The summer without toys

This summer all of our toys were in storage. Grandma has a few toys that we could play with, but they got old after a while. We spent a LOT of time watching TV and playing computer games. But, we also did some fun things that didn't require any toys.

Grandma and Grandpa got new cabinets and had lots of huge boxes. The kids spent several days decorating them, fixing them up, playing mail and just having fun.

Here is Sophie decorating the top of her box.

Katrina liked crawling in and out of the boxes. She also like collecting the markers. Later that day, she figured out how to take the lids off and color on herself. Her outfit was covered in marker by the end of the day. Luckily, it was washable and came out.


Caleb and his cousin Jakey got their blankets out and made a comfy bed in their house. Then they dragged the blankets all over the yard.

Maggie and Hannah drew pictures of flip-flops as their welcome mats for their houses. They traced their flip-flops and wrote "Welcome" on the flaps in front.

We also made fun bubble blowers. (Thanks, Hilary, for the idea.) This was good fun for several afternoons and kind of clean, too. The girls blew the bubbles and then held them upside down and said the bottles had Afros.

We went to the splash pad near our house. It is an open area with fun sprinkler things that come on and off and get you wet.

Hannah on one of the sprayers.

Caleb kept wanting to swing around on this fish, but he was just a little too short to do it well.

We got our toys out of the storage unit a few weeks ago. It was like Christmas in August. The kids played and played with their toys. Some of the joy has worn off, but Caleb loves to get out his dinosaurs when he is watching Big Al (a dinosaur show on Netflix), and the girls have a lot of fun playing Littlest Pet Shops. Yesterday they were making school lunches for them. They had paper spaghetti all cut up for them and were looking for beads to make apples, etc. I love a good toy that they can use their imaginations with.

Katrina Walks

It's been a long time coming, but Katrina is finally walking. She's been doing it for about a month now. She was 19 months when she finally got it down. She had a sword and kept fighting Caleb, walking toward him and saying "tshew-tshew." There was much giggling from both of them.
We kept her out of nursery until she could walk. We figured she needed to wait until she could hold her own before sending her in there. On the first day, Aaron put her down in a red boat. She didn't want to get out of it to play with other things. I assume that the nursery leaders coaxed her out of it, because she was sitting on a rug during singing time and had a snack and colored a picture. But, at the end of the day, she was right back in that red boat. It's her safe place.
Katrina also talks. Her favorite words are "hi" and "no." She pushes away food or toys that she doesn't want or people who are bugging her and says "no." She's very territorial. If someone is in what she considers her seat or playing with her toys, she immediately lets us know with a loud cry. With all those big brother and sisters, it's important to hold your own.

Our New House

We moved into our new house in June. Our family has three bedrooms. My parents and my brother, who comes to stay often, each have a room. That's five bedrooms in all. Still, it's a bit crowded. And most of our stuff is in a storage unit. We miss it, especially, the toys. My parents are working on completing the Garage-ma-hall, where they will be living. They are getting close. The two last things will be the carpet and the counter tops. The carpet will come next week and the counter tops will follow. Except for Caleb, who kept telling me that he wanted to go home, the kids are doing pretty well. They miss Kaysville and all their friends, but are slowly making new friends here.

A few days after we moved into our house, there was a rain storm and a double rainbow.

Of course we all ran outside to see the rainbow. And took pictures. How cool is that? A rainbow right over your house. All it needs now is angelic singing.

Lost in Dial-up Land

We have made the move to our new house and have had internet service, but have been lost in dial-up land. I could barely read email, let alone post any thing. But, this last week we got blazing fast internet and will be up and posting again shortly. This is just a teaser.

Aspen Grove

We spent last weekend at Aspen Grove Family camp. It was a lot of fun to hang out with Aaron's family. And the setting is fabulous! It's a beautiful area, they entertain the kids, make all the meals, and there's lots of fun things to do.
Here are some highlights from our trip.

Katrina liked crawling everywhere and enjoying delicious ping-pong balls.
Caleb loved all the animals to climb on.

He even made a photo montage of his friends the turtles.
Sophie had fun hanging out with her favorite cousin Elizabeth.
Maggie's favorite part was buying a new jacket in navy blue.
And Hannah liked being attached at the elbow to her cousin Allie.
They all liked to sing "Two Blue Pigeons"
with all the cousins and Great Grandpa Wight.

Aaron played with the kids and won. Here he is in victory mode. And we both had fun catching up with family. We came home tired and dirty and stuffed full of delicious Los Hermanos food. It was a successful trip.

Caleb's New Scooter

Caleb has been riding Sophie's old scooter. It has three wheels which is good for a 3 year old, but it is covered in princesses and has a pink basket. In the last month, he has started wanting to ride the big scooters. The girls have been mostly tolerant of him, but occasionally, there would be tears because someone wasn't getting to ride their scooter when they wanted to. So, I decided it was time to get him his very own boy scooter. I found this excellent green one at Walmart. He wanted it out of the box so he could ride it as soon as I put it in the cart. The first day he rode it in the house, then outside, then back in the house. He is really good at riding a two wheel scooter.
He balances well and will get faster with time. He left it outside on the grass that first night. The first thing he did when he woke up was run outside to get his scooter. It had a little dew on it, so he got a rag to wipe it off. I had to laugh at this shade of things to come.