The pool is 95 degrees! We have had a blast swimming with friends and cousins all summer.

Christian's Chikka Chikka Boom Boom preschool project! It took a few tries to get used to preschool, but now Christian LOVeS it.

Dane made a birthday cake for me, complete with my name and age!

The katydid had all kinds of new experiences after it's first day at kindergarten, including a ride on Dane's bike, and another ride on his hair! We finally let him go tonight.

Time for school and the katydid Christian found in the driveway this morning got to come along! Mrs Huber let Dane show the whole class...big hit!

Liza in typing class!

Dane and Jones in Math...I was spying through the door!

Tune in for the latest piano tunes...

Love that math, Jones! It's so great that since the kids have all been tiny, Kev has had them memorizing and repeating math problems as a ticket on to various rides he gives them all over the house. Before taking off on a "spaceship", they have to count to 100 by 10's, count down from 20 backwards, or solve an addition problem! It's been such a fun and effective way for them to learn!
Also Jones' reading teacher told me today that she saves his daily verbal reading test until last of all the students in the class, because she knows he will blitz through it, not requiring the time that most other readers do. Handsome, sweet and so smart too :) What a catch!

Fun to see....
Today, Dane's teacher told me that since he reads "almost as well as I do," she asked him to read a story to the whole class! He politely declined, but what a compliment!

Over the past week, Liza has logged about 4 hours of reading time. She is very much in to the Sisters Grimm series, and even finished book 2 tonight! Before bed, she was already on page 33 of book 3!

It was another fantastic day at piano; the boys are learning so much and loving it!

Lunchdate with my handsome men at Keva!

Then we were off to a kids photo shoot with our good friend, Tiffany. She was patient and cute with the kids and they did great!

The bird show was phenomenal; the highlight was having various birds at various times soar right over our heads, including a flock of doves.

Somewhere in the archives in Abba's house, there is a picture of me standing right like Liza is by this same zoo lion. 

Kev had the day off on Friday, so as soon as the boys were out of kindergarten, we checked Liza out of school and took them all to the zoo!

Liza and Ivie, the little entrepreneurs, had two hours to play together Thursday so a lemonade stand was on the menu! They set up in front of the tennis club and sold their little hearts out!

These two were so happy to see each other after the Roberts got back from a week in California. Jessa ran to Liza and jumped up in her arms for a big cousin hug!

Miss Kristi gave Christian these fire ant glasses for his birthday! What a treat!

Christian at preschool!

Fwd: Keys of Excellence

>
> Dear Parents,
>
> I wanted to write and tell you that I am grateful that Eliza is in my class. We have "Positive Post-It" notes in our class and the students and I watch for students who are following our Keys of Excellence. Here are some "Positive Post-it" notes that Eliza has received:
>
> "Eliza, I love how committed you are to be so productive. Keep up all the good work :)."
> "Liza, Thank you for speaking with good purpose when I had a bad day."
> "Liza, Thank you for speaking with good purpose with that beautiful card and cookies. They were delicious."
>
> Way to go Eliza!
>
> Mrs. Janna LaFazia

Soccer cheerleaders :)

Papa and Abba came to Dane and Jonah's soccer game tonight! Dane and Jones each ran so hard and got some great kicks in...go Grasshoppers!

...aaahhhh the life....

Taylor, Liza and Ivie at school!

Mrs LaFazia sent an email to us today highlighting several times Liza has done things in class that comport with the school code of honor....yay Liza!

Christian and I are enjoying our alone time together every morning. Today we went on a special Pace's raid for popsicles to share with the other kids when they got home from school!

I asked Christian to put away the playdough before bed; this is the cleanup sculpture I woke up to!

Liza's trampoline shower with the hot-water hose! She even conditioned her hair out there!

A whole year is just too long to wait for more fireworks...we found some smoke bombs and snakes in the garage and had to light them up!

Jonah's Lego wall at 23 levels tall; he finished it at almost twice this height!

Dane's Bloodmobile (it looks amazingly similar to the one on their science DVD).

Liza, Annalise and Kennedy swam almost all day Saturday so when the storm hit, they felt right at home; they sat on the driveway in the pouring rain playing games until finally they got so cold they were forced to come in! Die hards!

...Dane went up to Jonah and said, "hey, Jonah, great game...gimmee five.." so they had their own little twinnie fiver! So cute!

After Saturday's game (our first loss), the boys were giving fives to the other team. It's always a fun part of the game to see, but this time was especially great because....

Katie Stratford, Emma Haslam and Liza enjoying a swim in the baby pool in Stratford's back yard! A slightly different pool experience than Liza's earlier one at Abba's today...and still so fun!

Lunchtime outside

7 boys over for playgroup!

This picture says it all about the first day of preschool for Jameson and Christian! Happy campers!

Dane, Jones, Joseph Cannon and their bionicles had a playdate today! It is SO nice to have little friends close by.

Liza's new guitar teacher, Shawn Stringham, warned Liza tonight that the first lesson is the most boring....they talked about tuning, positioning, walking the board, learned some chords, and on the way home Liza told me that even the first "boring" lesson wasn't boring to her! We are off to a great start!

Christian's first day of preschool! He went right in with no fuss, which was a huge (and welcome) surprise since has has been telling us all summer that he WILL NOT go to preschool! Dane and Jonah took him in and showed him all of the toys! They told him how nice Miss Kristi is and helped him feel comfortable there. We are in for another fun preschool year!

The best cheerleaders a soccer team could ask for :)

Dane (#4) and Jonah (#7) and the Grasshoppers getting a pep talk from Coach Bailey...they had a great game and were very happy that they won again!

Drea came to Abba's to coach Liza and Ivie; they worked on starts and flip turns; they are doing so well! When Liza does the front crawl, she is a total machine....Very powerful and determined...it's really fun to watch her!

The boys couldn't resist getting in after their lesson!

Christian and I volunteered in Jonah's and Dane's class, as well as Liza's class this morning. Christian washed off the desks in kindergarten with me!

I thought this was a neat shot of Liza walking out to recess.