Homecoming Parade

 Since Ashton ran and joined student council, she gets to participate in more activities. One was the high school's homecoming parade. Joseph worked late that day so it ended up being me, the 3 kids catching candy, and Ashton sitting on the float throwing candy. We walked away from the parade with 13 pounds of candy! It was an intense amount of candy and a great parade for the kids. I call it a win since none of the kids got hit by a car or truck or float as they ran around collecting candy. And now I don't have to buy any for Halloween to pass out.

Because of when we had to drop Ashton off for the preparation part and when the parade started, it didn't make sense to go back home. So we packed a picnic dinner and hung out in the grass.

Ashton's Birthday Interview

How old are you? 8

What is your favorite color? Red and Pink

What is your favorite animal? Horses

What is your favorite book? Chapter books (very true; she'll read anything these days)

What is your favorite show? Wild Kratts

What do you like to eat? Strawberries

What is your favorite game? Monopoly Deal

What is your favorite thing to do? Drawing

Who is your best friend? Lyra (a friend from school)

What do you like to do with Daddy? Snuggle with him

What do you like to with Mommy? Read books

Where do you want to go on a vacation? Disney World (Ugh... we had a family over for dinner and they have just gotten back from Disney. Now Ashton dreams of going there.)

What do you want to be when you grow up? Vet (man, this has been her dream for a couple years now. She loves animals.)

What is your favorite song? I like to look for rainbows

What is the best time of day? Social studies time at school and science

What makes you happy? My family

Ashton Turns 8!

 Ashton is eight now! I still think about her as a little baby girl and how I dreamed about her 8th birthday. 

On her actual birthday (Monday), school was cancelled due to Hurricane Nicholas. She had the next day off too. Ashton was pretty bummed we couldn't go out and do fun stuff around town. But I think she loved that she could open presents earlier in the day and have a chill day at home.

Her party was the weekend before her birthday, right before the hurricane came. We did a pool party at the local pool and had a blast. Most of her friends could make it and she enjoyed swimming with them all.

I never bring my phone to pool so this time, I was able to catch a few pictures of the kids.

Ashton Starts Second Grade

 

Ashton started second grade on Tuesday, August 17th. She couldn't wait to head back to school. She has the same teacher as last year, who we love. Our district also starts having students switch teachers halfway through the day in second grade. With only two dual immersion classes, she just has those two teachers. Both teachers have a classroom economy and Ashton enjoys earning money for special things like bringing a stuffed animal to school or taking your shoes off in the classroom.

Ashton continues to participate in the gifted and talented program at the school. This entails a couple hours with a specific teacher in a pull-out manner. She loves this time and the group she is with.

Ashton also ran for student council and made it. She had to give a little speech and everything. She's excited for the meetings.

Her favorite parts of school are science and math. Her Spanish is coming along well, I think. She doesn't speak it a ton at home but her reading is pretty good now in Spanish. And she doesn't have issues at school with it. Ashton also loves art and music class.

Tanner Starts Kindergarten

 

Tanner started kindergarten on Monday, August 16th. Our district started something new where the transition grades (k, 6, and 9) start a day before everyone else. Tanner loved going to school without Ashton for one day.

He was excited about his teacher, Mrs. Cuellar. Tanner is also in the Spanish immersion program. He tolerates it pretty well and rarely complains about the teacher talking in Spanish all day. He sings some songs and counts to thirty in Spanish at home. The teacher has a classroom economy and that motivates Tanner to do his homework sheet most nights. He is very proud that he has made it 28 days and no conduct marks (for poor behavior). I am proud too.

His favorite part of school is recess, lunch, and science. That doesn't surprise me. He is very tired most nights but he also napped until just this last spring so I wasn't too surprised either. Tanner tells me who is sick each day and all the happenings in the classroom. His job right now is messenger and takes anything to the main office. He takes this job very seriously based on what he tells me.

Overall, the start to school has gone well and we haven't had to quarantine yet, so I'd say that's a win!

Girls Trip to Seattle

 A bunch of ladies from our old ward in Lake Jackson plan an annual girls trip. I didn't go on the last two because of nursing/pumping for Lydia and then something else the year before that. I was so happy to go again this year. Some of us are still in Texas, albeit in different cities. And then there are some that have moved out of state. It was amazing that we could find a weekend for all seven of us to come to Seattle. We voted on destination and Seattle won. It was my first time to the Pacific Northwest and it did not disappoint.

All our flights from various cities landed within 20 minutes of each other. We left bright and early Thursday and we capitalized on our time in the city. We spent that day seeing all the sights in Seattle. My favorite part was taking a ferry to an island and wandering around the island for a while. We found sand dollars, sea glass, wild blueberries, and lots of fun things.

On Friday, we went on an eight-mile hike in the mountains and hiked to a lake. It was beautiful. This hike made me appreciate the beauty of God' creation. The lake was stunning and we even saw some snow!

Saturday was another hike to an overlook of a lake. Much shorter at around 4 miles. But much more steep. We went kayaking on Lake Washington after this. I even got to try paddleboarding. After kayaking, we went to a fancy seafood place and then saw the locks/canal that the boats have to go through.

Sunday was church, visiting the temple grounds and a short picnic lunch at the beach. Then we all went back to the airport and flew home.

Saw Mt. Rainier from the airplane. Unfortunately, the national parks were a little too far to travel on this trip.

Summer bucket list

 Here was our lengthy summer bucket list.

We accomplished most of it. The things we did not get to include:

Lemonade stand (this has been on their list for three summers now and I refuse to do it. Maybe next year.)

Grow flowers- we didn't do much in the garden this summer.

Make popsicles- I even bought the mold things for it and didn't do it.

Ice skating- the only place for this is downtown at a really busy mall (and expensive) so we didn't go

Otherwise, we did everything else. We were busy!

We fit in a trip to the Space Center with cousin Caleb.

The caves

Tie dying socks instead of shirts. Their tie-dye shirts from last year still fit.

Fairy Trail park

Olympic ring pizza

We learned more about Japan and made sushi (candy kind), origami, cherry blossom paintings, etc.