The kids' school held a fun run on their last day of being on-track. It was so much fun to watch and to visit with other moms between races.

Bryce's class went first. That's him in the middle in the green plaid shorts. He was so excited.

Bryce at the end of the race. Exhausted and ready for the refreshments provided by the PTA.

Dane had a great time running with his friends. (However, I've tried to avoid including images of other kids here)

I nearly missed Ella's run because the switched the order of the classes. Just as I got there, she took a tumble, but I was so proud of her because she just got right back up and kept going!

My baby turned five this week.

He was very excited to see we had a stack of presents all prepared for him.

Cameron said it was time for him to have his own big set of Legos to put together by himself,

without help,

especially from his brother.

The morning's most adorable reaction was about getting his first Book of Mormon (no, the kid can't even read yet, but he asked his dad for one and Dad delivered). He squealed about it and is excited to have a case for it.

This was the favorite gift of the day. He sang a ballad all about the "king of the Angry Birds" all the way to school and he just wanted to please just carry it in my backpack.

Mom said no, but it was waiting in the van for the birthday boy to be done with school.

Before his siblings came home, Bryce built his ship with very restrained help from me. He did 90% of the work himself and he was pretty thrilled about it. His favorite things, though, are still the guys that come with the sets.

I hope these pictures speak for themselves. Here is the old.

Our old kitchen was a pocket that you could fall into. Now it is a portal, keeping the flow of our lives moving on.
Pictured here: our basement kitchen that kept us afloat during the remodel.

 

The demolition begins

Oh look! A blank slate!

 

 The cabinet installation begins...



I love kindergarten homework. Bryce's teacher really thinks outside the box and we have had a lot of fun with it.

Also, it's nice to have something to do with him when he gets home and the time to do it in. I'm so pleased he likes Kindergarten.

So, this happened rather quickly...

Ella mentioned to me one night that her eyes saw things really blurry. I figured it was because she was trying to read by the light of the sun...at 9 PM.

I admit I also dismissed it a bit because of my recently acquiring glasses myself, thinking she might actually want to be like Mommy.

I told her to look at the board at school tomorrow and see if it was blurry and we'd talk about it then and please go back to bed now.

When she got into the car after school the next day, she told me immediately that the board was blurry. Okay. So, I made an appointment for her.

That was Monday.

The more I watched her during the exam, the more it confirmed that she was probably going to be getting glasses. No one wants their child to get glasses, but I hoped she'd be okay with it, especially because she'd already expressed a desire not to have them.

Well, the doctor sent us out to pick out frames while waiting for her eyes to dilate with a second round of drops and the fun really began for her. She became really enthusiastic about choosing her glasses, which was a comfort to me.

She was especially happy when we got the call yesterday to pick them up (earlier than expected) and to see they came with such an adorable case.

Now we're reminding each other to wear our glasses. :)

The power supply on this computer is failing again. I started it up this morning, hoping to get prepared for Sunday early, just in case.
We've had the rottenest luck with this computer. Dang!
Anyway, consider this a forewarning of my possible online disappearance.

Bryce was so excited to start school for the first time!

 I can't believe how big he looks.

Ella gets to line up pretty close by him before walking into the school so she watches out for him.

Off goes my little Phineas, off for his big first day!

Backing up a bit, here is Ella and her best friend. Such a cute photo. They're in different classes this year, but still get to play together a lot.

On another school note, we had some water damage from all that wonderful rain and I thought it best to wait on school for one more semester. I'm disappointed, but sometimes money has a better place to go. So, I know I have plenty to keep me busy and I'll look forward to Spring 2012. :)

At the mere suggestion that he might want to go play in the torrential downpour, Bryce was a go!

"Mom, when I'm done, I'm going to need a nice warm bath, cuz it's COLD!"

He played out there for about fifteen minutes and had a great time squealing and seeing how long he could stand under the heaviest drips. He was so sad that the rain had dried up and the sun was out by the time he got out of the bath.