Joseph: 6; July: 4; Girls Camp: 24; Abigail: 11

We've had a few busy weeks lately! THANKS to those who helped us, particularly my mom and sis-in-law, Tarilynn, who took care of the kids while I was wandering the wilderness with my Sassy Celestialites (more on that later). 

Our Super-Dee-Duper, hilarious, giggly, on the move, snugly boy with a huge imagination turned 6.  I can hardly believe it even though he'll be in first grade soon...gosh, time has flown by since he was born in the middle of the night in Gallop, New Mexico.  Oh, no one can make us laugh like this little boy.  I wonder what he will be doing when he turns 15...25...35...45...heck, it's kind of quiet at the moment, I wonder what he's doing right now  (OK, it's all good, he's just playing). 

The boys got some fun things from Chad and Tarilynn, much more things to throw around, which is always a good idea with these two.  (Please not in the house)

Another always good present, a flashlight.

 Hurrah for after Christmas sales, we got an awesome Cars2 Lego set, he was dancing around the room.  I mean, more than usual. Look at that cheeser grin. Happy Birthday our funny little boy, so happy to have you making our family a little gigglier.

Just a cute picture, Abby loves to help Felicity during her piano practice.  Which, by the way, is going very well, she loves it and is always pushing to learn more songs and fooling around making her own songs.  So glad she gets this chance!

And then on July 4th, we were invaded.  It was just our nephews, but they still looked a little different.  Every year my family meets in my dad's hometown for all the fun small town festivities.   Farris ran the 10K and I did the 5K (I won't say ran, I just "did" it),we ate the town pancake breakfast, rode the Newey family float, had a yummy lunch with cousins I haven't seen for awhile, and just enjoyed the day very much.  During the fireworks we stayed in my aunts backyard and then when it was done, the kids wrapped themselves in glow sticks and gave us a show.  We got into a glow stick fight with my cousin Travis, which ultimately ended after everyone went to bed: Travis got up at 4:00 to head back to work and dumped the nephews out of their tent before he left.  Wait until next year Trav, they'll be prepared!

The Monday after the 4th I headed up to Heber Valley Camp  for Stake Girls Camp as the camp director for our ward.  Such a great place, so amazing.  The stake theme was Tribes and Testimonies, each ward was supposed to pick a tribal name--something with an -ite on the end--for each ward to focus on.  After throwing out the girls first pick (I won't even say it), we settled on Sassy Celestialites.  Thanks for the idea Nicki!  Our girls definitely have a little sass going on, and I wanted the girls to know that they are on the path to the celestial Kingdom and that should be their goal.  Lots of preparation went into this week and it went so well.  We had 24 girls, one just for the last day, and they were wonderful, love them.  So many things I was afraid would fall through or not work, or people would be bored or mad or all kind of things go wrong, but it was smooth, fun, spiritual and very, very tiring!  The campground has a lake to canoe on (and none of our girls tipped over, although we almost had a couple dunks), an amazing challenge course and these incredible couple missionaries that run everything and are excited to be around the girls.  Awesome, awesome, and well worth all the prep we did for it.  Thanks to the other leaders and our fabulous Bishop, everyone worked hard and helped me remember all those things I forgot to do.  Thanks to Farris who worked so hard to get that 24th girl up to camp and made sure everything at home was going smoothly.  What a good week! 

There's our girls!!

In the middle of the week that I was at camp, Abigail turned 11 months.  She did so good while I was gone.  We were afraid, she's such a mommy's girl, but mom and Tarilynn were great.  Me, however, I missed my baby.  Just a little bit.  Heh.  I told just a few...maybe a little more than a few...that she was turning 11 months and that I missed her, and that I hoped she was doing o.k, and that she was So. Very. Cute.  But in the end she (I) lived throught the separation.  So, anyway, here's a few highlights of the past month:

**She got two more teeth, on the top, but they aren't the middle, they are her cute little fangs.  So we have our Vampire baby.  And she does bite, so be careful.

**She officially took her first steps.  She's up to 9 steps at a time, but if you are expecting a show, sorry, she's no performing monkey.  She walks when she wants to, thank you. 

