That Fun First Day...

Lexi ready for the first day of sixth grade. Her teacher this year is Mrs. Bryson. She is a gem of a teacher and one of the best in the school. We are excited for that!



We are back to hurry, hurry, mode over here at our house. We started back to school this last week. I really have been in a bit of denial over the whole thing, but now that it is here I am forced into reality. I always had a hard time the first day of school growing up and I am afraid that I still have that same fear and trepidation. I just live it vicariously through my children.(lucky me). We as parents were required to go to "back to school day" I was at the school from 10 AM until 12:30 PM. Well, by the end of this "day" I felt so sick to my stomach that I didn't know if I would ever eat again.

I am happy to report that my children did at least 10 times better then me so, hallelujah for that! Lexi probably had the hardest time, but she is a good sport and just needs to get used to her new surroundings.


Lilli ready for the first day of 3rd grade. Her teacher this year is Mrs. Parrish. We don't know much about her yet but, we have high hopes. Lilli is starting the spectrum program and we are excited for that.



And....here she is.....The Kindergarten Gal!! I can't believe our little Ava is big enough to go to kindergarten...when did that happen? It seems like I just was going into Mrs. Flannery's kindergarten room with Lilli. Ava was very excited to go and had a great day. She is going to have a fabulous year and we are all very excited.:)

below-Ava with her friend Molly and new friend Meg. Standing outside the kindergarten door.

My Preschooler

Here she is, my preschooler, Vivi J. as I like to call her. Vivien was so very excited to finally get to go to school. She is attending Preschool this year with Mrs. Brooks. My usually sleepy 3-year-old had no problem waking up and putting on her new outfit (which she picked out herself). Vivi had a very fun day. Unfortunately, at recess she was stung by a hornet and this seemed to really leave an impression on her for the first day:( so, that was kind of a bummer, but she is still excited about school and says she is going back...so hooray for me! I truly can't believe she has entered the preschool world. It seems like it was just Ava's turn to do this and now here goes Vivi. Everyone keeps growing up!

This is the outfit that Vivi picked out for her first day:)

These are Vivi's buds for the year that she will be riding to school with.
L-R- Ethan, Carson, and Vivi

Vivien was shy at first and had to hide behind my leg as we walked into school. When she say Carson she was OK to leave me and headed to the "rug" for her first preschool instruction.

Still all smiles even after the hornet sting:) My sweet girl going home after an eventful first day.

The Luau

Ava and Lexi getting their lei for the luau. The girls were all very excited to get a real flower lei!

Ava, Lacey and Vivi waiting for dinner.

Janae and Doug

This was our table at the luau. We had a big group so, Lexi, Lilli, Madi, and Katie sat at a separate table. I think they had a great time. Unfortunately, all of my pictures at their table did not turn out due to people not cooperating...surprise, surprise:)

This was the show that was performed around dinner time. The girl dancing in the middle was very talented and did a great job.

Lilli

Lexi


Nicolette:)


from L to R- Vivi, Lacey, Ava, Lexi, Lilli, Katie, Madi

What a fun day we got to spend with our cousins! We are grateful we all got to be together for this fun day:)

Our Morning at the Polynesian Cultural Center

Our first day in Hawaii we spent at the Polynesian Cultural Center. What an amazing place this is! I had been many years ago with my family, but for some reason had not remembered much. I really hope my girls remember more than I did:) The church has really made this place somewhere worth going and experiencing all there is to offer. There are seven "little villages" Hawaii, Marquesas, Tahiti, Samoa, Aotearoa, Fiji and Tonga. Our host was Hannah and she took the kids around the villages while the parents got to be on their own:).

When we first met up with Hannah, she gave us all a shell lei. She had us hold on to it and then told us to lei someone in our family and tell them aloha. This was very fun. Above is Vivien giving her lei to Ava.

This is Nicolette eating her lei. Nicolette was such a trooper this day. She had the beginings of a terrible cold and spent most of the day in the stroller. She is always a pretty good sport in following her family around.

This was the first show we saw. The "natives" made fire from sticks and this guy up there in the tree had climbed this tree in 10 seconds flat! He pretended he was going to jump but, really he didn't
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This was the river show. All of the 7 villages were represented in different costumes and music, and dance. Really great.

Here is a picture of the girls "tattoos". They Paint them on the kids for fun.

Here are most of the kids with Hannah. LtoR Katie, Lexi, Madi, Hannah, Vivi, Ava, Lilli.

This is Ava and Vivi doing a hula dance. Lacey is looking on. It was a great morning!

