Remaking a Shirt

In Setember, the girls did a cheer camp at the local high school, and they were given shirts to wear to their performance. Unfortunately, the shirts were sized more for amazons than preschoolers, so I pulled out my scissors and went to work on them. I am by no means an expert, or even very good at this type of thing at all, but the finished result was so much better than what we started with. I took a shirt of Sareny's and cut the performance shirt down.

I also cut the sleeves off and cut them way down as well.

And then I tried to put them back together...and that's where it got dicey. I soon realized that I had cut the shirt down too much and hoped it would fit Finley instead of Sareny. And the sleeves--oh those darn sleeves. I had to unpick and reattach them, and I realized that I should have cut them so that I could use the bottom hem instead of sewing a new one. The sleeve hem was a bit fluttery, but still worked. Since I had learned a bit from the first go round, I cut the sleeve out better for Sareny's, but she ended up disappointed that her sleeve wasn't fluttery. Go figure. Here is Fin in the first shirt I made.














Both girls, where you can see the difference in the sleeves.














Despite my difficulties, when we got to the performance, I realized that my girls' shirts looked super awesome. Most people wondered how come they actually had shirts that fit them.

Grandma comes to visit

Grandma Nancy came to visit us in September! We were so happy to have her come. She went on a marathon roadtrip with her sister Susan--they drove down together from Washington and stopped to visit their kids on the way. After seeing us, they headed over to Disneyland with the Spiess family, before heading back home the scenic road up the California and Oregan coastline. They got to our house on a Friday, and the next day we headed off for some fun. We ate lunch at Cooperstown.

I like the atmosphere there and it is fun to go somewhere that isn't a chain. Sareny, Keith and Finley were sharing a Big Unit!, and I shared my food with the kids as well. Poor Finley wasn't very happy when they put the big unit right in front of Sareny.

Three of the kids with their grandma Nancy.

Daddy and Finley

Then we drove out to the Dinosaur museum in Mesa. I think it might actually be called the Natural History Museum. We hadn't been there in years, and yet the kids still mentioned things they remembered and asked about going back, so it was nice to revisit.

Sareny's foot was a little bit smaller than a dinosaur's.

Our family in front of a dinosaur skeleton.

They had a hands on area where kids could touch actual fossils. And let's face it, adults just might be interested in touching too.

There were several giant puzzles that we enjoyed putting together.

Sareny wanted to be pushed in the stroller and wouldn't get out, so I told her I would take her picture and blog about it. So there she is.

And Sareny took this lovely self portrait with Finley.














We also enjoyed looking at the disgusting old jail cells they used to use, and panning for gold. Keith and I were having no luck panning with Isaac and Finley--if we really stretched our imagination, we could sort of see a few small flecks. Suddenly, Sareny and Susan were having tons of luck, finding big nuggets that Sareny said you could just pick up off the sand without even sifting. I was puzzled, since they had been panning right where we had just checked. Susan later admitted to me that she purchased a bag of little nuggets in the gift shop and dropped them in for Sareny to find. Clever idea, really. It's much more fun when you actually can find something! Anyway, we had a super fun visit with them before they headed off to Disneyland without us. That was kind of sad.

Gymastics Show

Sareny's gym was selling tickets to a gymnastics show in September featuring the returning Olympians. We try to rotate through our kids taking turns going on dates with them, so we bought two tickets for a date night. I thought it looked like a really cool show and I'll admit I was a little disappointed that with a nursing baby, I wouldn't be the one taking her. Keith was thrilled to be able to take his daughter on a special date.

They had such a great time! I always loved gymnastics as a kid, and I would have loved going to a show like this.

 Since I wasn't there, I'm not entirely sure what they are doing, but it looks pretty cool. I recognize some of the gymnasts from the Olympics.

Obviously not an olympic event, but it looks way cool nonetheless.

Yikes on the outfits! Keith and Sareny had a fun time on their date, and the rest of us weren't too sad at home, since we were having a good time with Grandma Nancy and Aunt Susan, who had come to visit us.

Baby Love

I think we can all admit that little Rivvy is demanding of our time and attention, but let's face it, she's pretty darn cute and we love her tons.

We decided to try Lexi's sunglasses on her, which took some doing...

Rockstar baby going incognito.

Finley is a lovey big sister.

Isaac loves his little sissie.














