Kindergarten!

Have I told you that Ella is starting Kindergarten in about a month? I KNOW. We're playing "school" right now in an effort to prepare her. It's also the only way I can get her to look at the workbooks I bought. Oh, my well-intentioned naivety.

PLAN IN MY HEAD: Can't you just see it? We're sitting in the afternoon sunlight at the table, her hair perfectly braided, me showered and dressed. She practices drawing a "5" and exclaims with joy at her new found skills. We laugh, full of knowledge and the thrill of discovery.

REALITY: Mom, I don't want to do my math book. I want to color in my princess coloring book. Mom, that's not how I want to do it (because I'm obviously coloring the picture in wrong). Mom, can you get Gretchen out of here?

So we play.

Ella - When is snack time at this kindergarten?

Me - Kindergarten is for big kids, and it's not long enough for snack time. We don't have snack time in kindergarten.

Ella - (pause...) Well they should.

Me - Well, are you sick of coloring? Do you want to have recess now?

Ella - Yeah. I'm going to play with Pretend Kyle.

(Five minutes later, when Ella is frustrated and sitting on the floor...)

Me - What's wrong, you want to work together on something?

Ella - No, Fake Kyle doesn't want to play.

Luckily she has a playdate with Real Kyle tomorrow. She's super excited. I'm sure he'll want to play the whole time, and not be all moody and demanding like that annoying Fake Kyle.

Strict Standards

Ella is home sick today (not that we had anywhere to go, that's the glory of Summer!!!) She's trying to pick out a movie to watch, but it's hard. There's so many reasons NOT to watch a movie.

Monsters Inc. - The Secretary is mean and slams the thing down on the green guy's hand. That's mean.
Toy Story - The neighbor boy is mean and the weird toys are scary.
The Incredibles - The big ball and the big monster are scary.
Nemo - Cause of the big white shark.
The Polar Express - No Thank you.
Elf - She doesn't like that he eats the gum off the railing. That's gross.

She really really REALLY want's to watch Mary Poppins, but we can't find it. ARGHHHH!

Summer Lovin'

-Last week we went to Utah with Auntie Angel. 5 kids, 2 moms and 10.25 hours later we made it to SLC. We didn't even leave anyone at a rest stop.
-I'm pretty sure we stopped at every rest stop.
-Seriously. Two hours longer than usual.
-Ella actually had to use the bathroom every time we stopped. We only let her have one juice box. I don't know where it all came from.
-We went to a Family Reunion and I actually knew some of my family. When we walked up to the pavilion where everyone was gathered, my nephew Christian said, "Aunt Apryl, WHO ARE ALL THESE PEOPLE?" He didn't believe they were all related to him.
-They were.
-Ella, Gretchen & I got to spend the weekend at my Aunt Jo's house. It was super fun. Gretchen and Ella were in love with all her dog statues. They went around patting all their heads.
-I got to see Janeece & Ken at Aunt Jo's!!! They came over to visit cause they just HAPPENED to be visiting Utah the same time I was. YAY!
-Mom and I drove back to Reno. It only took eight and a half hours.
-We had to stop in Fernley for Ice Cream. Gretchen was loosing it. LOOSING IT!!!
-Fernley is only 1/2 an hour from Reno. But we still had to stop.
-I really want to see Harry Potter this week. But I still haven't seen Star Trek OR XMen. I'm so behind the times.
-Being poor sucks.
-My mom has all the good pictures from our trip on her camera & I forgot to copy them before she left.
-Uncle Tyler & Auntie Meghan came with Baby Kate this weekend. Baby Kate is super cute. She also sounds like she's been smoking for 60 years. It only adds to her charm.
-Yesterday our ward had a "Pie & Ear" party. For Pioneer Day. I didn't get it till yesterday. And I made the posters for the party. (Get it? PIE-N-EAR DAY!)
-Colby and Gretchen entered the Pie Eating Contest together.
-They didn't win, but not because they didn't try.
-Auntie Meghan has all the good pictures of the Pie Eating contest on her camera & I forgot to copy them before she left.
-The sprinklers just came on while Auntie Krista was pushing Gretchen on the swing.
-Ha ha!
-I think I'm going to return my camera because it sucks.
-That's what you get when you spend $100 on a digital camera.
-I hope you are all doing well, that you have lots of tomatoes in your gardens and cash in your accounts.
xoxo

sign designs

What To Do When Auntie Angel Comes To Town

What do you get when you put five small children in one house for a week? A LOT ACTIVITIES (you know, to make sure we keep all five children & don't "accidentally" leave some of them at the park.)

