1st Day of Preschool - What a Big Girl!

My baby girl is in preschool!! Ella was so excited to start preschool. We had been talking about it for a while so she was ready to be a big girl and go to school like Kaiya. The night before school we laid out her outfit and she could hardly control her excitement. Ella's favorite thing to eat is cereal so it was a no brainer that it's what she wanted for her special breakfast. Her choice was Life cereal.

(Cirdan) - It's still hard for me to believe that Ella Rose is big enough for pre school. She is absolutely ready as far as her ability to learn and understand. I think she also adapts very well socially and to new settings. Ella has a great attitude and has a smile on her face most of the day. She has her moments of course but all in all she carries a great outlook. I was very excited for her, I am a very proud Daddy....she has a very special personality. Part of me was sad that my little girl is growing up, there are many special moments in the rear view mirror. I'm excited to see what tomorrow holds for my baby girl.

Little Ella looks like such a big girl to me in this picture!

We waited for the preschool doors to open and took some pictures.

Daddy's girl :) !!!

Ella was kind of nervous but didn't care when we left.

I wasn't really sad about this new step in her life until I was about to leave her preschool, after dropping her off. Then I realized that my little girl was growing up so fast! Ella had a fun first day of school. Her favorite part of school is....snack time.

Football Parties...Hut hut hut

Football has started! We LOVE having people over to watch Seahawks and pig out!!! Greg and Staci came over for the first game of the season. Go Hawks!!

Labor Day Weekend

Kaylee and her boyfriend Rusty drove from Utah to Washington Labor Day weekend. The family got together on Sunday evening for dinner, we were able to meet Kaylee's new guy Rusty. He is a great guy and is so good to her. It's great to see her so happy.
Nate was a just a tad hungry...stuffing his face

Kaiya enjoyed putting the cookie dough into the oven by herself. She liked it so much that for the next 2 weeks (until I did it) she begged me to make cookies so she could put them in the oven and take them out.

Kaylee hurt her foot and since Rusty is going to school to be a Registered Nurse he was there to patch it up.

Kaiya had my camera for a while and I found a bunch of funny pictures of Emma looking like this...

Cirdan bought an iPad which has this really funny program where you can take pictures that are stinking hilarious. We were playing with it, laughing and having a good time. Someone noticed Jett who was covered in red. I forgot I had given him a piece of licorice and he went to town on it! He loved it!

The cute couple

Family picture

We took a funny picture, my mom apparently wasn't paying attention.

1st Day of 4th Grade

Kaiya is doing a program called Columbia Virtual Academy this year rather than go to school. It's funded like a public school but done virtually and in your home. We have a teacher assigned and Kaiya checks in with her every Monday. We started school on September 8th like the rest of Auburn Schools. I wanted to make her 1st day of school still special so I asked her what she wanted for breakfast. She chose Eggo waffles and bacon.

We were originally going to do the WAVA program but decided to switch to CVA about 3 weeks before school started. CVA helps pay for dance....which was a huge bonus!! Since we made the late switch we still don't have the school books yet but Kaiya has been very busy working in her 4th grade workbook we bought. We have also went to the library where she wanted to get a DVD about Argentina. She did a report on it after she watched it. It's amazing how much she can get done here at home. Hopefully we will receive the books this week!

Jett On The Move

Jett has been doing so many new things and I have been so busy and slacking on my blog. I feel horrible!

The beginning of August Jett started to wave and say..."hi". He would say hi to anyone. Even if they weren't paying attention to him.

My little daredevil is getting more and more devilish everyday. He loves to climb up onto the couch now and does it alllll day long. It has turned into a full time job for me, making sure he isn't on the cusions ready to jump or fall off. It really scares me when he climbs up and gets ready to dive off the ledge. Or when he climbs over to the edge which is higher off the ground ready to take a plunge.

I caught him doing this on the entertainment center the other day...

I had Jett up on my bed. He was looking out the window and soon after that decided that it would be a perfect place to climb. I sat there watching him...making sure he didn't fall. He did this all by himself!

