September

Sept. 6:

 Garrett ordered these cute little bikes without pedals for Noah and Bella.  Our nephew had one at the family reunion and Noah just loved it.  It helps them get the balance down for when they are learning to ride.  They both just love them.  It's fun to watch them ride them and Bella is feeling really comfortable with hers, so we'll have to have her try a bike with pedals soon.  

 I guess I don't have a picture of Bella on hers.  Hers is yellow, of course.  

Sept. 7th

The RS put together a temple trip for the morning, so I went with them since I hadn't been in a long time.  It was nice to get away with some ladies.  I was able to to see the new temple video, which was awesome by the way.  I love how they changed it.  Afterwards, we went out to lunch at Olive Garden and somehow, it turned into an all day event.  We didn't get home until 3!  Also that morning was the Daddy Daughter hike for the activity day girls activity.  This year, Garrett had two girls to go with.  They had a good time and took a picnic lunch.  They were very excited to tell me that they saw snakes on their hike.  I guess because they know that I HATE snakes!

Sept. 8th

Maggie had been asked to speak in Sacrament meeting and was given the topic of education.  She was glad for the topic, because she loves learning.  She did an excellent job, of course!  Grandma and Grandpa came to show their support for her.  It's so nice having family close by!  Later that afternoon we drove over to grandma and grandpas for dinner and Paige taught our FHE on being reverent in church.  

Sept. 10th

 Noah's 1st day of Preschool!!

 I drove him this first day of school because I didn't know how he was going to do when I dropped him off.  I thought for sure he would cry and cling to my leg and not want to go in.  That is how he is in nursery EVERY Sunday.  But, by some miracle, I took a picture of him, his teacher came out and welcomed him to school and walked him into the hall where they hang up their backpack and walked him in to class.  He smiled the whole way and didn't look back at me.  I seriously was shocked.  I didn't know if I should stay, you know just in case he decided to break down when he realized I wasn't behind him.  But then I thought, I should just go, they've got it under control.  So, I bolted!!  It was awesome!  

A picture of him at the preschool.

I signed up at this preschool because 2 of my friends have little boys around the same age that were going here and we thought it would be a good idea to carpool since we all live in the same neighborhood.  I think having his 2 buddies there really helped him feel comfortable going.  I also love the fact that the class size is so much smaller than the other preschool we were going to.  The old one typically had 25 kids and this one has 12!  I love it!

I was also worried about him, because we just barely got him potty trained and I was worried about him having an accident or going #2 and not being able to wipe himself.  (Too much info, I know...sorry)  But, to this day he has never had an accident or anything.  And the teachers there are very understanding about this age group and potty training in general, so I was glad for that, too.  So, we're all very happy with this preschool.  

Garrett was out of town for a couple of days, so that night was a little hectic with soccer and then having mutual right after.  We were having class activities (I am the YW 1st counselor and I am over the Mia Maids) so Maggie needed to be at the church right after soccer and my activity was going to be at our house, since we were cooking pizza's.  Luckily, I was able to get a ride for Maggie and then my awesome advisor was able to pick up some of the other Mia maids and bring them to my house. It was a little crazy with all of my kids there though, and trying to get them ready for bed and still be in charge of the activity and show everyone where everything was.  I was glad when that night was over.  :)

Sept. 13th

That night we went to a dinner and silent auction for our friend's co-worker's son who passed away from a disease called Juvenile Myositis.  It's an autoimmune disease that hits kids 18 and under.  This is the second year that we have gone with our friends.  This year the event was held on the roof top of a parking garage in down town Portland.  It was a beautiful night and there was a beautiful view, but once the sun went down, it was kind of chilly.  They had a buffet dinner and then had a silent auction.  For the entertainment, the had dueling pianos, which I had heard of before but never seen.  It was a lot of fun.  They would play songs, most of which people requested.  If you donated more money with your song request, they would play that ASAP.  After all, the idea was to raise money, right?  Garrett gave them $20 to play Jukebox Hero.  They did and it was pretty funny...he had to look up the lyrics for it.  Anyways, it was really entertaining.  After they did that, they had a live auction and one of the things they were auctioning was this huge cake.  It was pretty massive, it weighed like 25 lbs.  Anyways, Garrett bought that cake for a chunk of change and after all of us at our table had our fill, we offered it up for the rest of the people there.  And there was still some left for us to take home.  It was a fun night, and from what I've heard, a lot of money was raised to help find a cure for this awful disease.  

These were the dueling pianists.  They were really good and really funny.  