A sleeping baby--doesn't happen much around here. And if you have any expectation of her staying asleep, then you better count on holding her for the entire nap as well! But we try to remember that she is growing so fast and soon this stage will be far behind us, so we are snuggling her and loving her as much as we can.

Look who's eating big girl food!

When Keeley was four and a half months old, we decided to have her try some rice cereal. Here she is getting ready for her first taste.

I love this picture. I can just imagine the caption reading something like, "What the what?! You mean there's other food in the world? Where have I been for the last four months!"

First taste of rice cereal.

Not the most delicious stuff in the world, and it took her some getting used to.

I was actually surprised at how well she did her first feeding. I ended up having to mix up a bit more after she ate the first bowl.

Checking out the bib, to see if it might be tasty...

Just a little bit messy, but not too bad.

And here she is quite happy after her first meal.














Cute smiley girl!

Sareny's New Room

One thing that was hard to leave behind in our old house was Sareny's cute bedroom--we worked really hard painting her room and making it cute for her. It was particularly difficult for her since her new room had really ugly, dirty, flat white paint on the walls.

Well, it only took us two years, but we finally painted her new room, and it looks so adorable! I absolutely love how it turned out.














So cute! The beadboard was kind of a lot of work, at least it looked that way to me. I didn't actually do much by way of painting, or glueing, or nailing, but taking care of the kids while Keith does those things counts for something, right? Sareny also got a new zebra comforter with hot pink sheets.

Sareny wanted us to paint her new room exactly like her old room, but I pictured this looking perfect for a little girl's room. I don't think Sareny could picture what it was going to look like, but she ended up loving it.

Run, Run, Fast as You Can

The kids love the book The Gingerbread Man and ask to have it read to them pretty regularly. Our book has a recipe on the back, and Isaac in particular has asked if we could make our own gingerbread men. So one day we did.
















Unfortunately, I don't know what happened to my gingerbread man cookie cutters, so we just free handed the cookies. They turned out to be pretty chubby, but still tasty and cute. Finley and Isaac half-way wondered if their cookies were going to jump out of the oven and run away, but weren't too disappointed when they didn't. I was surprised that Sareny and Finley actually ate their cookies; not at all surprised that Isaac didn't want to eat his, however.

First day of School for Sare and IJ Isaac

The kids started school on Monday right after the Sollenberger game. Sareny was excited to start third grade at Odyssey again--sadly for her, this was the first year that she wasn't starting at a new school.

She chose this gold lame' backpack. I don't think I need to say anything more about it.

Her teacher this year is Ms. McCord, and she is doing great and loving school.

Isaac started kindergarten this year! He goes in the afternoons and loves it!














Here he is with his blue camo backpack.

Isaac's teacher is named Mrs. Isaacson, which he thinks is pretty cool. He is doing really well in school.

Keeley is wondering why it is so quiet around the house...

Good thing she's here, otherwise I would have an empty house three days a week for two hours...

The Sollenberger Classic

The MV Pirates got invited back to the Sollenberger Classic this year, and we had lots of fun visiting them at the Biltmore Hotel and swimming.

I'm glad that I have such good swimmers!

Isaac really liked the hot tub.

Their slide is lots of fun, and the pool workers are a lot more laid back than at our resident's pool.














Cute little Finney Lynn!

The splash down.

Lexi started cheering and yelling "Woo-hoo!" When I came off the slide once, and we started doing it for everyone after that. The person coming down the slide would then make a pose. It was pretty fun.














The girls in the pool. Minus Grammy Jo. It was kind of sad, because Isaac really wanted her to go down the slide with him. The first day she said she didn't want to get her hair wet, but she would go the next day. Then the next day, she realized she wasn't going to have time to wash her hair and leave to where the team was going, so she told him she couldn't do it again. He thought dripping water all over her hair would solve the problem--her hair was already wet, so then she could go down. :(














Cute kids in front of the slide pool.

Here is our group ready to cheer on the pirates. My friend Lauralyn was here this year with her husband Kelby. It was so fun to see her! We grew up together, and we were roommates together in college, so it is always fun to catch up.

The coach.

We had field passes, so we went down and took a picture of the line of scrimmage.

Lexi was totally embarrassed that I made her take this picture, but I thought we needed a picture of us on the field at Cardinal's Stadium. Also, I noticed that we seem to be taking after my kids here--faces pointed the right direction, eyes were looking at the camera screen...

Even though the Pirates lost this year, it was a super fun time! Hope they get to come back again.