1st Day of School

 Isak started Kindergarten today. He scootered to his class and I dropped him off. I made his little lunch in his dinosaur lunch box. I may have cried multiple times. I came home and stared at Lucy and thought, "what the heck am I suppose to do with 2 little girls all day?". Lucy is quite happy to do her own thing and much more laid back then Isak ever was. She just wants to read books and have dance/singing parties all day. And both kids still nap. So I got a nap today too! It was almost magical. But I did miss my Isak. All day is a long time to be gone when you're only five! He had a great first day and informed me that most of the kids in his class spoke English so he was able to make friends with all of them. But he did seem a little tired and cranky tonight. It will take some adjusting and lots of early bedtimes.

 Edyn turned 7 months last week. I don't know how she got so big.  She is getting such a cute little personality and I LOVE how she will just start laughing at random things she finds funny. Like Lucy eating Styrofoam. She really likes listening to music and loves to be outside and still thinks Isak and Lucy are the funniest people ever. She is very grabby and is always grabbing our faces/hair/arms and loves to feed herself crackers. She is still kind of cantankerous and really prefers me to anyone which while flattering, is kind of frustrating since she also will not take a bottle. She knows what food is and is starting to want what we are eating and totally knows what watermelon and popsicles are.

She hasn't been too interested in crawling yet which is completely fine with me and is getting close to sitting up by herself. I love this sweet girl! Now if I could just slow down time a little....

Isak really wanted his picture taken with her as well. She was hard to catch as she can sit up for about 5 seconds without toppling over. Isak starts Kindergarten next Monday and lets just say I am not dealing with it very well. Someone at church was asking me about it yesterday and how I was feeling and I got all choked up just talking about him being gone all day. I know he's my first one and come 5 years I will probably be counting the days till school starts. But he's my baby and once they start school and are gone all day I feel like they will never really be all yours again. He's my little buddy and talks my ear off all day. Who is going to try to tell me how much protein the fruit snacks have in them? Or why its good that we all live in one solar system? And who is Lucy going to torment all day? She's so crazy! What are we going to do just the two of us and Edyn all day? I have a feeling its going to involve a lot of singing, dancing, and trampoline jumping. We met Isak's teacher tonight and she seems nice. I'm just so nervous for him....this stupid scary world better be nice to my little boy!

Seattle

 We went to Seattle a few weekends ago with my parents. We have been wanting to take our kids to the zoo, especially Lucy, and Woodland Park Zoo is the closest. We also stopped by Monroe, WA and saw the Reptile Man which my kids also loved. We stayed in a very lovely hotel that had an indoor pool and my kids were in seventh heaven. The zoo had animals in very large habitat areas and not in cages per say so they were a little harder to spot. We got to see almost every animal thought for the most part.

 It was a BIG zoo and took us about 3 hours to get through it all and we even skipped some exhibits.

                                          There was a carousel that Isak and Lucy rode twice.

Kevin and I also celebrated our 7th wedding anniversary that day...3 kids, who would've thought?

Isak and Lucy were willing to pose as snow leopards for me.

This asian sloth bear came our right as we walked by. He had giant hairy ears. 

 In the aviary you can feed birds with seed on popsicle sticks for $1 each. Well by about noon, these birds are quite full and not so interested in the seed. Isak and Lucy were able to see this one up pretty close. I love the look on Lucy's face here.

 Oh and the reptile man. We've seen him a couple times, once at a school and then at the library so my kids were pretty excited to visit his actual "zoo" where all his animals live. These turtles were um, giving us some great national geographic moments while we were there. We ushered Isak and Lucy along but it was pretty funny.

 Isak loved the 2 headed turtle and got to hold a snake while we were there. Lucy also tried to hold the snake but got scared once it started to move. These kids are much braver then me!

 There was an outside tortoise garden where they just walk around and sun bathe. Isak was pretty cute, "uh hello, tortoise, my name is Isak. I'm five". He really liked them.

 So Lucy really liked the tortoises too right up until the end. This large one above started to walk towards here rather quickly and it spooked her. Kevin picked her up and the thing kept tracking her, it was pretty weird and it kept following her. Scared poor Lucy and she started crying. So that was the end of Reptile Man.

