March 12 [science fair]

Carly and Jason really wanted to attend the science fair at their school Thursday night.  Carly mainly wanted to go so she could hang out with some of her friends on her lacrosse team after practice.  Jason wanted to go so he could bring home his ‘pet rock’.  Whatever the reason we decided we’d take the whole family.  I think this is my first science fair ever – pretty sure in the past I’ve usually been happy to stay home with the little ones and send Justin with the older kids.  Turns out I’ve been really missing out because this event was THE place to be.  Who knew science could be so fascinating and fun?

We swung by Jason’s classroom to check out his rock project and bring little “Bob” home.  

The whole school was filled with science fair displays and activities.  The gym had lots of hands on activities for the kids.  I’m still bewildered how we could skewer a balloon and not have it deflate.

I have no idea what this next experiment was, but it all started with the kids stirring together some brownish liquids in a cup.

As you stir it starts to change color and form.

Then after a few minutes your cup is holding some strange hard material.  Awesome, right?

Justin spent most of the evening at the playground with Drew.  Lots of fun things happening back there too though – kids could build and launch rockets; there were large tubs of cornstarch and water to demonstrate something about liquids and solids.  Overall a really fun night.

March 11 [new carpet]

We had new carpet installed yesterday!

Too bad it’s only in the office :(

Katie and Drew thought it worthy of a dance party!

This little boy cracks me up!

Unfortunately, all office dance parties are suspended until the tack strips get properly taken care of

Turns out they don’t feel so great on bare feet :(

March 10 [snacktime]

Found Drew eating his snack in an interesting spot yesterday

(his little purple bowl is behind him)

March 9 [peek-a-boo]

Yesterday I spotted Drew playing peek-a-boo with the dropcloth in the office.

And then it was naptime.

March 8 [hair do or don’t?]

Carly has the thick, beautiful hair.  We recently started talking about donating it when it gets long enough.   It seems to grow fast so cutting it off wouldn’t be too far off in the future.  Last night she was playing around with her hair – totally the norm for this girl – and I caught a vision of her sporting a short sassy do.  

This is what I get when I ask her to open her eyes – She has gorgeous eyes!

Can you see it?

Too mature for my little girl?

March 7 [Saturday chauffeurs]

Justin and I shuttled kids around yesterday from the crack of dawn to hours past bedtime.  I only took a couple pictures of our various activities…

Abigail and her friend Morgan performed a flute duet at our regional solo and ensemble festival.  They had an 8:30am performance time so we were out the door by 7:30am!

After a great performance we enjoyed a yummy breakfast before heading home.

We spent the evening celebrating Hannah’s 8th birthday at the Baumgartner’s.  Since we were just blocks away from the gal who does my hair I snuck away during the movie to get Drew’s haircut.  I’ve been cutting it since his first haircut and wanted to let a pro have at it for a change.  Drew was amazing – her best almost 2 year old ever.

March 6 [swingin’]

Just a short video clip of Drew swinging during Jason’s baseball practice last night.

This kid just enjoys life.

(For some reason I can't view video on any of my devices, is it viewable for anyone?)

March 5 [the falls]

Shortly after the kids left for school on Wednesday morning I got a text from a mother in the neighborhood who said that Jason and another 2nd grade girl lifted up her daughters shirt at the bus stop causing her daughter to run home humiliated and refuse to go to school.  I was shocked.  Jason is uber aware of modesty at home for himself and is very respectful of his three sisters.  I couldn’t believe he would actually think something like that could be funny.  It didn’t sound anything like him.  The mother filed a report with the school and when I couldn’t reach either of Carly’s friends that have cell phones I decided to wait for news.

I received a phone call a few hours later from the principal.  She had questioned several kids at the bus stop and all gave her the same story.  The ‘victim’ was sitting on her backpack waiting for the bus, the other 2nd grade girl was trying to pull her up and when unsuccessful asked Jason to help her.  He did.  As they pulled on her arms her shirt lifted slightly showing a little of her tummy.  She obviously thought kids were laughing AT her and ran home embarrassed.  Thankfully it wasn’t as terrible as it first sounded, but still a lesson for kids to keep their hands to themselves.  The principal handled it beautifully.  She called the irate mother and explained the reality of the situation and that the kids weren’t acting malicious.  Jason and his accomplice spend their lunch writing apology letters to the victim and both were “punished” by not being allowed to ride the bus yesterday.  The principal said it almost broke her heart talking to Jason because she could tell how horrible he felt and how innocent his motive had been.  Regardless of his intent I think it will be something he remembers and hopefully he’ll chose not be a follower next time.  Just the day before this he was playing outside at the park with these two girls and they all went behind a fence to explore.  Not a big deal, but it’s something he knows I don’t approve of so when I saw him behind the fence he had to come inside and was done playing for the day.  Because his friends were doing it he decided he would too.  Raising these kiddos to strong enough to stand up for what they know to be right is not an easy job.

Anyhow, after I dropped him off at school yesterday we stopped at the Snoqualmie Falls on our way home.  Isn’t my backyard beautiful?  I so love where we live!

Drew was too busy running around to stop for any pictures.

The water is actually quite low right now.  This picture was taken in January when we were experiencing some flooding in the valley and the falls were overflowing.

Just a tad bit different.

March 4 [Carly's 11th birthday]

We have a long history of unexciting birthdays around here.  Carly might just say her 11th tops the list.  It’s her off year for a party though that didn’t keep her from trying (unsuccessfully) to sneak in some sort of friendly celebration.  Neither Justin nor I were home when she woke up in the morning (I did heat her up a cinnamon roll when I got home from running).  She had to spend the entire day at school (and deal with a little bus stop drama, a story of it’s own).  Then every member of our family over the age of 7 had something going on that evening making a family celebration impossible.

Leave it to good food though to make a day special.  Instead of a birthday cake Carly wanted Oreo truffles.  She was surprised with how well they turned out (dipping food has not been my strong point) – and Boy! were they delicious!

That’s an 11 she’s holding up.

When she got home from school I had to leave to pick up Abigail from soccer – Carly willingly helped prepare her birthday dinner while I was gone.   Not too surprising that it was chicken biscuits – a long time family favorite.

While kids ate dinner I fried up some Utah scones (completely different than Washington scones) that were meant to be an after school snack but took longer than expected to rise so they were an after dinner snack instead.

There was no time to clean up the disastrous kitchen before Carly and I headed out the door to her clogging class.  She started taking clogging once a week from a family in our stake back in October.  Until recently her cousin Hannah was going as well and Grandma and Grandpa Fletcher were taking the girls.  We’re on our own now and debated whether we could still make it work, but we decided we’d give it a try and if she couldn’t make it to a class or two it wouldn’t be the end of the world.

Yesterday was the first class I’d been able to go to and I was impressed.  It looked like so much fun and Carly has all the coordination I never had.  It was so fun to watch and I really hope we can continue to let her explore this new talent of hers (and that the idea of "performing" won't make her quit).

After clogging we stopped by Cold Stone to redeem Carly’s BOGO ice-cream treat.

Turns out Carly was so full of birthday goodness that she couldn’t even finish her ice-cream and ended up bringing it home to enjoy this morning for breakfast.   Hope you had a Happy Birthday Carly!!  We think you’re pretty fabulous even if your birthday wasn’t! ;-)