The Birthday Balloon- We love you Ethan!

J.C. and I (Kathryn) were sitting at the kitchen table this morning when this balloon came floating down the hall. We looked at each other a bit startled. It really was kind of spooky. This balloon was purchased on June 28, almost a month ago for Ethan's 6th birthday (June 29). We didn't even realize there was still a balloon in the house, but there is and it still has some helium left in it.

We took it as a sign that Ethan wanted to remind us his birthday is only 11 months away. (Ethan is very concerned about his birthday.) So to Ethan - we are thinking of you and are very excited for the one month anniversary of your sixth birthday. Maybe we'll count down your birthday with you.

Scout Court of Honor

Tonight was the Scout Court of Honor. J.C. received the 3 merit badges he earned at camp. He earned Leather Working, Art and First Aide. He has partials for Swimming and Environmental Science. Seems most boys couldn't tolerate the freezing water in the lake at camp.



After the presentations, each of the groups did skits - I can't say much about this - camp type skits seem to only be appreciated at camp. Here is the video of the skit. The premise is there is an old man trying to knock on a door, a boy comes up and asks if he needs help. The old man asks him to knock on the door. Then the old man runs, playing ding, dong, door, ditch. J.C. plays the person inside the door who finds no one there when he goes to answer. Just go with it. ;)

Faux Hawk

Ethan requested a Faux Hawk after his shower. We think he looks completely "adorkable".

Week 3 of the Kids Summer time

This last week was much lower key than the first two Julia and Ethan were here. No one had classes and Dad took the week off work. They worked around the house, went to Story Time at the Library, rode bikes and played on Slip N Slide, we also saw the Cars 2. We made two trips to the airport. On Tuesday we picked up Opa (Grandpa in German), Kathryn's Dad and on Saturday, we picked up Sitto (Grandma in Lebanese) Jamey's Mom. A visit to Salt Lake included a trip to the German Bakery for bread and to the German deli for meat, which is now being called Mommy Meat.

My apologies for the orientation of these videos, just tilt your head to the right. ;)

4th of July

July 4th was pleasant. It was nice that Mom and Dad both had the day off. It was just a good family day. The fireworks started days before. Utah has new firework laws, allowing high rising fireworks to be used, evidently they now go higher and cool faster so they are safer. So there were lots of fireworks going off near us this past week, but Independence Day isn't complete without fireworks. We watched fireworks on the edge of a ravine near our house. We could see fireworks across the valley. They were awesome.

The last year in review-Summer 2010

Our story begins at a beautiful campground on the shores of a Great Lake at Camp Radical in Ohio July 2010. We had a great time learning how to be better parents and to help Julia and Ethan learn how to respect and honor their parents and other authority figures as well as to help them feel safe, loved and secure with a positive self image and confidence. We drove from Ohio to St Louis to visit Chris' father.

While we visited for the evening there was a very sick and pitiful kitten crying outside his home. Because we could not just let it suffer in the heat of the south, we rescued it and stuck it in a box with every intention to take it to the local humane shelter. Of course with my luck there weren't any humane shelters open on Saturday's and it was past closing time on Friday when we were there. So we ended up driving home for 8 hours with an obnoxiously sick kitten in a box in the car. By this time we had fallen in love with her and Julia was completely taken with her. We called her Lucky because she was dang lucky we didn't kill her on the drive home. We kept her in our home for a few weeks until she was healthy and nourished. Thankfully Chris' mom, Candy, had a friend that had been looking for a cat for a while and felt that Lucky was a good fit. We were all ready for her to go, she was very active and used to being outside. Julia of course was very sad to lose her, however Lucky got into all of Julia's things so she was happy to have the kitten stay out of her room. Julia gets to go visit Lucky every once in awhile in her new home. Lucky is very spoiled and gets to live in a barn and chase all the mice she wants.

We were very occupied with the kitten for the rest of the summer and then getting ready for school to start.
Ethan was so excited to start Kindergarten, he had watched Julia love Kindergarten the year before which just made him want to go to school that much more. He counted down the days! We took their pictures at the school sign at the Back to School night.



At last the first day of school came! They were both excited and nervous about that day. They both barely even looked back as they got out of the car and ran to their respective classrooms. I couldn't believe that after 12 years of being a stay at home mom there weren't any children at home. It was surreal.

Ethan's Kindergarten teacher is Emma Orr and Julia's First grade teacher is Meredith Curtis. They were great fits for the kids personality and discipline wise. We were so glad that they got such great teachers.

J.C returns from scout camp

J.C. had a great week at scout camp. His favorite part was learning First Aide which surprised us all.

Scrubberella and Indiana McQueen or is it Lightening Jones?

We don't have a fireplace, so we can't have a princess named Cinderella. I guess we will have to settle for Scrubberella. Two weeks ago, I had Julia and Ethan help me clean the bathrooms. At first, I got moans and groans and then Julia found that happy place inside and made it fun to scrub the bathtub. This week, she was very excited to help. The bottom of the tubs have never been so clean, nor the person doing it, been so happy.

Indiana McQueen or Lightening Jones?

While we are talking about cleaning, Ethan made a mess with his cupcake and when he came back up stairs to clean it, he was wearing the hat. I thought it went so well with his t-shirt.