fun to watch him improve.  His team didn't have a very good season, but he still had a lot of fun playing and learned a lot.

Jensen was on the coach pitch Phillies team again.  He is such a good hitter and is going to be great when he gets to Little League.

 That's about it for pictures.  Pretty lame, I know.  Just ask the kids.  They will tell you it was a BORING summer.  I think they were actually kinda glad to go back to school!

The Fourth!

I'm not sure why, but I haven't been able to upload any pictures to my blog for a couple months.  So now it's working again. Yay!  That means I have a lot of catch up to do.  So now that it's October, how about a post about the Fourth of July?

I love the Fourth of July in our little town. It's seriously the best and it's alway such an enjoyable day. We were in Colorado last year on the fourth so we were extra excited to be at home this year. I think this was the first year that I wasn't on the Tramcor Truck for the parade. The kids were each doing something different in the parade so I decided to just take pictures this year.

Jensen wanted to decorate his bike and ride with the Primary kids.  I didn't realize how hard it is to put the crepe paper in the spokes, and the baloons lasted about five minutes, but he was happy and it looked great!

Logan was invited to ride on the Little League boat float.  They were weilding water guns and they knew how to use them.

Our Young Women also had a boat float, but Ally and her friend Emma decided to ride a tandem bike along side instead.  However, the Young Women also were weilding water guns and I was completely soaked by the end of the parade.  Love those girls!

Josh is NEVER on the Tramcor Truck for the parade.  So it was fun to see him and Bubby in the parade this year.  Holden had so much fun throwing candy at people.

Ally participated in the festivities at the town square.  Here she is fighting with a boy. ;)

She beat him, too.

Logan and Taden tried really hard to climb the greased pole to get some cash, but did not make it to the money.

Holden enjoyed riding the airplane ride this year.  Josh didn't enjoy helping out with the airplane ride though.  It was hot and some of the kids were heavy.

The water slide is always a hit.  Or at least it was until Holden landed in the water at the bottom.  Then he wasn't a fan.

Later in the day, we headed up to the East Park and watched the Little League game and then waited for the candy drop.  I'm not really sure what they were doing in this picture, but they were having fun.

Holden was screaming "It's the candyland (candy man)" when the airplane would fly overhead.  He was so excited!  I was a little nervous he was going to get trampled in the crowd, though.

After that, we hung around at the park waiting for the city fireworks show.  We normally watch the fireworks from my parents or Josh's parents houses, but we were already at the park so we decided to try something new.  It was way fun!

After the fireworks we headed to Josh's parents house to let off our own fireworks.  It was a long day, but so fun!

Here Fishy, Fishy

We had our annual fishing trip to the Uintahs the last week in June. The kids were so excited to go, and we had so much fun.  Holden was so excited to catch a fish, he could hardly contain himself! The Kotters (minus Gwen and Blake) were able to join us for the afternoon.  It wouldn't be the same without them!

As the parents, we spend 90% of the time fixing poles, bating hooks, untangling lines or casting poles, but it's worth it to see their excitement about catching a fish!

Ally and Katelyn.  Ally sure tried to catch a fish, but the fishing was kinda slow this year.  She got skunked.  Katelyn ended up with the biggest catch of the day, though!

Jensen caught the first fish!

Holden was SO happy to finally see a fish. He kept carrying it around and talking to it. And he called them "trouts" not fish-so cute. He didn't end up catching one, but he didn't care as long as he got to carry them around for a while.

Dad, Holden and Fish.  Does it get any cuter than this? I think not.

Okay.  Maybe this is cuter.  He was wrapping them up in a towel like a blanket and carrying them around.  So stinkin' funny! He was a little miffed when we gave the fish to the neighbors when we got home.  I think he would have been upset if we would have eaten them ourselves, though!

Logan pretending to fish on a stump.  I don't get it either...but we love him anyway. ;)

Josh and I didn't end up catching anything, but it was still an awesome afternoon.

We love fishing in the Uintahs!

60 Years!!

June 14, 2012 was my parent's 60th wedding anniversary!  Can you imagine being married for 60 years?  That is quite an accomplishment-especially in this day and age! It's inspiring.

The happy couple.  My Mom does not like a lot of fuss and hates crowds, but we did talk her into having a luncheon at Maddox Lodge.  We also got them to have a portrait taken. My Mom hates pictures, but I told her it would only happen every 10 years, so she said okay.  The last one we had was at their 50th anniversary.  I can't wait to see how the picture turns out.

Most of the family was able to make it and my kids had fun playing with their cousins and second cousins.  Here are Jensen and Holden with their oldest cousin Jason.  Jason always has fun with the kids and they love to see him.

My goofy boys.

Ally and Grandpa.  I'm so glad my kids get to really "know" their grandparents.  My Dad has had SO many close calls and it is such a blessing to have him in our lives.  Mom, too!  My kids help keep them active and healthy! 

After lunch, we all headed back to our house for an afternoon and evening of the "Naylor Nuthouse".  Some crazy things were happening and I can't wait to get pictures from my sister.  I foresee another blog post about it in the future!

Little Pagoda

Ally had her ballet recital last week and she did a great job!  Her studio has an actual ballet instead of just a recital and this year it was called "Little Pagoda".  It obviously had an oriental theme.

Ally and her friend Breonna were "White Egrets".  They were the only white egrets in the production.  Their costumes were very pretty, but SO big!  They couldn't wear them anywhere but on stage.

Ally got her pointe shoes in January and Breonna got hers in May.  This was their debut pointe performances and they did awesome!

Look at her strait legs!

My pretty White Egret.

Ally and Breonna.  BFFs.

******Ally found out that she got a part in Willy Wonka this week, too.  She is playing the part of "Matilda".  Matilda is Charlie's schoolmate and she has a few lines and a solo!  Out of 38 kids in the cast, she got one of the few speaking parts.  She will also be in the "Cooks Chorus".  It will be so fun for her and she is excited!*****

******Okay. Another update.  Ally found out this afternoon that she will be the understudy for Violet Beaureguarde!!  She gets to perform Violet at both matinees and one other performance!  We couldn't be more excited!!*****