**We have a gate at the top and and one at the bottom of our long set of stairs (no, Chad, not to lock them in the middle), and she's figured out how to crawl through the one on the bottom and climb up all 12 steps.  Coming down safely is still a problem, we'll have to work on that, especially now that she can get through the bottom gate.

**She's still such a happy baby, loves to clap and wave good bye, she likes to be really loud in church and tries to crawl under the benches, her favorite things are her brothers and sister, but mom and dad get good hugs, too.  She's quick on those little knees and dresses bug her because it's hard to crawl in them, she gets up on the hands and feet with her little bum in the air, so cute.  My favorite thing is when she starts dancing, she'll jam to any music.  She likes to help lead the music in church or during FHE, too.  Our musically happy little baby.  Only one more month until she's a year old!  Crazy, crazy. 

There's that cute grin!

 Look out Jedi, here she comes.

I was playing on Picaso, loved how this one turned out.  Nice that I can do it with just one little button, since I'm photoshop illiterate.  I might have to do one of these for each of the kids, wouldn't that be a cute grouping?  Hmmmm, much more to do.

Abigail's 10 months and summer fun

Happy to be 10 months!!!

Yum, tasty

Well, hello

La-la-laaaa!

Yes, Abby is 10 months old now.  She's trying to walk, doing a little bit of cruising along furniture.   She's even standing for longer periods of time,  she'll go for about 30 seconds and we can see her chubby little legs just shaking with concentration to not sit down,it's cute.  Her favorite sound to make is "da-da-da-da" which makes Farris really happy, of course. Although she's not doing too much that is new-new, but she's doing everything harder and better and longer.  The other day she discovered our little toy walker and she spent a lot of time zooming up and down the hallway downstairs. (I'm trying to load the video...having problems with the new blogger, if any of you know how to do it, let me know!)

For our playgroup the other day we had a parade!  The kids could dress up in costumes and decorate bikes or wagons, and then there was the noise! The noise, NOISE, NOISE, NOISE, NOISE! (heh.  anybody recognize where that quote comes from?  hint: it's a Dr. Seuss book :)  The kids had a lot of fun with some noise makers, actually had a lot of fun.  We went up and down the street from our church and we made a few smiles from people passing by in cars.  We also invited Brother Wharton to join us as our Grand Marshall, but he declined. 

Felicity reprised her Cowgirl costume from Halloween, including tying her stick horse onto her bike.  Caleb was a soccer player but I didn't get a picture of his soccer field he decorated his bike with (he was moving too fast!) and Joseph couldn't decide what to dress up as, so he just smiled his charming little smile and enjoyed the parade.

Seth was a noisy dinosaur!

And Abigail was a sweet little princess.  Who didn't like her hat and spent most of the time trying to eat it. 

We went to our city's splash pad one day. Their favorite thing to do is sit on the fountains, giggle, giggle, giggle.



Seth spent the whole time running back and forth, getting wet, drying off, getting wet, and drying off.  Such a cutie.

 

Caleb loves it.

Felicity loved packing Abby around through the fountains.  Abby wasn't too sure, she liked to get her hands wet, but then it would hit her face and she'd look stunned.  I can't wait to try her out in the pool later this summer. 

Father's Day is always fun, the kids love looking for gifts for Dad.  This year we made a special card (umm, yes, the idea from Pinterest) where we traced all the kids right foot and then Farris' right foot and then glued them in a stack with the words "Following in Daddy's Footsteps."  It turned out really cute, although Felicity was disappointed because Caleb's foot was exactly the same size.  I had to pull her foot up a little higher so we could see it at all.  Joseph's foot is only a size or two bigger than Seths.  Yup, I can already tell who is going to be the tall ones in our family. 

And now I have to tell a Joseph Quote.

Joseph came running into the kitchen this morning.  "Mom!  Can I have a monkey?"

I was a little alarmed "What? You want a monkey?"

He turned red. "I mean, can I have a banana?" 

It made me laugh.  Because I can totally see him asking me for a monkey. 

