Preschool Grad

Lydia recently had her last day of preschool. And boy was she excited for it! That may sound weird, but to her, the end of preschool meant summer was coming, and after summer comes KINDERGARTEN. So needless to say, she was excited for graduation...though maybe not for the reasons as the other kids.

Lydia was one of eight students in her class and was known for being patient with the other kids, for helping the teacher read to the other kids, and for loving to get dressed up for school.

Lydia's teacher was impressed that she has mastered/surpassed everything to learn in preschool besides writing (Lydia's one main hardship - she just needs better coordination!). She counts to a hundred by ones, fives, and tens, can read, adds and subtracts, has mastered scissor skills, understands rhymes, opposites, and patterns. Basically, she's a whiz. And that's coming from her teacher...not just me :)

Lydia picked a horse as her animal in the presentation because it's my favorite - such a sweetheart!

Although Lydia was looking forward to the end of preschool, she sure loved going and making arts and crafts, playing, field trips, learning, and just growing up.

And boy are my kids growing up!

Here are the side-by-sides of both of my babes on the first day of preschool and the last:

Ammon is really the one that has shocked me with his growth. I know he's growing like a weed, but the side-by-side really shows how he's matured. It makes me want to lay down and sob. Look at that sweet baby-boy face in the first half, and then the child-face in the second! My baby boy, where did you go?

The other thing I love is the growth of Lydia's self-portrait from the first day of preschool and the last:

From a circle with legs and arms poking out, to a body with clothes, long hair, and even eyelashes and toes. Not to mention the improvement of the writing of her name! I knew she would thank me after forcing her to sit down and write her name over and over again - despite the tears and whining, it's helping!

My beautiful Lydia-girl did so well at school, just as I knew she would. And I'm not joking when I say she seriously gets stars in her eyes when you talk about starting kindergarten. It was the one time during her preschool graduation when she dropped her shyness and showed some life, when her teaching asked if she was excited for kindergarten. All the other moms laughed and turned and smiled at me because she just couldn't hold back a grin. I don't know what she's expecting, but she asks all the time if it's fall yet because she knows that's when it starts. I'm perfectly happy with her innocent exuberance for school and only wish she could be that way all her life!

May Days

I keep swearing I'm going to keep up with our lives on here...and I really want to! The only problem is that my phone is having so many problems making my pictures accessible, that the hassle makes me put it off because it takes so long. But, today I messed around with the process for awhile, and hopefully I found something that works better so I can post more. On that note, let's go over our month of May so that I can start posting about June, since it's been busy for us lately.

First of all, we've been visiting the library weekly and with the weather turning warmer, it's been giving us all the camping itch. The parking lot looks just like a camp-ground parking lot: it's a one way road with little pull offs and everything. And the building looks like a lodge or something. It's like we've driven to the mountains for a camp out instead of the library.

I love it!

One of the joys of Maple Valley.








When the weather is good we then drive across the road to Lake Wilderness Park.

I told Ammon to smile, and this is his face. It makes me laugh and scares me a bit...

There's so much to do at this park that we could spend hours here. Playgrounds, a creek to throw rocks in, ducks to feed at the lake, and more.

It's really so picturesque sometimes, it kills me. All this beauty, across the street from the library and five minutes from our house.

Memorial day weekend my parents were out of town so Brigham and I ran the house with our kids and my three siblings. Saturday morning all the boys went to see the new X-Men movie while I hit up the Memorial weekend sales with the kids at the mall (I think I got the better end of the deal). We packed a lunch and had fun eating it at the food-mart.

 The next Monday, on actual Memorial Day, we embarked on a hiking trip to Squak Mountain State Park
.

We first went on the Pretzel Tree Interpretive trail where they had little signs with a story that led you to the pretzel tree that basically looked like two trunks winding together. It wasn't as cool as I thought it would be, but Brigham had fun showing it to the kids and they loved running from sign to sign.





The Pretzel Tree trail was short so we decided to hike a little further on another trail, just to get the kids hiking-ready for this summer. We only went for another mile, but it was fun because we did get to feed some horses who were taking their owners up the trail too.

Ammon was hilarious because he kept saying how the hike had too many hills, and when were we going to get out of the forest, I'm tired of the forest, etc. When we finally did get out of the forest, he jumped up and cheered, "Yes!"




The state park was supposed to have some picnic tables to eat lunch at, but it was weirdly all messed up with trees chopped down and nothing except the trails, so we left to eat somewhere else.




First we stopped by the National Cemetery to pay our respects.


We didn't know anyone buried at that location, but Kenny did put in benches for his Eagle Project there, so we said hello to those and remembered those gone before us in other parts of the country.

After that we went to Lake Wilderness Park to play and eat lunch before we headed home. It was a great day.

Lydia and Ammon had their annual check-ups at the doctor and Lydia got her testing and shots for Kindergarten. She of course passed the eye and hearing tests, though she was too shy to raise her hand when she heard a sound. We could tell when she heard the sounds by the little smile on her face she couldn't hold back when the machine beeped in her ear. And she was so brave during her shots! She just flinched a little bit and didn't even cry. She did get a really offended look on her face towards the nurse, haha. We talked about it a lot ahead of time so she knew what to expect, and the nurse said she had a feeling Lydia would do very well because I was so calm. She said that often the mothers are the ones that are so anxious that it makes the kids freak out. It made me feel pretty good, like I had done one parenting thing right in my life. I promised Lydia and Ammon a new book (well a new-used book that I bought at the library book sale) if they did well at the doctor's and they both definitely earned their prizes.

I had to laugh because Ammon now out-weighs Lydia by a couple pounds. He weighed 39 lbs and she weighs 37. Honestly, he feels like we weighs a lot more than only two pounds more than Lydia. That kid is heavy! But he's had a huge growing-spree lately and he's always been a big boy. They both stayed in their normal ranges with Ammon being in the 90th percentile for weight and 75th percentile for height. Lydia is 30th percentile for weight and 50th percentile for height. Pretty much what they have both been since they were born. So they're growing great!

We also took a really fun evening trip to the beach at Kopachuck State Park.

We swam in the water, caught crabs, found tons of sand-dollars, built sand castles, and just enjoyed the sunshine for once. Both my kids were terrified of the crabs and seaweed, and Ammon wouldn't even touch the water because it was too "yucky". Lydia only lasted about two minutes in it, and the second Brigham let go of her hand she screamed bloody murder and then when he picked her up, she scaled him like a ladder. Wimps for children, I tell you.

We had a marvelous time. The boys made a couple different sand castles because the tide was coming in and destroyed them. They worked as hard as they could to protect each one from the water, but alas, the longest one lasted was nine minutes once the water had breached it's protective walls and moats built around it.




The kids really liked helping to build the castle and pretty much everyone got in on trying to defeat the elements and save the castles from the water.











Once the tide is in completely, the beach isn't very sandy anymore and it's only rocks, so we threw a frisbee for a bit and then left to go find food.

Summer really is the best in Washington, and we've had such a mellow spring that we were able to get a May preview of all the fun we can have these next couple months.