 

 It was a fun little vacation and so great of my parents to take us with them. I also got to stop by IKEA in Seattle and pick up some things for our house which was completely crazy on a Saturday afternoon with 3 kids. But I got some great stuff to organize our mess of a house right now so hopefully with the completion of our kitchen our lives will start to get back to normal.

Growing Kids!

 Isak went in for his 5 year check up a few weeks ago. Since I am awesome, it was a few months late. He is 45lbs and 44.5 inches tall, 88th percentile for height and 64th percentile for weight. He was worried he was going to have get shots but just had to have finger prick.

Edyn pie went in for her 6 month check up last week as well. She is 17.2 lbs (68th percentile) and 27.25 inches tall (78th percentile). She is doing everything she is supposed too and loves her baby food and watermelon. She is very grabby and loves to pick things up and play with them. She is super social and loves to smile at everyone but absolutely prefers me or Kevin to anyone else. She baby talks all the time and laughs a lot. She is starting to get her top teeth so I will try and gear myself up for that. She already has her bottoms and so far is teething at about the same times that Lucy did. Her hair is getting longer and it tufts straight out above her ears. Oh and she still refuses a bottle which has made me working very "fun". Little stinker. We just moved her to her crib a few weeks ago and she sleeps better now she has some room to stretch out, I'm hoping she will stop waking up 2-3 times a night very soon.  And that Lucy starts sleeping through the night in her room as well.....

Summer Experiments

Isak and I have been doing science experiments during Lucy's naptime everyday this summer. I found some blog where a girl made a book of them and I printed them out. Isak really loves them and everyday asks what our next experiment is going to be. Above we mixed yeast with vinegar and baking soda, a very cool explosion.

 On this one we mixed yeast, sugar and vinegar together and the carbon dioxide released blows up the balloon.

 We made grass heads last week for home evening and talked about having faith and a testimony. We sprinkled grass seed in the bottom of some old nylons, filled them with dirt and tied them off. Then we tied them off and added some eyes, nose and mouth and watered them. Hopefully they start sprouting soon, my kids are very anxious to cut their "hair"!

 We filled balloons with water and froze them a few days. Isak was so excited, he kept checking on them and letting me know how frozen they were. We poured salt on them and then I let the kids dump food coloring all over them.

 It made the coolest designs all over the ice, they used A LOT of salt and food coloring and it took a while to clean them up. My hands were pretty discolored for a while as well. I can't believe this summer is coming to an end and my Isak is going to be in school all day. It makes me excited for him but a little sad for me, I'm sure going to miss our time together. He's been working in his little kindergarten workbook everyday and he's so ready to start and so excited. We're going school supply/clothes shopping this week and Lucy is pretty insistent she needs school supplies as well.  She's going to have quite the adjustment being home with me all day without Isak. We will have to find some cool stuff to do...

Giant Bubble

I made a giant bubble out of plastic tarps for the kids a few weeks ago. I found the idea on pinterest and decided to give it a go. I duct taped the tarps together and left an opening for the fan and for the kids to climb in.

 I let them blow bubbles inside and it got pretty slippery. It was also pretty hot in there and as I discovered, it acted like a giant magnify glass on our lawn and burnt a pretty good chunk of grass.

 But the kids thought it was so awesome! The key this was to use heavy plastic sheeting, the thin cheapy tarps won't work. I just used a regular box fan to blow it open and it worked really well.

Mud Bowl 2012!

Every year the youth in our ward play mud football in someone's giant dirt field. For the past few years it has been out at Kevin's parents' house near their farm. My kids have gotten to participate every year as Kevin or I have always had a calling with the young men or young women. And they absolutely love it.

This year, Lucy was much was hesitant about getting muddy which I found odd. She wanted to watch from a far and at the end, waded in a little bit with Kevin. She was by far the cleanest one at the end of it all.

Kevin and Isak did not fair as well, they got pretty darn dirty. We rinsed off in Kevin's parent's sprinklers and their ditch. My kids took baths when they got home and I washed their hair about 5 times each. Our bathroom and car needed a really good cleaning when all was said and done. I love the mud football every year. Such great memories.