First Day of School

After months of waiting, Ethan's first day of school finally arrived. He was very excited to go to preschool and he loves already loves his teacher, Miss Holly. Before he met her, he told us that he was going to be "shy with her." After meeting Miss Holly at the orientation, he warmed right up and told us "I'm not going to shy with her." The excitment of going to school lasted a whole day. He still has fun, but he's already complaining about how long it takes before Mom picks him up (a whole 3 hours).

Brooklyn was almost as excited as Ethan about going to school. It was hard to keep her out of the pictures.

Brooklyn has been very sad when she discovered that she wasn't invited to go into to school with Ethan. She's gotten sad when eery day Ethan gets dropped off. While Ethan was at school, Brooklyn wanted to have some "Mommy time" and watch a movie. They watched Sleeping Beauty. Jen explained what was happening throughout the movie to help Brooklyn comprehend. When Aurora pricked her finger on the spinning wheel, Brooklyn got very concerned that the princess had an owie. But finally the princess woke up when the prince kissed her owie better. Now Brooklyn loves to watch what she calls "the Owie Movie" with Mom whenever she gets the chance.

Our garden is really starting to produce lately. It makes us happy.

We're starting to get a lot of unusual cucumbers as well. It's like they're trying to send us some kind of cosmic message about the answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe, and everything (Kyle couldn't resist the Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy reference).
Or maybe they're just trying to communicate something more simple.
Ethan has been going through a phase where he's been telling us that he wants to marry Brooklyn or Mom when he grows up. Yesterday, he informed us that when he grows up he wants to marry Dad. We made sure to explain how that idea was wrong on so many levels.

Catching up

We've had a busy few weeks.

Jen made this dress for Brooklyn this week.
She and Ethan had fun posing for the camera.

Kyle's Grandma Morrey passed away on July 29, so we traveled to Richland, Washington for the funeral last weekend. Jen's parents were kind enough to watch the kids for the weekend, which made the 1400 mile drive much more bearable.

The funeral was really nice (as far as funerals go). It was good to see so much family and remember all the things that Grandma has done. She'll be missed.

On the way home, we stopped for a potty break in the Middle of Nowhere, Idaho. A few weeks back, we took a trip to the family cabin in Island Park, Idaho. Kyle's dad brought his horses, and took Kyle into Yellowstone Park to ride among the bison. It was quite an experience to see all of the wildlife close up. One of the kids favorite activities at the cabin was making S'mores.
Chasing chipmunks, a favorite pastime at the cabin, has been passed on to the next generation.

We took the kids for a rafting trip on the Snake River.

While eating breakfast this morning, Ethan mused, "When I grow up I want my house to be next to Smith's because I like Lucky Charms."

Wild Wild West

We just got back from a trip to the family cabin in Island Park, Idaho. While there, we had to stop in West Yellowstone for our traditional family photo. You may notice how much more classy we've become over the years. The kids were very excited about holding guns.
Here's our photo from 2007, when Ethan was only a few months old.

And here's the one from 2006. This picture sat on the desk of the photo studio for many years as an example of how a girl can dress as a modest "saloon girl." It now hangs on the wall above the desk.

We have many more adventures (with pictures) to share soon. Stay tuned.

Ethan's antics

Here are a few quick stories about our silly little boy:

Ethan has had a phobia of fruit for the last few months. Anytime he sees a strawberry, he screams and backs away. When someone is eating a banana, he always complains about the smell.
This afternoon we were eating some plums and when Ethan noticed what we were doing, he ran downstairs to get his pliers. When he came back upstairs, he was plugging his nose so he didn't have to smell the offending fruit.

Ethan and Brooklyn were having a bath earlier this week. We stepped away for a minute, and when we came back one of them dumped a bunch of shampoo into the water and all over both kids' hair. The water was so soapy, we had to give them a quick shower to get all of the soap off. Brooklyn did fine with the shower, but Ethan was traumatized. After he was all cleaned up and dried off, he wanted to draw a picture of the shower. This is what he drew:

You can see the water falling down, and the circle with a cross through it (similar to a "no smoking" sign). At the bottom, he wrote, "No Showers!" (or at least that's what he says he wrote.)

Weekend of the Fourth

This weekend we went to Logan for Fourth of July festivities. As soon as we got out of the van at Grandma Morrey's house, Brooklyn saw the neighbor's cat and had to go shower it with love.

We celebrated Kyle's Grandma Smith's birthday with sparklers. Ethan didn't dare hold one.

We got Brooklyn to hold one for a few seconds.

The family went to Romney Stadium to watch the fireworks. Ethan didn't dare come, but Brooklyn was excited to go. She had a lot of fun running around before the show. When the fireworks started, she sat in Grandma Morrey's lap and hardly moved a muscle. When asked if the fireworks were scary, she replied, "I 'tared." When asked if she like the fireworks, she gave an enthusiastic "Yes!"

She made it most of the way through the fireworks, but couldn't last through the entire show.

