Stay-cation

For our anniversary David's parents came up and stayed with the kids for two nights while David and I enjoyed ourselves a little stay-cation. Friday night we checked into our hotel, ate at the buffet and then saw a late night movie. Which was so fun, it was so nice great to stay up late, watch a movie and then head back to a hotel room with no kids to deal with or to wake us up. Saturday we spent the morning shopping and then we took a nap with no kids to wake us up (seriously our biggest reason for wanting to get away was to catch up on some sleep :) then that afternoon we went and watch The Lion King musical at Mandalay Bay. I've always wanted to see it and I'm really glad we went, it was a excellent show. Then we watched another late night movie. Two movies in one weekend that has never happened to us in our 7 years of marriage, it was so fun. I picked out The Help, which was excellent and we both really enjoyed it. David picked out a movie called Abducted, which was LAME. David was seriously so bummed and embarrassed by his movie, I couldn't help teasing him for a while over it. We went to watch the Bellagio water show because I still have yet to see it. But it wasn't working and we needed to head over to the theater but of course once we got to our car it started but we were to far away to head back before it ended, I was so bummed but that is just my luck. We had a great time the only downfall was it was too short. The weekend went way to quickly. The kids had a lot of fun playing with Grandma and Grandpa as well. David and I have definitely decided that we will not wait another seven years before taking a trip with just the two of us.

My newest nephew made the perfect timing with his debut into the world because we actually happened to be home visiting. I love seeing the babies when the are fresh out of the oven instead of having to wait a couple of months. So I was very excited to meet baby Blake on his first day of life.

Spring Preserve

I have been wanting to go to the Spring Preserve pretty much since we moved here. But we just never got around to going. Well on Labor Day they had a free admission day so we decided to head on over there and see what the whole thing was about. It's a pretty fun place. Lots of things for the kids to do on this particular day. Animals to look out, a live bug show, face painting, free snow cones and popcorn, an indoor play ground. I guess they switch out the themes there every few months so its always changing, always something new to see there. We had a lot of fun and the kids loved it, however it was so cram packed full of people since it was a free day it was hard to do everything, so we'd like to go back another day to full take advantage of all that there is to do there.

Yep Dutch saw another kid with a spiderman painted face and had to have one of his own. Maylee wanted the princess look but was very insistent that she did NOT get paint on her eyes like she did to Dutch.

Dutch Boy!

Dutch missed the kindergarten deadline here in Nevada by nine days. I was a little sad about this because all of the friends (minus his bestie Lukas) he has played with here over the last two years started kindergarten with out him. But I know in the long run with Dutch's personality it will be so much better for him to be the oldest in his class rather than the youngest. Still I knew that this next year would be a little bit boring for him, since he is already so ahead for his age. So instead of doing another joy school with him I enrolled him in the preschool through the rec center which is highly recommended around here. He goes three days a week for 2 hours. He started last Monday and he loves it. It gives him something to look forward to, something with more of a class room structure and time away from his sisters so he can remember just how much he loves them and why he shouldn't tease them so much.

Funny story... after picking him up from preschool on Monday, I was asking him all sorts of questions trying to find out how is day was and who is played with. Here's our conversation,

Me: "So Dutch who did you play with?"

Dutch: "I don't know their names I didn't call them anything."

Me: "Did you play with any girls?"

Dutch: "I love my sisters, but I hate the girls in my class!"

Me: (trying really hard not to seem like I am laughing at him) "Why do you hate the girls?"

Dutch: "Because they only play girl things, I don't like to play girl things."

I was dying laughing. He was cracking me up. And I LOVED that he made sure that he told me he loved his sisters even though they have the misfortune of being girls, but not the girls in his class.

First day of school.

