Back to School!

Summer ended and school began! As sad as it is to see our fun summer go, it is also so exciting to have school start and all the excitement that brings! We did our traditional back to school feast. I think the boys have decided on a firm menu that might be our menu forever- Salmon, Rice, Salad, mandarin orange jello and a poppyseed cake for dessert.

After our feast, Ben gave the boys very sweet back to school blessings. I can't remember a thing he said, but I do remember the sweet spirit that was there.

The boys were up really early and completely dressed for the first day- like before 7 am! I made them take a million pictures before we headed out the door.

Chase is in 5th grade with Mrs. Flynn- who seems super nice. He has his friend Clayton in his class, which was super exciting for him. After just two weeks of school, he's already saying that 5th grade is his best year yet!

Hudson is in 3rd grade with Mrs. Hubbard and Bland. Chase had them in 3rd grade as well, and he was stoked for Hudson to get them. He has his buddy Hyrum in his class, but not Richie this year. They still play at recess though. Also, the deepest desire of Hudson's heart was to have a plain white t-shirt to wear for the first day of school. Okay, buddy! Whatever you want!

Davis tried so hard to get dropped off at school too! He had a backpack on and insisted on first day pictures just like the big brothers! Luckily he only had to wait one extra day for preschool to start.

And Lila assumes if a camera is out, it probably should be pointed at her. She dutifully sat on the steps and smiled and said "Cheese!" for me even while I was photographing her brothers. Oh, I could eat her!

The boys came home tired and a little grumpy for the first few days, but all around reports from school have been positive. This year has been a little anxiety filled for me, especially since there are NO Covid precautions whatsoever at school and the kids can't be vaccinated yet. But we decided to have faith and hope for the best! Also, I get to volunteer in both their classrooms this year every Wednesday morning, so it's nice to be able to see them at school a little bit and get to know their teachers and classes.

Davis got to start his little preschool! We are doing a little co-op with a few friends and so far he is absolutely LOVING it. He runs out of the van each day with a huge smile and waving "BYE MOM!" over his shoulder. It's a stark contrast to the other kids in his class who cry and want their moms to stay (although Lila might be that type of preschooler). He's so confident and social and is loving having his own little activity!

I love the structure back to school brings to our lives. I am so thankful my kids got good teachers and have friends, I think it's going to be a great year!
 

August

 August absolutely fell by! The whole summer did actually. In August, our scheduled stuff settled down a lot and we had time to just BE a little bit. Of course, we still stayed pretty busy, but in a slower way. This was one night after a fun swim night with cousins- Chase was unfortunately sick this day, but I love how crazy these pictures are. True form with this many little guys running around.

Davis quit naps. I was kind of sad about it, but we transitioned to having story time and then quiet time (aka- TV) during Lila's naps and it's gone pretty well. He's going to bed a little earlier and easier at night too. But that means that he frequently falls asleep somewhere around 5:00 pm- like this particular day after swimming.

Lila and Davis are kind of competitive with each other- especially when it comes to their parents laps. Frequently if we are holding one of them, we have to be holding both.

Heidi came to town! We had so much fun with her here, and despite Davis's pleas, she actually did have to return to Boston. But we made the most of her time here. One day we went to lunch and took Lila along for the ride- she was darling the whole time and seemed so excited to be included in girls lunch! I think we'll bring her again.

Little miss Lila hit the 18 month mark- which means nursery at church! Much to my surprise, she's doing awesome with it! She usually doesn't love being left, but she loves nursery! She's also starting to say so many words! She loves to talk about "buddy" the "doggy" who says "woof woof". She LOVES her baby dolls and loves to hold, feed and push them around in the stroller. She decidedly does not love to share her toys. She is 22 pounds (50th percentile) and I can't remember her inches, but she was 70th percentile in height. Our tiny, tiny baby is now a pretty average sized toddler! She let the doctor check her out this time, although she glared at him the whole time. She's just the sweetest little gem and we all love her so much!

Ben took this picture of Chase reading to Davis- I have so many pictures of this same scene over the last four years but it never gets old to me. Davis is lucky because he really has the BEST brothers ever.

