Lately

-- Cade's piano lessons are going well. So far the practicing hasn't scared him away, likely because his teacher doesn't enforce a "timed" practice session each day-- just simply to practice each song assigned 5 times each day. He genuinely enjoys his lessons. I am loving how close his teacher lives to us. We can walk there faster than driving. BTW-- Hannah, I loved your idea to have him learn a certain number of hymns. That's a great idea. There's a goal, a purpose, and it's up to him.

-- Cade lost his second upper front tooth. His grin is precious.

-- While we are talking about Cade's physical attributes, might I add Kyle gave him a hair cut between conference sessions on Sunday and accidentally used the wrong attachment. He's buzzed now. Still cute, but definitely not the look I was going for especially being that today was picture day. Whoops.
-- One night around 1am I heard a loud noise downstairs. I nudged Kyle awake to go check it out. He obediently went and came back to bed with nothing. Later at 3am the kids woke us up very concerned that their glow stick had spilled all over them. What were they doing up at 3am? Turns out Cade woke Savvy up at 1am and were excited for Saturday morning's brunch before watching General Conference on TV so they set the table (hence the loud noise I heard) and hung a sign. And then they played around the house for a while until the glow stick broke and we sent them to bed. Silly kids!

"Surprise! Cade and Savannah and Ruby love you mom and you dad. Savannah and Cade saved the Day! Horay! Thank us thank you." -- hilarious. We did thank them. Thank you very much. :)

-- I had some spray painting fun on Friday which proved to be perfect weather for spray painting. It was one of our last warm, sunny days for a while. I love the transformation a can of spray paint can offer, but I don't love that my pointer finger is numb and my hand is sore.

(should have taken some after pics... I'll get on it!)

-- Cade's soccer season is over. Bitter sweet. He loved it and had a great season. He got to the point where if he didn't score more than 3 times he thought he played poorly. My oh my. Wait until next year when he has a bigger field, goalies playing, and refs staffing the games. It's going to be a whole new ball game and he'll likely to be lucky to score 3 times in an entire season. My highlight? Getting a goal recorded on the camera. And the chest bump he did with his teammate afterwards. Priceless.

-- Ruby is walking! Two Sundays ago Kyle spent some time with her in the hallways at church and she started taking to the idea of walking long distances. Sure enough, when we got home she decided she wanted to try out our own hallways. After a few days of it, she made it her preferred method of transportation. It's so cute to see this little baby walking around the house like King Kong. Cade and Savvy are especially excited to have a new partner to play chase and hide and seek with.

-- I took a time machine back to 1986 and bought Savvy some foam curlers for her hair. She's starting to lose her natural curl (Sadddd!) and her hair is still quite thin. I though I'd give the curlers a shot and it just tickles me to see my 4 year-old in the same style of curlers I wore at her age. Tonight when she laid on her pillow she said, "Mom, this isn't real comfortable." I told her I usually slept on my tummy (perhaps that's why I am still a tummy sleeper to this day?) and after much thought on the subject she decided she'd stay on her back. We'll see how the curls look in the morning. With her hair so short, I'm anticipating something like orphan Annie. We'll see!

-- My dad when to our school's "Grand Lunch" today-- a sneaky way for the school to get grandparents to come to lunch with the grand kids and then take them to the book fair and spend money on them. Now that Tyler is in kindergarten at the same school Cade is he was able to buy for two grandkids! He brought them McDonald's which was a highlight and then got them each a book. It's great living close enough to family where this can happen.

-- Dad stopped by after the grand lunch and after reading Savvy Curious George (which he adeptly remarked that the book must have been an original because George was smoking a pipe in it and books would never do that now!), he took her for a spin on Kyle's motorcycle. SHE

LOVED IT.

-- Kyle and the kids have taken up geocaching and seem to go any spare moment they have. Savannah's favorite was a cache titled "What the heck is a Palisade?" and she's been going around saying the phrase ever since.

-- Cade hasn't done much in the way of creating lately (minus the rocket ship he and Savannah are coloring out of a cardboard box), but I'm hoping he gets super inspired soon and creates a masterpiece for this year's Reflections Contest. The last two years it's been like pulling teeth to get him to submit an entry and then like a week after the submission deadline, he gets hung up on some art project at home and spends every waking moment working on it. Like this solar system for example:

We'll see!

He's very proud when he wins awards and such, so much so that they earn a spot on his bedroom wall. You'd think that would motivate him. It's like the motivation seems to happen AFTER the fact. Hmmm. I'm going to do my best to not be a helicopter mom and trying to inspire him from afar. We'll see how that method works.

-- Kyle has been enjoying playing softball and soccer on some old men's athletic teams. We enjoy having him come home to share his war wounds and stories... red cards, scratches, sprained thumbs, bruised egos feet, etc. etc.

(Kyle with his then broken phone.)