David has been super busy building lots of projects for me around here on his month off. But I haven't been the only one putting in requests for things around here, Dutch made a requests as well. He wanted a Bow & Arrow. He was playing at his friend Kailer's house and apparently he had a bow and arrow and Dutch couldn't stop talking about it. So the wheels in David's head starting turning and he figured out how to make a bow and arrow. And it's like the real deal, maybe a little too dangerous for a four year old. But Dutch loves it and David is quite proud of himself for making one.

Dutch is obsessed with super hero's. For awhile his favorite was spiderman, then he went through a Captain American kick and now as long as it is a super hero he really has no favorite's. He loves them all. But while he was going through the Captain America he really wanted a shield and kept asking for one. So I went out to my craft closet to see what I could come up with without having to go to the store. I think the end result turned out pretty good, for not having to much to work with. And Dutch loves it. After we took the kids to Lowes for the free building day Dutch loved to put on his apron, his googles (they all recieve one for free from Lowe's) and grab his hammer and pretend to build and fix everything around the house. Dutch loves Rue. Although all the kids can be a little too rough with her from time to time. Dutch is such a great kid. He has his bad days, and his sensitive moments. But the kid is golden. He is generally an excellent listener, super obedient, loves his sisters and is a great big brother. I couldn't have been more blessed than to have had him as my first born. He still has a very mellow personality, and he is a pleaser. He hates to upset David and I. I love this boy more than words can say.

Maylee started a dance class and preschool all in the last couple of weeks. I had talked to her about doing dance class several months ago and she was super excited. I took her to buy her tutu and leotard, she was thrilled to have them and wore them for the next week before class. I think I had to wash them twice before her first class. When the big day arrived she had no problem walking into the class all by herself and leaving me at the door. I got to watch through the window and I couldn't help the but have a huge smile on my face as I watched her dance around. She is one cute girl.

Then the following week she got to start preschool. She was beyond thrilled. She was a little jealous of Dutch going to preschool the year before and now it was finally her turn. This year we are doing a joy school with Maylee just like the one we did last year with Dutch. It's me and five of my friends, Heather, Shelly, Jordan, Hailey and Katherine. We take turns teaching, we only have to teach once every six weeks. It's a great system, and I love being able to teach at my house occasionally to watch my kids interact with their friends.

First day of preschool. And lastly Maylee has discovered her "huge muscles" (also known as elbows). She is so proud of how "huge" (her words not mine) her muscles are. And I love that she thinks her elbows are her muscles.

Zions!

David's month off has finally arrived, I really thought it would never come, but it has and nobody is happier than I am about it. So for our first adventure with Daddy we took the kids up to Zions National Park to go camping and we had a blast. We got up there Thursday after noon, set up camp and then headed out for a hike. We took the kids hiking up to the Emerald Pools. The kids enjoyed the hike, even Talli. Although camping with a 17 month old results in a lot of falls & tumbles and therefore makes her look like she's been beaten. She is covered head to toe in scrapes and bruises, but the girl loved camping & hiking and did not appreciate having to be held more than Dutch & Maylee.

Riding the shuttle up to the trail. This is probably the best thing about camping at Zion's. It's a no brainer on things to do. You hop on the free shuttle it carries you to all the different trail heads and drops you off. The kids loved riding the "train bus" and Dutch was always in charge of the map and making sure we got off on the right stops. Walking to the trail.

The start of the trail.

Wow trying to get a decent group photo, is no easy task.

The kids loved these caves. At the lower emerald pool. And about every five feet Maylee just could not resist the urge to sit down and play in the dirt. I'm not sure if it was because it was the super fine, powdery dirt or what but the girl just had to run her fingers through it. At the middle Emerald Pools and that's as far as we went. Hanging around the campground. On Friday we took the kid to the Narrows to play in the water.

