Meet Mrs. Anderson

On Thursday, we got to find out who Max's Kindergarten teacher would be, meet her and explore his new classroom for an hour.  

Meet Mrs. Anderson!

 She was darling and the classroom was filled of fun things to read and look at.  Max was so excited to be there!  He can hardly wait for tuesday!

Here's Our Babe!

So, my uterus was measuring a little 'large' {did you want to know about my uterus?} so the Dr had me have an ultrasound this week to make sure we had the correct due date.  

So, fun, I've never had an ultrasound that early!  Our Ultrasound Tech was so cute, it was a really fun appointment, but the best part was the little pics of our little gummy bear.

it's got arms, fingers, legs and toes...and isn't quite an inch long.  

{why am I already chubby if it's only an inch long?!?  whatever dude}

More of Max Reading

Kindergarten is fast approaching, and our goal was to finish his reading book before it started!  We have 7 days left and 6 lessons left, and I wanted to for sure record max reading before we finished the book!  He's doing so awesome, I'm constantly impressed with how smart he is an how hard he works.  It's been so fun to teach him to read, and watch him build confidence in himself!  I love to hear him reading books in his room to Ivy.

Another fun thing we found was a little game Max got for his birthday.  It's called Pop for Sight Words (we got ours at Amazon).  It's a little pop corn container filled with 100 sight words.  You take turns pulling out the popped kernels.  If you can read the word correctly, you get to keep the kernel...if you don't you set it aside.  If you pull a POP kernel, you have to put all of your words away.  It's a fun way to practice sight words.  Jeff didn't even mind playing! (probably because he won)

set, hike

I remembered to take my camera to practice this week!

Here's Max at Flag Football practice, with his flags in place and his mouthguard half-in.

he loves it!

'set, hike'

Flag Football begins!

I haven't posted out trip to the Great Northwest yet, I'm still waiting for some pics from my sister (hint hint)  BUT, I thought I'd post a little video from Jeff's phone of Max's first flag football practice last week.  

He really likes it...  and we're excited to watch him!

here we come, Friday Night Lights!

My favorite 5 year old!

Today, Max is turning into a 5 year old!

he's getting so big and old, I can hardly believe it!

He's a swimming long distances with no help, bike-riding with no training wheels, bug-lovin', Book-readin' hamburger-hating (he doesn't say that, but the word is appropriate for the alliteration...he just 'doesn't prefer it') Ivy-teasing, sweeeet Kindergartner-to-be.  

Max loves life.  He makes everything he does fun.  He has a catching little smile that is ALWAYS around.  He's so curious which i love because he just soaks up information like a sponge.  He's constantly interested in learning new things about dinosaurs, sharks and anything in the ocean, construction...anything that anyone will tell him about.He loves to play with his sister, and is such an amazing helper.  When I ask him to help me clean up something, or make his bed, he hops right up and says: "sure, mom"  i love it!

He loves to read, and I love that while we're driving in the car, I can hear him sounding out either the books that he's sitting next to, or the signs on the side of the road. 

Max loves babies!  Anytime one of my friends comes around with a baby, he is so gentle and cute with them and loves to play with them, and make sure they have some toys to play with.  He's also a friend to everyone...he calls people buddy as soon as he meets them, can make a friend in 2 seconds and tries to get them involved in some fun adventure.  

I'm so grateful to have Max in our family. We are so blessed to have him! He's my very favorite 5 year old!

Happy Birthday, Maxer!

June Bugs in August

Look what we caught today!

a June Bug!

 These things are freaking awesome...if they're in a jar.
I screamed one time trying to get it because it flew away from me and landed on the back of my neck.  holy crud!

Why they're totally scary when they land on the back of your neck with no one around to help you.  Max, where were you? :

-they are huuuuuuge

-they make a wicked buzzing noise when they're flying
Why they're totally cool:
-they are huuuuuuge
-they make a wicked buzzing noise when they're flying
-they are green, and irredescent, and all sorts of other fun colors
-they have wings hiding under their amazing technicolor dream-coat
-they totally can't hurt you, even though they're huge

Metamorphosis

Max has an obsession with bugs...every little boy does, I'm sure.  But there is a line of toys that he's hooked on that he wants everything of...and Grandma even made him a bug-hunter vest (you can see all of his gear here)

Anyways, one day, I was at TJ Maxx and I ran across one of those coveted toys for cheap.  It was a butterfly net, and we have a ton of them in our backyard, so I thought he would have a fun time trying to catch them and stick them in this net.  

When I got it home and opened it up...there was a coupon inside to send away for some Painted Lady Caterpillars that would turn into butterflies while we watched...

some friends of mind have also done this, so I thought we'd give it a try.  Fun!

it was magic!

it only took about a week to get our little vial of caterpillars.  I didn't take a picture of them right when we got them, because they weren't moving, and I was afraid they were dead!  but they were tiny.  This was after a day or so.  They finally came out of hibernation mode, and started walking around inside the vial (there were 5).  They ate and ate, and got to be huge, compared to what they were before!