The boys have worked hard in their garden with Papa all summer and now it's finally time to sell their produce and reap the reward of their hard work! They put together salsa kits that include bell peppers, hot peppers, onions and tomatoes and they've been a huge hit! So far they've made $200! I'm proud of them and grateful for the lessons they are learning.

Chase wanted to host a party for his friends, so we squeezed it in right at the end of summer. We had all his little friends over to swim and I got 4 pizzas and Chase made some cupcakes. It was perfect! So easy and the boys had a blast!

Chase has grown up so much this summer! He's getting really close to being taller than me, which happened way too fast. He also read so many books this summer- we'd check out a big stack from the library and he'd be through them in a few days. He finished the summer by reading all three Hunger Games books- in 3 days! 

Davis continued to just make my laugh all summer long. This boy is just delightful. My favorite memories of this summer will probably be him learning to swim, and how cute and fearless he is in the pool. He also just loves riding his bike so much. His tire got a hole in it, and instead of fixing it, I just kept pumping it up every day. Which was annoying, but made more tolerable by hearing his adorable, raspy voice say "It's flat as a pancake!" every single day!

Papa Ray is slowly, but surely working on winning Lila over. She was completely content on his lap one Sunday night as long as he let her pick and eat strawberries straight from his garden.

We had a fun day at the Aquarium. I promised Chase a trip here after Covid ruined his field trip that was supposed to happen back in 3rd grade. Only a year and a half later we made it happen! What a cool place! We took my mom too, which was so helpful, since Davis and Lila like to divide and conquer in places like this. Davis was completely entranced and so excited to see everything "SNAKES! I LIKE SNAKES!" "JELLYFISH! I LIKE JELLYFISH!"

The funniest part of the day was in the shark tunnel, Davis yelled out, "Hey sharks, follow me!" As he ran through the tunnel. This is seriously the coolest part of the aquarium. True to form, Chase was more interested in reading all the informational displays than looking at the actual fish and animals. And Hudson was so quiet and interested we almost forgot he was there! And my mom and I scrambled after Davis and Lila the whole time and everyone had a blast!

Out of the Mouth of Davis

 A frequent response from him:

Me: Are you cold/happy/hungry/cute/finished?

Davis: No I'm a boy! 

Also, everytime I say "thank you Davis" responds with

You're woof-woof welcome my mommy!

He calls Lila "cutie-girl" and recently started calling his cousin Anna "Anna-girl". He also calls his uncles "Monkey Will" and "Monkey Nate" (Chase called them "Unky" instead of Uncle and it's just stuck. Then Davis switched it to Monkey which we all like even better)

He stole an Ironman helmet from his friend Will and came to our house with it saying "Hey Mom, I am not giving this back to Will okay? Okay Mom?" and then the next morning said "Um, I think I not give this back to Will. I think this is mine now okay?" (It has since been returned)

He starts all prayers with "Oh God, the Eternal Father" (like the sacrament prayer). Then he prays for the Porters, for our bodies, and body, and bobby. We haven't really figured out what he's talking about there.

We went to visit Nana and Papa one day and Davis looked right at them and said "My daddy is poopin!" (When we left Ben was in the bathroom)

I went in one night to see what was taking Ben so long in getting Davis to bed. 
Davis (Puts his arm protectively across Ben's chest): No, daddy needs to stay in my bed.
Me: Oh, are you the boss?
Davis: No, I'm the boy.

He walked in on my making dinner and when I told him what I was doing he so enthusiastically said, "Oh! Oh! I know! Pizza!" (I was not making pizza. In fact, he gets upset most nights when I tell him that dinner isn't pizza. He usually responds with "NO! You making pizza!")

An older gentlemen was walking by (Bro Emmons- he lives in our neighborhood) and Davis started saying to him "Hi Grandpa!" He passed by a few more times that morning and each time Davis referred to his as "grandpa" at which point Bro. Emmons started calling Davis "grandson". Davis calls both his grandpa's Papa/Papa Ray, so I think this guy just looks like the stereotypical "grandpa" one sees in books/shows/etc. We haven't seen him since that day, so I'm curious if the event will be repeated.

