1st day of school

Matt started his pre-K preschool program today. (Not the greatest pic, it is from my cell phone, my camera died). Matt was excited to start school, and actually went without crying, so I was glad. I'm still happy we decided to wait a year until kindergarten. I think emotionally he wasn't quite ready to go yet, so he'll enjoy this year of preschool and I'll enjoy having him home all afternoon! (Don't you love that hair? He refuses to let me cut it or fix it!)

Kaitlyn is starting 2nd grade. She was excited because her 1st grade teacher, Mrs. Munro, moved up to 2nd grade and just looped her whole class with her, so Kaitlyn already knows all her classmates and her teacher. I was happy because Mrs. Munro is a really good teacher, and is constantly challenging Kaitlyn.

Here they are together.

She's 7!

Kaitlyn turned 7 last week. She was so excited. She had been counting down to her party for over a month. She chose to go to Chuck. E.Cheese and do the whole party thing (the ticket booth, pinata, pizza, Chuck E. etc.). I don't actually have any pictures of the party since I forgot my camera, but she had a blast. One little story from the party that just shows what Kaitlyn is like: during the ticket booth, they stand in this booth with lots of tickets blowing all over. There are also big papers that are worth 100, 50 or 200 tickets. Kaitlyn grabbed quite a few of these. After she stepped out, she proceeded to give a big paper worth 100 tickets to each of her friends from her party. The party planner at Chuck. E. Cheese was so impressed, she said she had never seen a kid share their tickets before, that she gave Kaitlyn 500 extra, so she ended up with 1000 tickets. I just thought it was sweet that she wanted to share with her friends.
She wanted a puppy cake for her bday. This is my attempt. I spent 3 hours working on it, then the head fell off, so I spent another hour trying to piece the head back together. It's not that good, but Kaitlyn liked it so that is all that matters :)

As shown above Kaitlyn is a sweet, generous girl. She is very aware of those around her and tries to make everyone (excluding her brother!) feel happy and welcome. She is super smart and can memorize stuff amazingly fast. She loves to read. She read Diary of Wimpy Kid in two days, and the second one in 3. She is working on memorizing the articles of faith and is doing great at reading the scriptures with us. She has also starting reading the Friend and enjoys those articles. I started her on piano lessons this summer and she already can name and point out the notes on the staff better than students I have been teaching for a couple of years. She is a hard worker. She still loves video games, but she actually spent most of the summer outside playing with 2 girls from our neighborhood. She loves to ride her bike and she still loves to play tennis. We got her a badmitton set for her bday, so she's been spending plenty of time working on that. She is still a fiesty little red head, but I love everything about her! Happy Birthday Kaitlyn!!

Multnomah Falls

We've lived in in beautiful Vancouver for almost 7 years, and we finally made it down to hike Multnomah Falls. It was a nice overcast day on Saturday, so not too hot for a hike. My kids were troopers and we made it to the top of the falls. The hike is only 1 1/4 miles up but it is a pretty steep hike. We had to take lots of breaks, but we made it. It was so beautiful and my kids said they had a fun time. Guess we'll have to check out some of the other hikes in the area.

We had to bring Ramsey's of course.