Caleb's Baptism

Caleb turned 8 years old on May 29th!  He was so excited, not just for his birthday, but also that he was going to be baptized in just a few days.  He wanted a Lego cake, so I decided to try fondant for the first time.  I got a recipe off of Allrecipes.com that was called butter cream fondant, it said that it tasted better than regular fondant....but it kind of melted so I had to shlop (that might not be a word, but it's what it felt like) it on and pat it in place.  Anyone have a recipe that works better? 

He still liked it (even all shloppy), and the kids loved the marshmallow nubs on the top. 

We gave him a Lego City police boat set, he loved that it actually could float and after it was all together we had to try it out in the kitchen sink.

We managed to catch the perfect expression with this present from grandma Child--a light saber.  Now he can give up on using sticks or forks or...socks...and actually have something respectable.  He also got a Moon Phase light from G-ma and G-pa Newey which he has really been excited about.  He knows he wants to be a scientist, he just keeps bouncing from space or marine or insect, I think he just likes learning about things. 

 On June 2nd, he was baptized.  What a blessing!  We had much of our family there (we missed those of you who couldn't come!) Caleb really enjoyed having so much support and love.  After all the preparation the actual baptism happens so fast, but the Spirit was strong and Caleb has been writing about it in his journal so I hope that moment is what he will remember the most.

 This is all the Newey cousins (minus Tanner who is still on his mission), I love this shot because of Rachel doing some kind of crazy Chicken Dance.  SHE IS HILARIOUS!  Of course, Seth wasn't being an angel at the moment either, as you can see he's in take off mode.  And Blake wasn't really sure why we handed the baby to him. 

 The picture with the adults was a little more sedate.  I think we threatened them with something, but I can't remember what it was...we're just missing my brother Robert and Tanner, of course.

 And here's the Child family, we're missing Geri and Cody and family, Desi and Nick and family, and Sam and Kolleen and (I guess we can count Audi the dog) family.  We have another baptism on this side coming up soon, so I hope we'll get to see them there. 

 For our traditional Baptism Present, we give the kids their own set of hardback scriptures and a journal with their names engraved on it.  He's been asking for a set, and a bigger scripture bag (which is in the works) for awhile so he was pretty happy with it.

And I don't have any pictures, but we've been enjoying summer break.  We've stuck to the schedule of chores, reading time, then free time so far.  Hmmm, I hope we make it all summer! It's been a hot summer so our garden is kind of fried, but my sis brought a new plant for us to try.  It's called Stivia (I'm not sure I'm spelling it right) but it's sort of a sugar plant.  The leaves can be steeped or ground and then put in whatever you want sweetened, so there is less processing than with white sugar, sooo it's supposed to be better for you and since it is sweeter than white sugar you use less of it.  It should be an adventure, anyway, and I'm excited!  Also growing at our house now is an ivy plant my aunt brought to us.  It's an ivy plant with history!  It's from a start from the ivy we had at our wedding receptions.  I'm not the best at keeping house plants alive (yeah, my degree is for OUTSIDE plants.  Heh) and managed to kill off the two we kept, so it's sweet to have a little bit of our history back.  But if anyone managed to keep one of those goldfish alive that we had a the receptions, that's ok, you can keep it.  I am very sure a fish wouldn't last too long in this curious household.

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And now I just have to share some cute pictures...

 

I'm still trying to get a "stinky face" picture.  She just doesn't want it captured for posterity, I think.  We'll try to sneak it out of her.

Caleb's program and celebrating the End of School

Caleb finished his 2nd grade year with a wonderful program. His favorite song from it was Lean on Me, and he memorized his part with out telling us that he had one. He's had such a good year and grown and learned so much.  He even started multiplication and fractions this year...and he's actually excited enough about it that he brought home two math workbooks that he wants to work in this summer.  If I didn't know better, I would swear he wasn't related to me.  But I am glad that he's excited about math.

He loved his teacher this year and was sad when she announced that she'd be teaching at a different school next year.   

After school on Wednesday the kids (mostly our social Felicity) wanted to invite friends over, and I wanted to try out something I'd seen on Pinterest...a water balloon pinata! But instead of groping them all together, we hung them all over the tree. They looked like colorful rain drops falling from the tree and lasted about that long. The kids and some friends had so much fun, I think we can call this a success (even though it takes a lot longer to hang them than to pop them!) and do it again.