And again Maylee could not help herself from stopping to enjoy the wonderful dirt they have there. The girl was filthy. Playing in the water. The water was freezing on Friday, Dutch jumped right in and quickly hopped right out, it was too cold for swimming, but perfect for throwing rocks. So here at Zions they have a TON of squirrels and they are not afraid of people at all, because way too many people feed them. And not only are they not afraid of you, they are a bit aggressive. While we were playing in the water we turned around to see a squirrel running away with a sandwich bag of PB&J. After that the squirrels knew there was food in our bag and would not stay away. There was about five of them coming after it. And there isn't much you can do to scare them off. We kept yelling and chasing them and tossing rocks at them but they wouldn't run away, they'd back up about 2 or 3 feet and then come right back. Well the kids were eating lunch and Talli had a cookie in her hand. David and I were trying to keep the squirrels back, well at one point one squirrel was about to grab the cookie right out of Talli's hand (and being concerned that it would bite her in the process) David threw a rock at it to scare it away, well the rock landed a little to close, like on its head close and killed that squirrel, I screamed because it freaked me out and David wanted me to be quiet because he didn't want people to think he killed it on purpose (the squirrel was still twitching) so we quickly packed up the kids and got out of there. Hopefully it taught the other squirrels a lesson, but I'm kind of thinking it didn't. On the shuttle ride back to camp after hiking around the Narrows, everyone was wiped out. Dutch and Maylee instantly fell asleep on David's lap and David fell asleep too and it was so funny watching his head roll back and fourth. After playing in the water we had to drive into Springdale to take the kids shoes to the laundromat to dry, so we stopped and got some ice cream. Taking a walk around the camp grounds. Saturday we headed to a different part of the river to play in. The day was hotter and the water felt warmer so we had no problem playing and getting wet. David found a bunch of little frogs and was helping the kids catch them. Of course Maylee fell instantly in love with every single frog and cried each time she had to let it go back into the water. I did a long run through the canyon Sat. morning and I was having a hard time cooling down afterwards, so I was excited to being playing in the water. Talli loved the water. I think people around us might have thought we were torturing out kid because every time she had to get out of the water, or pulled back into safety because she is so fearless she would scream and throw a fit, but it seemed like we were forcing her to play in the water. So not the case, we could not keep her out of it. Maylee with her frogs. David sat on this rock and held onto to the kids while he put them in the rapids and let them body surf the rapids, they loved it. We took Rue on a walk down to the river by our camp. The dog loves the water, she could care less that it was cold, she just jumped right in. Rue wasn't allowed on the shuttle or trails, so she spent a lot of time in her kennel in the tent, she was always excited when we got back to camp. The weather was great up there. During the day it was nice and hot (just how I like it) but it cooled down to about 70 and got insanely windy at night so we were able to sleep very comfortably. It was so much fun.

David and I kept joking about how we were probably the people that everyone hates having as camping neighbors. The kids would fall down and cry or fight over the dirt and cry, or Talli would cry at bedtime. We wouldn't have wanted to camp by us :) The kids really did very well but regardless they are 4, 3, and 1 and each had there moments. Plus we were all so disgustingly dirty, we looked so trashy (or so we thought and felt). And 3 different times we had to have someone jump start our van because the kids would play in there and leave on a light or something and kill the battery. David and I were feeling a little embarrassed of our looks and situation at some points but it also made us laugh pretty good too.

Sunday we packed up and headed home. We had a lot of fun taking the kids camping. Although David and I learned something about camping with a 4, 3, and 1 year old. Not only do the kids get disgustingly filthy but we do to. Having to hold them and take care of them, I'm pretty sure I have not been that filthy camping since I was the kids age. But we had fun and we can't wait to take them again next year, we are thinking that this is going to be our Labor Day weekend tradition. We asked the kids what there favorite part of the trip was, Maylee's was catching the baby frogs and Dutch said he enjoyed catching the frogs as well (he was agreeing with Maylee here) but he loved being the leader on all the hikes to make sure everything was safe, following the map and his most favorite he said later was riding on the "train bus". I think it's safe to say that Talli's favorite part was playing in the water. David said his favorite part was playing in the water on saturday. And as for me I'd have to say my favorite part was playing in the water on Saturday as well, running through the canyon and just watching my kids have fun.