One day I was sitting at the computer and looked up to see Jett almost eye level to me. My brain went a thousand miles a second trying to process what I saw....while I was thinking, "how is this happening?" He was trying to grab a mug that was on the kitchen counter. Ella had left a stool in the kitchen and Jett climbed up on it.

Jett screams like a girl! He is around Ella and Kaiya all day and that doesn't help. He hears them scream and copies them. AHHHHHH!!

When Jett is doing something he shouldn't, I say...."no, no" and shake my head. Now when he does something and he knows he shouldn't he starts shaking his head. Do you think that stops him from doing it? Nope!!

Jett learned how to clap! He gets so happy about this new talent of his! The night he first learned how to clap he was so excited that he laughed and clapped and laughed and clapped for hours.

Jett loves to pretend to be on the phone. He picks up anything and puts it up to his ear. Shoes, toys, books etc.

Kaiya's New Dance Schedule

Monday - 3 hours
Tuesday - 4 hours
Wednesday - no dance !! Woo hoo!! It will change though...they are starting a gymnastics class.
Thursday - 4 1/2 hours
Friday - No dance!
Saturday - 4 hours

Ella will also take 2 hours of dance on Saturday while Kaiya is in class. Busy dancing girl! Busy mommy who has to drive and pick her up from dance.

Ella's Songs

Row, row, row your boat
Gentally down the street
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily like a butter dream.

Justin Bieber -
Baby Baby Baby Uhhh light Babae babae babae Uhhh Light....You'll always be mine mine

There is others but I can't remember right now.

The Many Faces of Ella

As soon as Ella knows that the camera is on her she makes a silly face. When we were in Spokane she even learned how to cross her eyes. This brought the face making to a whole new level. Here are just some of her famous faces.

I See More Teeth!

Jett's top teeth are coming in! Can you see them?

Taken 8/31/11


Taken 9/12/11

Summer Sleepovers

Kaiya had one last sleepover for the summer. Bailee her cousin came over to have fun. These girls have grown up together...born only a month apart from eachother. Yay for summer sleepovers!

Big Kids!

Jett has started walking and Ella is in Preschool!! More information to come....been so busy it's hard to update the blog!

Spokane - Monday

We decided to stay an extra day and go home on Tuesday. We figured that with Ava with us we might as well take advantage of our mini vacation and spend some more family time together. We didn't really have anything planned. I knew I wanted to take the kids downtown to the big wagon slide and go to the park. Cirdan thought it would be fun to take the kids swimming with the Niemi girls. The way it worked out we could do both. The kids had fun at Riverfront park. They were able to go on some rides...which were about the same price as Disneyland. Super expensive!!! But their smiles made it all worth it. They also got a snow cone and played in the water. It was a nice warm day so the water was perfect. Jett really enjoyed his first snow cone and ate a bunch of it.

































We hurried back to Kim and Charlies house to change into our bathing suits. I was hesitant at first to go to the pool. Cirdan, Kaiya and I had forgotten our suits but were able to borrow some....take that back....Cirdan had to wear his shorts but Kaiya and I borrowed one. I also didn't want to pack all the stuff it takes to get 4 kids to the pool clean them up. I am glad that my bad attitude didn't stop us because everyone had a blast!! Jett LOVES the pool. The girls all would gather around Cirdan. It was very cute. Kaiya and Hannah are good swimmers so they went off into the deeper pool while the little kids stayed in the shallow pool.









After the pool we went to Richard and Sue's house. Richard was out of town and Sue would be coming home to eat but then had to run to a play with a friend. It was good to spend some more time with her. Everyone was starving so we ate. Soon after dinner the kids heard the popsicle man so Grandma gathered her change so all the kids could pick out a popsicle treat. We then went on a walk over to Manito Park. I have only been there once before when the flowers were in bloom. That was the first time I had been to Spokane, while Cirdan and I were dating, in 2005. It was a long time ago. I had no idea that there was even a Japanese Garden there. There were coi fish and a waterfall. Very pretty and relaxing. We then walked to the rose garden. So many beautiful roses! They each had name plates next to them with the names of roses. Never realized there were so many!









I was so excited to see the lilac garden. Half way through the trail I realized that there was no lilac and that they weren't in season. Oops

We all had a ton of fun!!