Evan's Birthday

Evan had his 5th birthday last week. We celebrated by going to Sky Zone, the trampoline place. He celebrated his 4th birthday there, too, but wanted to go again because it's just so much fun.

Birthday cake on Tuesday night with just the family:

After jumping on Friday with cousins and a best buddy:

My silly 5 year old!

I celebrated a little in my own way. Yesterday I took the baby locks off of the cupboard under the kitchen sink, the one where the garbage can is kept. No more babies when the youngest is 5. I can't bring myself to take out the outlet covers though. Baby steps.

Wipeout Training

Drew and Dean training for a future Wipeout episode at our local indoor pool:



Evan couldn't pass the swimming test needed to qualify. After being pretty sad for a few minutes, he got a coach (Dean) and started training on his own. Little cutie.

Labor Day, NorCal Style

This is my 15th year living in Northern California. I've lived here longer than anywhere. And yet this is the first time we've been swimming in the American River. It's what people do here. Like Southern Californers go to the beach to swim, and Utahns go to the lake, NorCal folks swim in the river.

Of course, being Labor Day, it was a little crowded. But that's ok. It's a big river. We can share.All the kids liked it except Evan. He was pretty nervous about the fish and sharks that he was sure were in the water, no matter how much we tried to convince him otherwise.


Lots of fun! It's something we'll definently do again.

The last First Day of School

First, Evan had his first day of school last week. Then I had my first day of school on Monday. Now today, Wednesday, we had our last first day of school for the year.

Dean is in 5th grade this year and was assigned to the new teacher's class. He came home with a great first impression of her, so we can breathe easy.
Drew is now in 7th grade. Actually, I get a little sick if I think about it too long. I mean, he was just in kindergarten yesterday...wasn't he?...
And Edie is in 2nd grade. We know from experience she got an excellent teacher. She whispered in my ear as she came out of the classroom today, "It was awesome!"

Back to School? Already??

Summer went by much too fast. I am not ready for the structure of the school year yet, I much prefer the lazy summer days. But this summer wasn't all that lazy. It seems like we were home only long enough to do laundry and pack for the next trip. We went to San Bernardino twice and then there were those trips to Austrailia and Brazil...

But like it or not, school is here. Evan started last Tuesday. He's in a pre-k program in the next school district over, hence the different start date. Pretty cute, no?
He is having a great time there. He already brought home a project for us to try: Monster Toast. He instructed us and they turned out pretty good I think:It's basically painting on slices of bread with colored milk. The colors brighten when you toast it. We had to paint monsters, or face Evan's wrath, but you can do what you want. I won't tell on you.

Everyone else starts school this week. Even me! I'm taking 3 classes this semester at the local JC. Just trying to get some prereqs done to apply to nursing school at some point in the near future. It's amazing all the free time you end up with when the baby's in school!

I hope I remember to come back this week with pictures of Drew's first day of 7th grade (??!!?!?!) Dean's first day of 5th grade and Edie's first day of 2nd grade.

Pinterest

I am really enjoying Pinterest, a new-to-me website. It's a place where you can pin images from the web that you like, or that you want to remember. And you have friends and you can see what they pin too. (Just FYI, if you join and Nathan Fields is your friend: He likes poop)

I was on Pinterest a few days ago and found something I thought Evan would like. You know Evan, right? My video game loving boy who only ever eats 2 bites in one sitting? Yeah, that one.

If you saw my pin, you know the original was cuter. But Evan sure likes this one!
And yes, he ate all of it!

Psych

At least one of my children was very impressed by my amazing detective skillz today. I kinda felt like Shawn Spencer.


Who took a bite out of Dean's leftover birthday cake?



OK, OK, I guess it doesn't take a psychic detective to figure that one out.