Our Labor Day Trip to Steve and Melissa's

Here's our trip to Bakersfield to visit Steve, Melissa, and kids. It was a very fun Labor Day Weekend filled with swimming, soccer games, karaoke, Summer's birthday party, and eating yummy food. Thanks for such a wonderful trip Steve and Melissa.

Of course we had In-N-Out Burger on the way home.

Summer's 9th Birthday Party with Friends

Summer's 9th Birthday Party with her school and church friends at our house. It was a lot of fun. I am so glad that we decided on a 2 hour birthday party, instead of a sleep over. We were all exhausted after just 2 hours. It was a lot of fun though. Such sweet girls that Summer has for friends!

Summer's family birthday party

Summer got to celebrate her actual birthday with cousins in Bakersfield. Rachel and Lauren enjoyed decorating Summer with the beautiful new flower hair accessories they gave her. What a special birthday to spend with family. Thanks Steve and Melissa.

Grandpa Spendlove

Grandpa Spendlove had a heart-attack a few weeks ago. Stuart and I were able to visit him in the hospital, while Rebecca watched our kids (have to be 16 or older to visit). We had such a wonderful visit. He looked so wonderful and was in such good spirits. He had a beautiful smile on his face when I gave him a hug. We were so grateful that we live so close to be able to see him. We are so grateful for the tender care that Grandma Spendlove, Sarah, Rebecca, and Steve have given him. He is home now and recovering.

The kids made him a Get Well Banner as shown at the top. Summer has shed a lot of tears over Grandpa in the hospital. She loves her Grandpa and has been very worried about him. I think this helped her.

Spencer's future career

I was helping Spencer with his "All About Me Poster/Report" today. One of the questions was what do you want to be when you grow up? He usually says a scientist, but today he surprised me.

He said, "Ya know those people that dress up at Disneyland and wave."

"Um costume characters."

"Yes."

"Who do you want to be."

"Mickey Mouse."

So there ya have it; Spencer wants to be Mickey Mouse when he grows up. I tried to have him write "Mickey Mouse costume character at Disneyland" so that it would make sense, but he insisted that that was too long and just wrote Mickey Mouse.

Spencer's new tie

We used to work so hard to try and get Spencer to wear ties and finally gave up. Recently, Spencer has really been wanting to wear a tie to church. His little kid ties were getting too small so Stuart very proudly passed down one of his ties to Spencer. He is just so cute.

We were filling out a questionaire for his school teacher about him. I was asking him the questions and filling in the answers. The question was, "What is your favorite activity?" He said, "Church." My jaw nearly dropped with shock and excitement. He was also supposed to take 3 things in a bag that describe him. The very first thing he handed me was his old Book of Mormon from his Lubbock, Texas Primary presidency. I was surprised thinking that he would hand me all kinds of his little trinkets and asked him why he chose that. He said, Because it's about Jesus. What a wonderful day for me.

I don't know what I'd do without each of my sweet little kids. They are all so unique and add so much to our family.

Our new police cruiser and fire truck

A couple in the ward gave us their grandkids police cruiser, firetruck, stop sign, gas station, and meter. The kids have been having a blast with it. We have such wonderful friends in the ward. We are so blessed.

The kids kept going back and forth between their kiddie pool and cars. Nephi has been spending a lot of time in the yard. He likes to take anything he can find and fill it with water and then dirt to make a major mud fest. I have tried to have him not get the mud in his pool, but that's kind of a lost cause. I was getting the cups out for dinner tonight and couldn't understand why we didn't have enough cups. Oh yeah, they are kind of occupied in the backyard, or some of them have made it to the trash can. I had to ask myself are these kids cups from Chili's really worth saving? Not really. I'd much rather Nephi enjoy himself...and that he does.