Kindergarten Graduation

Hally graduated from Kindergarten! She is such a smarty pants. She got the highest scores on everything. I hope this continues as she goes through each grade. Mrs. Rigby was such a good teacher and she will surely be missed! We're so proud of you Hally, keep up the good work! 

Addi's 1st Grade Program

The 1st grade program at Hidden Hollow was darling! The theme was "Around the World" and Addi even had a speaking part. We were already to record it on the one side of the stage where everyone was saying their parts, when all of the sudden we heard her speaking on the other side of the stage! Darnit! We missed it on the video! She did such a good job though. She said, "Dancing is very popular in Germany. Many people would meet their future spouses at dances." Then her class did a cute German dance, all dressed up in German attire. So cute! I was begging her to smile during her program, because she's notorious for not smiling when she's in front of people. She promised me she would, but as you can see in the video, she doesn't look very happy. LOL! One of these days I'll get her to smile more! I do think she's the prettiest one. I may be a little biased though:)

Waiting with her class.

A cute friendship bracelet from her friend, Lyvia.

Kind of blurry, but she's on stage ready to preform. This is about the only smile I got during the whole performance.

Hally's Kindergarten Christmas Program

Hally had her kindergarten Christmas program and she did fantastic! As usual the gym was WAY crowded so it was hard to see and take video/pictures. I did manage to take some video even if some guy's arm was in the way. Hally is just so cute!

Hally with one of her good friends, Hayden.

My sweetie pie, Miss Hally:)

AUGUST IN REVIEW

August is over and we're halfway into September! Even though I'm super busy, I feel the need to keep up with my blogging. Even if it's a recap of each month.

~I took the girls to an Orem Owlz game thanks to USSynthetic. Tim would have come, but Kendall had pink eye, so I got to go with Addi and Hally. They had an opportunity to get their picture taken with the Owl and the Owlette, but both chickened out. I guess giant owls are scary.

~Tim and I celebrated 8 years of marriage! My mom watched the kids over night and we went to dinner at PF Changs and saw the movie, "Crazy, Stupid, Love", which was a fun movie. This picture is kinda blurry, but it's a picture of us right before he proposed. The plan was to propose at Eagle's Landing at Zion National Park, but my knees would not allow me to make it to the top. I had a feeling he was going to propose, so I kept willing myself on. We could both hear my knees grinding and finally decided that I shouldn't go further. I was kind of disappointed and I'm sure Tim was too. We headed back down to the

bottom and I thought I'd missed my opportunity to get engaged. At the bottom of the trail, as the sun was setting, Tim proposed on a bridge. It was perfect and the rest is history. Tim, I love you so much!

~Addi started soccer. This is her first time playing soccer. She's had her ups and downs, but has kind of decided she doesn't really like it, however the whining and complaining has ceased somewhat now that we're 3/4 of the way into the season. I was never very athletic, so I wanted my kids to be sort of good at sports. I'm not so sure that's going to happen though. We might have to stick with gymnastics and music. Maybe I'll sign her up next year though and we'll practice lots on the off season so it will build her confidence and her skills and her aggressiveness. We'll see.

~First day of 1st grade!!!! It's back to school time! Addi's lovin' school so far. She's had fun seeing all of her school friends from last year and making new friends. She's also enjoyed eating lunch at school. Sometimes she takes a lunch from home and sometimes she eats school lunch. Once again, it looks like she's a model student. I ran into her teacher, Ms. Taylor at Walmart and she went on and on about what a great student she is and how cute she dresses. Her teacher also said she was blown away by her reading abilities and is going to move her to a 2nd or 3rd grade reading level. Smarty pants!

~Hally Bear is in KINDERGARTEN! Wow, my kids are growing up and I'm getting OLD! She was SO excited! Of course, mom was a little nervous for her little girl to start school and had to wear sunglasses to drop her off;) The principal was passing out kleenex's to all the moms. So far so good. We love her sweet teacher Mrs. Rigby and she seems to be doing well, liking it and making some new friends. GO Hally!

~Last of all, I wanted to give an update of me working. It's been almost 9 months and it's going great! We've already been able to accomplish some of our goals! I like what I do and the people I work with. I quit daycare a couple of weeks ago, because once school started again it was too much and too stressful and too busy. It feels so weird not having any daycare kids after five years of having them. It's for the best though. Many people say to me that I'm crazy for working full-time graves and it's something they would/could never do. Really, the decision was a simple one. We could have stayed in our same position and struggled financially for the rest of our lives, or I could go to work for 1 to 11/2 years and get into a situation where we could move forward in our lives. So yes, let me work my butt off like many other women do to accomplish a goal and make a better life for my family. Simple as that. I hope that people can be supportive, tell me to "keep it up" or "you can do it" and let me be to do what I need to do. I never want to feel like this choice I've made is the wrong one, or I'm a bad person or suffering spiritually because of it. I may not be the social, outgoing, bubbly person that I was before I started this schedule. BUT, don't worry, it's just cause I'm tired basically all the time and any extra energy I do have is directed towards my family. It's been really exciting to see the progress we've made thus far!

Thanks for all of your support! A special thanks to Tim for picking up where I leave off when he gets home so I can go to bed and for never complaining!

Any questions?? Please ask!

Addi's Kindergarten Graduation

Addi will soon be in 1st grade. That means school all day long and eating lunch in the cafeteria. Addi absolutely LOVED kindergarten! She was a "model student," as her teacher would say. She LOVED her teacher, Mrs. Lebaron and will miss her so much. We are so proud of Addi, she worked hard in school and was always so nice to everyone. She was given an award for the "most kind kindergartner."

Addi with Mrs. Lebaron. We couldn't have asked for a better teacher!!!

A cute thing Addi said the other day: She was explaining to her friend, Suzie how to play "Angry Birds" and this is what she said, "You put birds in a sling shot and try to hit the pigs and then the pigs (a thoughtful pause), pass away." She's such a sweetie and we love her so much!

Addi's 1st Day of Kindergarten

Well, today was the day. The day that my first born went to kindergarten. So I know, it's only 3 hours a day, but still, this is a HUGE milestone. This means that my little girl is growing up! Tim gave both Addi and Hally a father's blessing last night to help them with school, which was so sweet and special for the girls. I am thankful for the priesthood in my life....

I woke Addi up this morning and it was like Christmas for her. She was so excited! For me it was bittersweet. Sweet, because I got to see her so excited and bitter, because I don't want her to grow up yet. We had breakfast, got her ready, took some pictures and then headed over to the school. We walked over to the playground where all the kids from four different kindergarten classes got to play until the teachers came out to get them at 9:15. She gave me a big hug and kiss and I told her I loved her and she said she loved me too. Then she went and got in line to go inside her classroom. Wow. There she went. I made it back to the security of my car and then I started to cry. Like a baby. Then Hally started to cry, not knowing that I was crying, because she wanted Addi. We were both in the same boat. Sad that Addi was gone. Sad that things were going to be different. When we got back to the house I quickly realized that I would miss Addi more than I thought. She's my BIG helper. Seriously, she's AMAZING. She's only 5 and VERY responsible. She takes care of Kendall when I ask her, helps me clean, plays with Hally, etc. Now I was going to have to do it all by myself and needless to say, I didn't get a lot done. Hally was moping around the house and whining about EVERY little thing and was very defiant, more so than usual. Then three hours later we went and picked Addi up and she was okay, so I was okay. She had a good first day of school and told me all about it.

Addi & one of her best friends, Haven.

This is her excitement after she told me goodbye.

There she goes into her classroom. Her teacher, Mrs. Labaron, is the one in purple.