Sept. 15-19th

Just another typical busy week.  Dinner at the grandparent's house on Sunday (love that), Monday--physical therapy appt. for Maggie to build up strength in her back from her scoliosis, Tuesday--preschool, soccer, activity day girls activities, YM/YW Temple trip for Maggie, Wednesday--dance class for Paige, I get sick on Wed and Thurs; Thursday--piano lessons--Maggie, dance--Bella, soccer--everyone, and back to school night for Maggie--luckily Garrett takes her since I still don't feel very well.  

On Thursday, my friend Beth drove for preschool that day and after school took all three boys, plus her other little boy to the zoo since it was such a nice day.  They had a great time and I was so appreciative to have a few more hours of quiet.  Thanks Beth!

 Ethan (Beth's boy) and Noah

 Cooper (Gabe's boy), Noah, and Trevor (Beth's 2 yr. old) climbing in the jeep at the zoo

Ethan and Noah.  I know this picture has a giant snake's head which totally gives me the willies every time I see it, but I think it's the funniest picture because Ethan is so close to the snake's gigantic head that it looks so weird.  Like Beth said, it looks like he's getting hypnotized or something.  

Sept. 20

That night we went to a Primary Teacher Appreciation Dinner at the church because Garrett is a primary teacher.  It was such a nice dinner--they put a lot of work into the nice decorations and made a really yummy spaghetti dinner.  They played a fun game that allowed people to get to know each other and then we went home.  We talked about going out after, but I think we just went home and watched a movie.  

Sept. 21st

We went out to eat for Grandpa Jim's 73rd birthday (which was the next day), then we had to head over to the stake center because our stake is participating in another dance festival and that night was the Kick-off.  Our last one was 6 years ago. I was YW president then and I remember going to see it and how awesome it was.  So, I'm really excited about this one.  I'm just trying to convince Maggie about how awesome it is.  

The kick-off was lots of fun.  They got the kids involved right away by learning part of the opening and closing dances, showing off the costumes, etc.  Maggie's age group for our stake will be dancing the Cotton-eyed Joe.  We've had a few practices so far and they are picking it up rather quickly.  But it is very fast paced, so they have to know those steps in their sleep.  I'm really excited about it! 

Sept. 22nd

Garrett wanted to surprise his parents for Jim's birthday by showing up at their ward building for their sacrament meeting.  Their church starts at 9 like ours does, but it's also 25 minutes away.  So, we really had to work at it to get there before they did.  But, we did it, and they were surprised.  I think they were really glad to see us there and be able to introduce us to all of their friends.  Later that afternoon, they came over to our house for dinner and presents and cake.  

Sept. 23rd

Maggie started her season of  soccer on Monday.  She has it every Monday and Wednesday until mid November.  Her first day was pretty rough, I guess some girls were talking bad about her behind her back.  She was really sad and frustrated and wanted to quit.  But after talking about it and telling her those girls might not even be on her team, then she decided to keep going and things have been better since.  She's really liking it a lot and working hard to improve.

Sept. 25th
I was coming home from taking someone somewhere and I had Noah with me.  It was in the evening and he fell asleep in the car on the way home.  I got him out of the car and he woke up a little bit, but I layed him on the couch and he fell back to sleep.  He slept for like an hour.  He was so tired!  Of course, since he had such a late nap, he was up till 10 or so.  He never falls asleep on the couch and he hasn't had a nap in at least 6 months.

Sept. 26th
Here are a few pictures of Bella in her acrobatics class.

 She was actually walking this way.

Sept. 27th

Lydia had her first b-day sleep over at one of her good friend's houses.  I don't really like my kids attending sleep overs, but we decided that this one would be OK and she really really wanted to go.  She had such a great time.  I told her to not stay up all night because she would be miserable the next day.  Garrett actually got mad at me for saying that.  I guess he thinks that staying up all night once is fine and part of the 'sleep over' experience.  I happen to disagree and value my sleep more than that.  Plus, only bad things happen when you stay up all night.  Right, Tad and Megs?  Luckily, she didn't stay up past midnight.  :)

Lydia and Elise

Sept. 28th

Maggie and I had been doing really good with exercising everyday during the summer, so I signed us up to participate in a 5K "Bubble Run" in downtown Portland on the 28th.  I thought it would be something fun to do together and it was a good way to keep us motivated to keep exercising.  Unfortunately, the weather that weekend didn't cooperate.  There was a bunch of rain and strong winds, and so they decided to post pone the event.  The only problem was that they postponed it until Aug. 2014!  Pretty much a year away.  We were pretty bummed.  I think it will still be a lot of fun, but who knows what I'll be doing next August.  

Well, that pretty much sums up September.  I hope I didn't bore everyone to death with all my details.  I'm trying to capture more of the day to day events of our lives, but I'm also wanting to quickly catch up on this blog.  So, I wanted to get all of September done.  In the future, I'll break it up more, so there's not so much in each post.  At least I'm in October now, right Megs?