The next day, Grandpa Morrey took Jen, Brooklyn, and Grandma Taylor to ride horses. Brooklyn had lots of fun playing on the bleachers while the horses were getting ready to go.

Grandpa Morrey got them ready.

And Brooklyn wandered off into a nearby, picking "pretty flowers" (the giant dandelion-type weeds).

The next day, we took the kids to the Cache Valley Cruise-in. Ethan and Brooklyn both had fun seeing some real-life cars from one of their favorite movies, Cars (of course).

This picture shows their utter excitement, doesn't it?

There were some other fun cars too.

Last weekend, we took the kids to see Cars 2. They were really excited to see it in 3D. We figured the kids would do well since they've each been to a few movies before. When we walked in to the theater, Ethan flipped out about the room being so dark. He cried that he wanted to go home. He burried his face into Kyle's chest until he recognized Woody's and Buzz's voices from the Toy Story short before the featured presentation. He peaked at the screen and cheered up a bit until the Toy Story credits showed up, at which point his face went right back into Kyle's chest where it stayed until the Cars movie started. Again he heard voices he recoginzed and peaked at the screen. After about 10 minutes into the show, Kyle finally convinced him to sit forward and put on his 3D glasses. Kyle never could convince him to sit in his own seat. Brooklyn took a hint from Ethan and insisted Jen hold her. So we had to hold both kids through the entire film. Ethan did fine until the last five minutes. He must have sensed the credits were coming, and he started hystarically screaming. His head went right back into Kyle's chest for the remainder of the show.

We thanked our lucky stars that there were only a handful of people in the theater, although it did give Brooklyn the excuse to run up and down the aisle for the last fifteen minutes of the movie.

After we left the theater and Ethan finally stopped crying, we asked him what he thought of the movie. To our surprise, he firmly declared that he loved the movie! He loved that it had three races, whereas the original Cars only had two. We liked it too, despite the mediocre reviews it has been getting. It's about half an hour too long, and the plot is way too complex for our kids.

Happy Father's Day!

Happy Father's day to all the great daddies out there, especially the three dads who have been the greatest blessing in my life, my dad, Kyle's dad and Kyle himself. I've learned so much from all of them and am so grateful for the relationships we have and that they have with my kids. I have to say, though, that I think I married the sweetest daddy on the planet. From the time Ethan was born he has always been such a naturally tender father. He loves to spend time with the kids as much as he can and finds so much joy in watching them learn and grow. I admire all the sacrifices he makes for us and all he does to provide for us. I can't find the words to express the deep love that I have for him and for the loving family he has helped establish.

This week we finished up swimming lessons. It was a really good experience for Ethan. Although he still has a long way to go to get over some fears, I'm grateful we made the decision to start them this year. He really had a great time and looks forward to going swimming as a family throughout the summer.

Meg, one of Ethan's friends, had a birthday party this last week. Ethan was the only boy invited, and Meg was adamant that he come. He picked out a Little Mermaid toy for her and was excited to give it to her. Her family rented a bounce house for the party and Ethan loved it.

Ethan has already been planning his Halloween costume. He keeps flip-flopping between

Tangled characters (Him as Flynn Rider, Brooklyn as Rapunzel, and Dad as the horse, Maximus), Cars characters, PBS cartoon character Word Girl (which we are aren't going to support outside of our home), and a few others. Well, this week at a yard sale, we found these awesome Cars costumes. Both kids have been racing all over the house in them. This morning, Ethan "pulled" Mom out of bed using Mater's tow cable.

Today for our Father's Day dessert we had chocolate fondue with coconut covered marshmallows, strawberries, bananas, and pretzels. It was enjoyed by all but possibly ruined a t-shirt or two. Ooops!

Now that the warm weather is finally here, our peas decided to produce. Two days ago, Brooklyn spent at least 20 minutes picking them clean. Today, enough had replaced them that we were able to have fresh peas with our lunch. Yummy.

Swimming Lessons

Ethan started swimming lessons this week. He was very timid for most of the week, but by Friday he was "swimming" all by himself. When he finally let go of the teacher and floated by himself on Friday, the teacher quietly declared it a miracle.
He also got to the point where he would jump into the teacher's arms instead of cautiously sliding down the side of the pool.

He's getting more comfortable with each lesson. Here's a picture of the first time he "jumped" off the diving board. He's a little more comfortable now, but has a long way to go.

After swimming lessons the kids love to go feed the ducks near the pool.

These ducks are very friendly, and Ethan even got on of them to eat right out of his hand.

Houseparty.com is a website that gives free products from sponsoring companies as a method of marketing. They sent us a bunch of washable dry erase markers and marker boards to give away. We had a bunch of kids over on Saturday, and they all seemed to have a good time.

One of the activities we did was inspired by the kid's show Blues Clues. We hid little blue footprints around the yard, and the kids had to find them and draw a picture of the different clues.

Brooklyn likes to eat with her toes. It's funny to watch.