W.R.E.C.

So yesterday my friend Maria called and invited us to go to the Water Resources Education Center. I know what you're thinking, and I was skeptical at first too, but we decided to go. It was cold and rainy yesterday, plus this activity was free. So we hopped in the car and left. It was actually quite a fun place. They had all these exhibits teaching about water and where it goes and how it gets there. Plus how to save water. They also had a cool kids area with slide, puzzles, games, puppets, toys etc. The kids had a lot of fun. They got to play with all the exhibits and look at fish, frogs and birds, and just run around. IT was educational and fun, which is a double bonus. Thanks Maria for showing us!!!
Here is Matt checking out one of the exhibits. Here is Kaitlyn trying to pump water to all of Vancouver without overflowing the pump. She was working pretty hard!

Here's Matt navigating the "stream" and in the lower corner you can just make out his friend Gavin.

Here is Matt, Kaitlyn and Marshall having fun in the tunnel.

We tried to get Kaitlyn to put on a puppet show for us, but apparently show buisness is not in her future, she was too shy :)

Fishin'

Last night Gabe and Wendy invited the kids and I to go fishing with them for FHE. Aaron was sadly at class and unable to participate, but we made sure to text him and let him know we were going :) My kids were so excited. Kaitlyn was so loudly excited that I'm pretty sure she scared away most of the fish. Matt and Katie had a blast playing with worms, which included, but was not limited to putting the worms on their arms, bellies and head. Annie was quite the caster and could get the line almost as far as her dad. Gabe did most of the actually help, but Wendy and I did are part. Wendy got the great job of unhooking the fish so the kids could throw them back in the water. I made sure to test the worms out to make sure they were edible for the fish (I'll leave this story to your imagination since it is still quite awful for me to remember). All the kids caught a fish. I was going to draw an arrow on the picture so you could actually see their fish, but alas, haven't figured out how to do that on the blog yet.

You can see from Kaitlyn's picture how well I dress my kids for such an outing, and of course Kaitlyn has to make sure and pose with her fish.
Annie shows what most of the kids were actually feeling as they pulled their fish in.

Here is Gabe, showing the pure exuberance of what I'm sure was his biggest catch ever!

The Greatest Show on Earth!

Last night we went to the Barnum and Bailey Ringling Brothers Circus with Gabe and Wendy and the girls.It was our first time ever at the circus. It was pretty cool. We got there an hour early and you got to go down onto the floor to meet a bunch of the circus people. The show was great too. Kaitlyn said her favorite part was the tigers, Matt said his was the cannon (they shot two girls out of these HUGE cannons). They also had elephants, horses, clowns, tightrope walkers etc. It was a fun, but late night. Matt fell alseep with a half-hour left, but Kaitlyn braved it until the very end, only to fall asleep the second she was in her seat in the car. We'll see how tired she is when she gets home from school today, I actually had to wake her up to get her to go. It was worth it though.

Kindergarten

Today was Kaitlyn's first full-day of kindergarten. She goes from 9:25-3:35 on Monday's, Thursdays and every other Wed. I know, what a wacky schedule! I asked her what she wanted for her special breakfast, and (she takes after her mom), she wanted bagels and cream cheese, or as she calls it, the white stuff. So I made an early run to Panera and got her a blueberry muffin with hazlenut cream cheese.

We then got her all ready for school. The kindergartners for the first two weeks have to wear name tags with their bus number and their teacher's room on them, so if they get lost from the bus to the room, anyone can direct them where to go. That would be what the big green paper is on her shirt.

Matt and I then walked her to the bus stop. There was a nice boy named Alex (a 5th grader) who was a bus buddy and was in charge of getting the two kindergartners from the bus to the classroom, so I was a little less worried about Kaitlyn. I was good and didn't break down until after she was on the bus, but then I cried the whole walk back to the house. Matt was unconcerned. He actually was quite excited to have the house all to himself, and when I asked him later if he missed Kaitlyn he gave an enthusiastic "NO!"

Here she is after school. She was pretty pooped, but actually hasn't fallen asleep yet. She did tell me however, that she doesn't like riding the bus. Aaron and I asked her why, but she didn't give any reasons. We asked her to try it one more day, then we'll see. I might be taking her. All in all, she had a good day. She is excited to get to buy lunch tomorrow (it's pizza day) and check out her first book from the library!

New Form of Punishment

The kids were driving me nuts today. Between pulling hair, hitting, spitting, yelling, kicking and fighting I had had enough. So when Aaron got home I ordered him to do something about the kids. This was his response. (This ledge it about 8 feet up from the floor). But I don't know, I don't think they look too repentant.