I hurt Lila! She did not like it! (Said with a kind of surprised voice, like this outcome seemed unlikely when he hit her)

He's been on a Daniel Tiger kick, and keeps talking about going to "GrandPere's house". One morning we had this conversation:

Me: Davis, who is grandpere?

Davis: It's my Grandpere!

Me: But what else do you call him?

Davis: I call him....your dad.

Me: What do you do with Grandpere?

Davis: We plant tomatoes!

Me: What about Papa Ray? Is he grandpere?

Davis: No, He's a boy.

Me: And who are you?

Davis: I'm a boy too!

At the beach he was frantically working with a hoe in the sand "I'm fixing the beach!"

Ben was holding him before bed and I leaned in to give him a kiss. Davis sweetly patted me on the head and said "You're a little bit little!" and then patted Ben on the head and said "And you are a little bit big!"

July

A much anticipated event- the big boys got to go to day camp at Camp Keisel! They had so much fun! They both loved the trading post, the BB gun and archery stuff, rowing canoes, and so much other outdoor boy fun! They came home hot and exhausted but so happy!

And then our yearly BYU friends camping trip happened! And much like usual, I only took a few pictures! There is just so much going on with this group. 13 kids in this group and they all get along so well. Also, hanging out with these people is just so pleasant and happy! We stayed at Jolley's Ranch in Hobble Creek Canyon, which is just 15 minutes from Virgin's house. We hung out at the campsite all evening and into the night- cooked s'mores and all that. The kids got super dirty and had energy coming out their ears!

At 10:30 after s'mores and everything, the Bennetts left for the night (they weren't feeling up to camping) and Ash and I took the tiny girls back to her house to sleep. It was kind of awesome. Lila fell asleep immediately when we got there, so Ash and I stayed up until 2:00 chatting about all the deep life stuff and it was the best. When we got back to camp in the morning, we found out that Ben and Russell had done the same thing! So all the parents were exhausted, but I think it was worth it!

We spent a little more time playing around the campsite in the morning before taking off around noon. I took a bunch of pictures of Chase and Kynlee playing in the river together, slightly in hopes it might go in their wedding video someday.

This is just Lila being adorable reading her books. She's starting to love paging through books on her own, which always looks adorable.

We spent a day at Pineview with the Josephs! The kids had so much fun, and true to my usual form I hardly took any pictures to document the fun. At one point all six boys were on one paddleboard! This is Megan and me out on the paddle boards. The day was super warm, but the water felt amazing and it was so fun to see the kids have the time of their lives at the beach. Davis had been begging to go to the beach for a few months, so this was a dream come true for him. He really was one with the sand.

She's watched her big brothers play- she knows what to do. She also frequently tries to join them during their practice sessions, which is sometimes cute to them and sometimes just frustrating.

 I took the boys on their own back to school shopping date and then lunch afterwards- this was Hudson's date at Zupas. I didn't even get a picture during Chase's, but it was so fun to have time with each boy!

Chase and Lila doing "up-shoulders" as Davis calls it.

We've spent so much time at the pool this summer! 

I let Chase stay up late to watch Olympic Gymnastics with me- he loved it mostly because he loves a good excuse to stay up late.  We spent a lot of time in August watching Olympics and we loved every minute of it.

I took my kids to the Natural History Museum. It was a brave endeavor, and Lila was kind of a nightmare. But the boys all loved it! They had a cool exhibit on mummies, which was a highlight for Chase. And Davis is super into dinosaurs and loved seeing the dinosaur bones (we walked through them twice!). 

We usually swim 4-5 days a week, and we usually bring friends along too, which makes it more fun. On this particular morning my kids were just being way too cute in the water, and although pictures never quite capture their cuteness I tried anyway.

While I was watching Olympic gymnastics the Bacciocco kids were over and they all were trying to do gymnastics (although Nora was the only kid who could really do them). They all sure tried! Even Lila would bend her hands to the ground, stick a foot in the air, and then stand up and clap for herself!