The Red Eye

This is how we spent our evening a couple of evenings ago (flying the red eye). I am still very confused as to the time and day I am now living in (we had a 4-hour time difference). I have to report it was all worth it! Hawaii was wonderful and such the perfect vacation spot. I did experience my own "living nightmare" on the plane ride home, but I still report it was worth it. Kaui was a really fun island to visit. I had never been to Kaui and it has a lot of fun to offer. I have many pictures to share soon. It is good to be home...but, I'm ready to go back with a few less children:)

Cabin Days

We took two moms, eight kids and no dads to the cabin. A recipe for disaster? Well, not necessarily. It was scout camp again the beginning of July, so I decided we weren't going to sit around at home and wait for Doug to get home. We took Sara and her cute kids to the cabin with us for a week. Sara and I always get "great ideas" of what we want to do with the kids, for example the Chuck E. Cheese trip:). We were running ourselves a bit ragged, but all in all we had a great time! Sara and I do deserve a girls trip though after the whole week of the kid trip.

This was our hike at Cascade Falls. A beautiful spot! This is one of my favorite hikes around.

This was our rest spot. We did have a couple of hikers who were not thrilled with the idea of the hike, but in the end I think they were all happy they went. (Just not in this picture.)

We made it down by the falls for a picture:)

Lilli, Rachel, and Sara having a rest.

Here are those of us who were not to afraid to step out a bit for a picture.

Here is our group after our first hike of the week. We tried to hike to the spring. It did not go to well if you see the look on Lexi's face. We got caught in a bit of a rain/hail storm. I actually had a blast! My dad was at the cabin by then and came to our rescue. Unfortunately, we really mudded up his brand new car:( I think it will eventually be clean again.

Girls having fun in the rain.

Sara is a great and energetic, fun, friend. She came up with tons of fun crafts for the kids to do while we were there. We made darling paper boxes, sewed tiny bags, and made fun decorative clips and many more! That Sara has more creativity in her than I do in my little finger.

Sara teaching crafts. Lilli hard at work. I think Spencer is trying to be patient:).

One night when my dad was around, he helped us doing the roasting marshmallow thing. The kids thought this was great (and also the moms because of the smores).

Lexi and Rachel. Rachel was very supportive of Lexi and her refusal to get near the fire. (We had the same problem at her birthday with the candles....sigh....)

Well, everyone is having a bit of a moment here. It was late and we just wanted dessert and bed by this time. Thanks Sara and kids for a great trip:)!

Nicolette's Lot In Life...

Here is my baby. She is being carried around in a laundry basket? I must say this baby is one good sport. She is so happy if anyone is willing to play with her that she really puts up with a lot! She actually thought this was a great game, being toted around by Ava. Nicolette is a really good baby and a lot of fun to be around. I know that being the 5th girl in a family will have it's challenges for her, but I really think she is already dealing with it stupendously and I just hope that her wonderful attitude carries on!

Ava is also having a great time!

I am sure many of us 4th and 5th children spent time in a laundry basket:)

Happy Birthday Poppy!

Look who's 61!! Poppy! We had a slightly fun, chaotic, intense, girl fighting birthday! The expression on my dad's face here is pure bustin up laughing, because...in his card I wrote " I hope you have had a nice relaxing day at the cabin". That's how hilarious my statement was. We were glad to get to spend the day with him and appreciate him sacrificing a peaceful b-day to spend it with the grandkids:)

Here is the grandkids that were left after cousin camp to help celebrate the birthday.

Here is my dad reading his 5th card from Ava and Vivi.

Ryan thought there really must be something interesting in the cards seeing there were so many to read.

Poppy, Ella, and Ryan (I think a very cute picture:)

Aunt Karla with her biggest fans. Aunt Karla is a wonderful sport. Ava and Vivien needed her attention at every meal time. "I want to sit by Aunt Karla, no I want to" (you get the drift here.) We even had one meal that Uncle Mike wasn't even aloud to sit by his wife because Vivien was in some serious tears at the thought of not getting to sit by Aunt Karla. Thank you Aunt Karla for being so patient with us!

Cousin Camp 2007

We have returned from the cabin after a very eventful Cousin Camp. This is our group (minus Rose who was asleep). We had a hard time getting a group shot this year. I think some of the campers are not as enthusiastic for picturing posing as they once were:( We still had a fun time with lots of jam packed days full of activities. The sr. campers were gone hiking for the first day and the second day consisted of family pictures, talking about charities, and closing ceremonies.
Thank you to Mammy for all of her hard work and her donations for all of our charities. The kids have all been reading since Christmas in order to earn money for their charity. Thanks Mom! What a great learning experience for the kids, maybe we won't have to move to Peru after all. :)

Here are the three youngest campers. Ella, Nicolette and Annalise.

This was Aunt Katie's paper towel flower making. We only had spilled food coloring a few times:)

Here are our jr. campers planting wild flowers with Aunt Steph.

All of our jr. campers thought the flower planting was great. We finally had to stop the watering so we didn't wash away all the seeds.

This was our dish towel hand printing project (thank you Grandma). These kids have some really cute hands! We learned that hands are not for hitting:)

Nicolette, her first cousin camp:)