We went to Lake Tahoe on Thursday. And yes, Gretchen is screaming in this picture. It was the end of the day. And I just caught her MID FALL off a huge boulder. Cause I'm an awesome Mom (that puts her small child on large boulders... Poor kid.)



Matia and Gretchen have a love/hate relationship. Especially when Matia decides to "help" Gretchen. I think Gretchen is on time-out #259 for pinching/pulling hair/hitting. Here you see the LOVE part of the love/hate. Check out the sweet blue swim goggles that Gretchen insisted on wearing.



Making sand castles in the sand....



We didn't even need to pull out the Ghetto Pool! Grandma bought this fancy Alligator Pool last year and it only had one hole in it!



We went to Auntie Krista's house some mini-farm fun. What? Gretchen thought riding on a horse 20x her size was fun? How unexpected.






Poor, poor baby chickens. They tried to run, but no one is safe from Matia. Or Gretchen.





Auntie Krista thought it'd be funny to take some naked baby glamour shots. Gretchen thought it'd be funny to crash the party.



We celebrated the Klassier side of Reno by taking the kids out for a photo shoot downtown. We're so proud of our town!












No chickens were harmed in the making of this post.

Snakes and Nursery! Happy Fathers Day!

Auntie Amber took us to the museum a week ago. It was cool. There was a room full of fake sharks (which the girls refused to enter), a shrunken head (you're right Amber. I shouldn't have gone looking for it. SO CREEPY.) and snakes!!!!

Yup, Ella refused to go in the room with a fake shark, but she held a gigantic albino python.

On Snakes, by Ella Stott
I liked the snake when I held it. It was bumpy. And soft. I would not like to have a snake in my room, but I would hold one again.

Here she is learning about snakes from the super nice museum guy:


Touching the pretty wittle snake...


Holding the SUPER HUGE snake... (Sorry these pics are sideways. I need to fix that...)


So brave, my little girl!


And Happy Fathers Day!

Thoughts About My Dad, by Ella Stott
I love to play with my Dad. Puzzles. I like to play with him a lot.

Oh yeah, and today was Gretchen's first day of nursery at church. (When babies turn 18 months you get to ditch them at the baby Sunday School where they play with toys, eat snacks & sing songs. It's pretty fantastic.) I stayed in nursery too. Not because I was worried about her, per say, more worried for the other children. She only made one boy bleed. He was gettin' all up in her puzzles. She did NOT like that. He got a quick "Gretch Special", a cheek pinch with fingernails. Dude. DUDE! There were four other little boys in Nursery. She's the youngest. And she's a girl. And she had them all running in fear. The oldest kid kept running to the Nursery Leader saying, "Save me! Save me!" and at one point barricaded himself in the corner behind a metal folding chair. Sigh.

But she IS afraid of fake sharks.

Crush

I told Ella that we're going to our friends pool on Thursday. We've been going weekly since it got warm, but she was not excited.

Ella: Why do we always have to go to Kimmy's pool?

Me: Cause it's fun!!!

Ella: I don't want to.

Me: Hank, Ken & Kaylie will be there too! (My friend's elementary age kids, who are out of school for summer. Ella is especially enamored with her 13 year old son, Hank...)

Ella: Will Hank not have his shirt on?

Me: !!!!!!!

Me: How would you feel about that?

Ella: I don't know, I don't want to see him without his shirt on. (Giggles)

Me: Good night.

Ella: (Giggles. Shuts door. Giggles.)

!!!!!!!!!