Friday was the last day of school, so my three little helpers (hmmmm) helped me get ready to welcome Felicity and Caleb to summer!

Always excited and a little sad for the last day of school, but they had fun breaking through the streamers so we could officially start summer--first thing is otter pops!

Next we finished gathering everything for the first camping trip of the year.  We just got a tent trailer and were so excited to try it out.  Farris got off work early and we headed up Diamond Fork Canyon to find a camp site.  Of course, it was Memorial Day weekend and we hadn't reserved a site so it took a little (a lot) of driving to find a site that was empty but we were really excited to find a place that wasn't packed with people and was at a trail head.

We quickly set everything up and went for a hike before the rain started!  We got hit by a few drops but what smells better than rain in the mountains in the spring?  Abigail was in a carrier backpack and loved looking around at all the trees, especially because she got to munch on graham crackers. 

After a dinner of tin foil dinners and peach cobbler (it's always surprising how much you can eat in the mountains) we roasted marshmallows for s'mores.  And then after pjs were on we did a un-camp like thing and watched a movie on the laptop.  In the morning the clouds were still threatening and a cold wind had come up so after breakfast we packed up and headed home, making plans for all the future camping trips we'll take this summer.  So ready for summer!  So excited for swimming and camping and water fights!  Bring it on!

Beginning of End of School Stuff

The end of the school year always brings lots of activities, field trips, and programs.  This week has been a little crazy, and we still have one more week to go!  Felicity went to the This is the Place State Park (her teacher took a picture of her next to the Burnett Cabin, our ancestor's cabin.) 

Joseph went to the Hogle Zoo.  Oh, the craziness that is the Kindergarten Trip to the Zoo!  I didn't get to go this year...I love going, but it's almost a relief that I had an excuse!  They both had fun, anyway.  Caleb had an All-Second Grade Kickball game that he was so excited about, it was boys against girls.  He's not sure who won, but he had much fun playing.

Another kindergarten tradition is the Kindergarten Store.  Each kid makes 10 things, labels them as $.05 each and brings fifty pennies.  Then they get to shop each others stuff and bring home ten new things and fifty new pennies.  I got an idea from the Parents magazine website and we made clothespin airplanes.

http://www.parents.com/fun/arts-crafts/kid/simple-wood-crafts/?page=4

I did the gluing (he tried to help but burnt his finger on the glue) and he painted.  It kept him busy for about an hour and a half and since he did it outside there wasn't much of a mess.  I have a feeling we're going to more of these projects

Felicity's class did the play "The Lion King" and Felicity was Nala.  She worked really hard memorizing her lines and was so excited when it was time to perform.  I painted her face before she left for school that day and she wouldn't wash it off the rest of the day. 

Getting a snuggle from Seth.  Every time one of the lionesses came on stage, he'd ask:  "Is that Sissy?"  He was pretty excited for her.

Joseph's Kindergarten Graduation.

He likes to pose for the camera, what a funny kid!  He's grown so much this past year, it's incredible. His teacher says he's so friendly with everyone, it doesn't matter what table she puts him at, he still finds someone to talk to.  Not sure if that's a good thing...  We've also been stopped at the grocery store with some little boy waving excitedly "MOM! That's Joseph!"  He's a major celebrity in the kindergarten world.

 His teacher did a marvelous job, we're so sad she's going to another school this next year. 

Here's our kindergartner!! Good job, Joseph!!

 Felicity's program was later in the day on Friday.  This year they learned about the history of Utah, starting with dinosaurs, moving up to the native tribes from this area, the pioneers and mountain men and then on to each individual county.  Felicity's favorite song?  The Beaver Song.  You'll have to ask her for a performance the next time you see her.

Lissy's teacher did a great job this year, too.  Thanks to all our wonderful teachers!

I realize this was a very Joseph and Lissy heavy post, but Caleb's program is next week, and he's having all his fun things next week, too (water day, PPPPP Party), plus his baptism is in just two weeks.  Here's the picture I took for his announcement:

Such a handsome kid!