 Slowly but surely, they migrated their way up to the top of the vial...

 I swear, they dropped off their own heads....but that's not scientific fact...and after their heads were off...or their tails, one of the two, they curled the end of their body up just a little, and magically when we were running errands, the chrysalises formed. 

4 of the chrysallises hung from the top of the vial, and one was down in the bottom...I don't know if it fell, or if that's just where life happened.  

On Monday morning, I painstakingly took the lid off of the vial and attached it to the lid of the butterfly cage with some thread.  eek!

This morning, we woke up to 3 butterflies...and 1 more this afternoon!  Don't worry, the one of the bottom of the vial was one of the first to emerge!

I was nervous about how long to keep the butterflies in the cage because I knew they needed to get food, so we released the first 4 today...and we're waiting for the last one to "hatch" and we'll let him go, probably tomorrow.

 The underside of their wings is not very pretty, but the top looks like a monarch...it was so fun and magical to watch!

Ivy gets her turn to hold one tomorrow (hopefully)!

Training Wheels

We finally convinced Max to take those suckers off!

The mere mention of the phrase 'time to take off your training wheels' would lead Max to tears.  We gave him a little slack because he DID break his arm falling off of his bike, but really...he could do it!

So, yesterday, we went on a bike ride as a family.

When we got home, Jeff broke out the tool box, and we anticipated a long evening of running up and down the driveway, bent-over to hold the back of a teeny little seat.  

Well, we tag-teamed it to cut down on back pain, but...

he only needed about 20 minutes.  

what a rock star!

 he feels like he's king of the world, and is hell-bent on teaching our neighbor Salma how to do it, too.

here's our boy in action:

say NO! to auto

Today was a long-awaited day!

I signed up weeks and weeks ago for a photography class to teach me how to get out of using 'auto' mode on my camera.  I've had my camera for going on three years...Jeff got it for me for Christmas a few years ago from his Brother...and I've loved the quality of pictures I've been able to take just using 'auto' mode...but I knew that I had waaaay more potential.  I didn't know how to learn how to use it...I didn't have a manual, and I just put off printing one off of the internet because...really...would I read it?  I'm a show-me-how-to-do-it kind of girl.

So, that's what this was

the Say No! to Auto workshop with Kristen Duke.  She happened to have a workshop HERE, and Jeff was able to watch the kids so my friend Jen and I could go!

...and I'm dying.

So, prepare for some better pictures coming from me...I'm practicing like crazy already, and loving it!  and loving that I even know how to change some settings on my camera and have them not turn out BLUE...like they were every time I attempted 'manual' mode.  

So, without any photo-enhancing...here is what I did right when I came home today!

max in auto mode:

max in manual mode:

 Ivy in auto mode:

 Ivy in manual mode:

 I didn't edit at all!

are you impressed?!?

hee hee

I am!

Tyler, Kayla and Grandma come to visit!

We love to have visitors!  Lucky us, we live in a spot that everyone else wants to come vacation, so we do get more visitors than we would anywhere else!  So, while Kayla and Tyler got to come visit Grandma in Arizona for a week, Grandma decided to drive them over here on their way home for a couple of days.  (slight detour on their way back to Utah, but a good detour!)

It's so fun to stop our normal lives for a minute, and do the simply fun things that our area has to offer...namely: beach, beach, beach!

They got here Wednesday afternoon.  We played at the beach for a few hours and then came back later for a bonfire on the beach with s'mores.

I've said before that we're so lucky to have older cousins for our kids to play with!  They are so darling with our kids, reading to them, taking them on shell hunts...whatever they want.  i LOVE our big-kid cousins.  Max really looks up to Tyler, and pretty much thinks he's the best thing ever!  I'm sure Ivy thought the same of Kayla...she was her little shadow!

 We thought the kids would enjoy having a little camp-out on our bedroom floor, while the big kids got their beds...I'm sure they enjoyed it...Jeff and I DID NOT!  I never want to sleep in the same room as Max again! oh my!

 They loved Grandma reading them stories...as usual!

 Collecting seashells on Thursday morning.

 While we were shell hunting, we saw a couple fishermen catch a shove-lnose shark...

 and a sand shark...Jeff (our token shark expert) doesn't think it's a sand shark...he has the name...but I don't know what it is

 After donuts at Adams Ave Donuts, we went on a bike ride...Max was an excellent photographer in the trailer

 We rode down to the pier and had lunch...and watched the crazy surfers through the binocs (we never do that!)

 Max and Ty

 Me and Kayla

 Ivy and Daddy

 We even saw a swimmer be saved by a lifeguard...it was scary to watch, but it all worked out in the end!  Thank goodness for those lifeguards! (glad it's not me!)

 We had dinner at Ruby's on the pier...and Ivy was a happy camper the whole time because she got to cut her own fries with a knife...really?  Is that all it takes?

 That's my boyfriend...

 ...and then we did more beaching Thursday afternoon.

We were sad it was such a quick trip, but we loved having you guys here!!!