First Day of School

Oh the first day of school....such mixed feelings.

The boys were excited to see friends and for a new year, 

and I was a wreck.

Especially with Chase starting kindergarten. 

I just wish they wouldn't grow up so fast. 

He was super excited, and a little nervous. 

I walked him in, and kept it together until I left him. 

I didn't want him to see me cry, I didn't think that would help him.

I made it to the edge of campus before the tears came. 

Grant was great at telling me it would be ok. :)

These guys are so cute! I will miss them terribly, 

but I know it's so good for them. They learn so much about school, 

life, friends, and how to navigate it all.

Grant turns 9!

i can't believe it! where, really where, did the time go?? 

i still remember the days of holding him, seeing him laugh and learn to walk....sigh.

i know everyone says this, but it seriously does go by so fast.

the great thing is, i love getting to know my kids as older kids. gasp!

grant is funny, outgoing, friendly, compassionate, kind, and so happy.

and he's such a great big brother. chase is so so so so lucky.

he's one of a kind kid - something i never realized until he got older.

i thought all kids were as nice and happy and easy going as he is - but that's so not true!

he makes our life so complete and i love watching him grow up every day.

happy birthday grant! we love you!

birthday breakfast! (the boys get to pick their food on their birthdays - 

it makes me feel sort of ill, but it's only one day right?)

grant picked out a tie dye cake. chase and me are making it here. it actually turned out 

soooooo good! (and i'm not a cake person! especially boxed cake!) who would have thought?

chuckecheese tradition! we met jason there for lunch and games

hamster! grant really really wanted a hamster for his birthday, so that was the 

majority of his gifts, since we had to get everything for it. he's loved it thought, 

and has been really good so far at taking care of it. 

it actually provided quite a bit of entertainment the last week of summer,

so it really worked out really well.   :)

his cake! our nice camera died, so these are from my phone. jason got him trick candles,

so here he's laughing at not blowing them out....he cracks me up every day.

him and his funny faces.....he kills me. :)  you can see what the cake looks like here....

happy birthday buddy! we love you more than you'll ever know!

Summer's almost over

Here's the last few weeks/month of summer.

We sure had a fun one. Lots of trips, fun in the sun, together time.

I'm always so sad when it's over. Good thing we have lots of memories!

the boys had chances to earn toys by doing good deeds or chores.

chase earned this HUGE airplane and had a lot of fun putting it together

and flying it. as you can tell from some of these pictures, i had trouble

keeping shirts on the boys this summer. they decided it was "cool" to not 

wear shirts. it was pretty hot....waay too many 105 degree days.

chase decided he wanted to make a headdress. i was pretty impressed that

we made this one afternoon just with stuff we had. he loved it!

grant chose a mineral dig. we've had a few of these, but they still love to get them.

you get to dig out crystals and rocks and then identify them. 

i was impressed with how creative the boys were together. lots of days they'd come up

with their own things to do and make. for a week they made these creatures and played with them...

their room looked like this a lot - some fort, or cave, or something....

chase convinced grant to have "concerts" a lot - grant was in charge of playing the

piano and chase would sing. they would make a stage and everything and then i'd have

to pay to watch the show. grant thought it was hilarious, and chase was serious.

chase often would decorate the playroom for us....the goal always being it was 

to be as scary as possible with what we had around. (as you can see, you probably

don't want to plop down on the couch without moving the wooden sword...)

another concert, this time with a stage and "microphone"

one sunday after church i thought the boys looked cute...not the best picture but oh well....

grant went to scout camp for 3 days - and loved it! here's me telling him to smile before

i have to go drop him off. i did get to volunteer one day and it was pretty fun seeing him 

have fun and shoot guns and play with his friends. 

he was SO happy the last day because he hit the bullseye!!!

another of chase's toys was this skeleton with organs inside. this was pretty

fun and scientific. the organs are even squishy. 

we hit up jumpalooza a couple of times...

and of course the pool. we had fun trying new pools this summer.

we would go to the pool 3-4 times a week. the boys loved swimming, it was good

to get out and get exercise, and it was just a great activity for us.

a magic show! i forgot about this. a few times the boys would put on a magic show

and sell treats and charge admission. i TOTALLY remember doing things like this

as a kid and it was fun to see them do similar things. 

all in all, we had a blast this summer. yay for summer!