School Starts

Brian started Second Grade on August 19th and is in the full swing of Second Grade madness already.  I am shocked at the amount of homework he has this year.  It is too much in my opinion, but what do I know?  Despite the extra work load he is doing well in school and his favorite time at school, if you're not counting recess, is math and Chinese.  His Chinese is coming along and he likes opportunities to use it.

Timmy had to wait for a week after Brian started to start Kindergarten.  He could not wait!  He was so excited to start at the same school as Brian.  He only goes half a day and he loves it all.  He's great at making friends except he cannot remember their names.  He can describe everything about them down to the color of their clothes and what they did and said that day, but he just cannot remember their names.  He is doing great and wants to follow all the rules and listen to his teacher.

Bear Lake

The weekend before school started we got an offer from Mark's coworker to stay in his cabin up at Bear Lake.  We decided to squish one more adventure in to our ending Summer.  I had to sing in church and teach on Sunday, so we went up on Friday night, spent Saturday at the Lake and stopped in Logan to visit Mark's brother and his family on our way home Saturday evening.

This is from the cabin on Saturday morning.  Bear Lake is so beautiful.

The boys and the coworker's grandson were so ready to get out to the lake.  So we headed down to the beach to play for awhile before they put the boat on the water.

It was a fantastic morning without too many people on the lake.  It was the closest I was going to get to a real beach here in Utah and it certainly did not disappoint, until later when the crowds showed up.  I'm glad we went early and enjoyed the crowd free time there.

We played in the sand and water and on the little boat and caught a frog.

Then the big boat showed up and our friends offered us a ride out on the water.

Their boat is super nice and quite large.  It went really fast and we had a blast out there on that gorgeous blue water.

After some time on the water we went back to our place on the beach.  Only we really didn't have a place anymore.  Our stuff was left on and in front of a picnic table and I was shocked that there were just a bunch of guys eating lunch on our table with all our stuff and lounging on the sand where we had put our things. Within an hour people had smashed themselves in there like sardines.  We ate lunch and the kids found more sea shells and then I just couldn't take the crowds of people any longer and we got out of there.

We drove around the lake a bit and checked things out.  We went over to the marina where the boys loved feeding the fish there pieces of bread we had from the car.

Mark drove his friends truck and trailer down to help get that gigantic boat out of the water while we watched.  It was so nice of them to let us stay in their cabin and ride on their boat!  It was a fast and fun little trip!

After some delicious Bear Lake shakes, we said goodbye to the lake and what felt like goodbye to summer knowing it was our last outing before school started.

The kids conked out for the drive to Logan where we stopped to see Mark's brother's family and their new house. Then Mark's brother's family took us to Chuck-a-Rama where we ate ourselves silly.  What a great day and a half!  And yes, we were sunburned and tired, but it was totally worth it!

August

I'm getting behind!  Life is moving full throttle forward and I want to document the happenings around here.

August was full of work and fun. I wanted to squeeze in as many projects and outings as I could before school started.

One of the first Saturdays we went up to Smith and Morehouse with some friends.  We went to play in the lake, but it was a bit too cold for that, so we hiked and played by the river and then went to the Ranch.

We found so many yummy wild raspberries by the river!

 At home Mark taught the boys how to use their heads in soccer while the goats ate the weeds at the park.

We did lots of reading.

And playing in the sand!  The boys made a volcano with the water hose and some big fortress thing.

Brian got glasses in August and I got new glasses.  He's been great about wearing his. I have not.

One week in August Brian did a chemistry summer camp for a few hours each morning.  He absolutely loved it and came home and taught us all he learned.

Timmy randomly gave himself a nap a few times.  We wore him out trying to pack everything in.

I got a new car!  This is not the greatest picture, but the car is awesome!  It's a Highlander Hybrid.  I couldn't be happier.

We also did lots of work.  This is a random picture at the dump getting rid of the concrete, carpet, etc. that came form the mud room remodel.  Boy did it stink at the dump.

Mark patched up the concrete stairs in the mudroom/office and I cleaned, polished, sanded, stained, sealed the floors, and painted the trim, walls and doors.  

We went to the splash park one day.  The ice cream truck came while we were there and for the first time ever I allowed the boys to choose some overpriced ice cream from the ice cream truck.  They thought it was the coolest thing in the world.

One night for Family Home Evening Mark taught the boys how to use the metal detector and we went treasure hunting in our field.  Brian and Timmy thought it was so fun and really wanted to keep all the old rusty nails and pieces of metal they found as if they were pieces of gold.

We got one last day at the Ranch before school started!  I'm so glad the Scotts and Mandy and her kids could be there with us.  Oh how we are missing days at the Ranch.  It sure is hard to find time to get up there with school now.

We also went to Bear Lake in August and Brian started school, but I'll give those their own posts.  It was really hard for me to say goodbye to summer this year.  I wasn't quite ready to give up the freedom summer brings, but I do feel like we got to do almost everything I was hoping to do this summer. We lived it to its fullest!