Youth Prom (formerly known as "Mormon Prom")

Every year the local stakes sponsor a Youth Prom. My girls were finally old enough this year! No dates, but luckily going stag was encouraged if you didn't have a date. Here are Elizabeth and Caroline at the dance.

The decorating theme seemed to be "rustic elegance," and the decorating was really, really well-done. There was teen-favorite food in every activity room. This room had karaoke and served Italian cream sodas.

There were even thoughtful tables in the restroom area.

After the party Caroline said it was so much fun, more fun than she thought it was going to be, that she was going to try much harder next year to get a date!

One last picture of my sweet girls.

(I made Elizabeth's dress on the left and Caroline's came from a thrift store with the jacket refashioned by our friend Rhonda.)

Generation 1.5

In March our family made a quick weekend trip to Salt Lake City, Utah. We went for a temple sealing, but instead ended up in the emergency room at LDS Hospital up in the Avenues.  Happily, it wasn't one of the girls, but it was one of the relatives, and she had to deal with a dislocated shoulder. Not at all fun for her.

While we waited, we took the girls to B Street Park. This tiny park is on a lot that I think once held a Victorian house. It's a ten minute walk from where I used to live and I took my older children there many times. It's hard to explain how much I loved taking my second set of children to the same place my first set enjoyed so much.

New Year's surprise!

New Year's Day the kids came running in to my room to tell me it had snowed overnight.  Not so strange, right?  Wrong, because we live in Arizona in an area where it snows only every couple of years and no more than 0.25" when it does.

We had about an inch and it stayed until early afternoon.  The children loved it!

An October medical tradition

Somehow the girls' annual checkups have become an October thing. A couple of years ago I had to take one of them in for something (very rare in our family) and the regular pediatrician was out and we agreed to see his partner.  Loved her.  Never went back to the original one.

It's fun to listen to her ask all the medical questions, then launch into the social ones, great to hear the age-appropriate answers, reassuring to see their growth and development is right on track.

Love these girls!

First day of school--Part 2

While I was taking Sophia to the bus, Bill was taking Caroline and Elizabeth to theirs.  Last year he drove them to school every day because for one reason or another we never figured out exactly what time the bus came through the neighborhood.  However, this year the information was easy to find and Bill and I decided they need to ride the bus both to and from school, which makes it easier for him to get to work early.

A very nice "shop locally" promotion

We almost always get out of the house on Thursdays because my mother's house cleaners come that day and I need to get the girls out of their way.  Today I took them to 4th Avenue, which is a fun and funky street near the university.  I thought we would window shop up and down the street, which entails about 6 blocks, then go home.  Instead we found announcements for a "Where Is Waldo?" promotion.

The girls got a "passport" at one of the sponsoring stores, then set out to find a 6" cardboard cut out of Waldo in the stores listed.  We found 15 of them!  Some of the store clerks were helpful and some weren't.  I did notice about half the clerks' eyes darted to the approximate location when I told them we were looking for Waldo.  LOL.

Holding the passports in our hands kind of gave us permission to walk all over various stores and even restaurants while we looked for Waldo.  It was fun.  And of course it got us into more than a dozen stores we never would have gone into.

When it was all over we did not stop at one of the interesting restaurants that dotted the street because they were a little more than my budget would allow, but we did stop at a Dairy Queen in the district, which was actually a very rare event for my girls.  No inside seating, only outside.  Two Blizzards and a large sundae, please.

Summer party!

Our ward (church congregation) has parties . . . just because, and plenty of them.  This was the first time we've ever had a large water feature for a party and it was a huge hit with all the kids and some of the adults as well.

We love our zoo!

This trip certainly seemed to be for the birds . . . .

 

There were a couple of good looking girls in the same area and you can see one of them in the background above.

 

This was another peacock.  Such beautiful feathers!  The bird below let me get that close to it (no telephoto lens).  It does not have an aviary but flies free.  However, I've seen it there many times, so it knows the zoo is a good home.

 

This crane got spooked by something and gave a really loud squawk that startled us!

 

There were a number of duck with their teenagers.

The girls wore their swim suits in hopes of playing in the water area, but it was closed due to an infestation of bees.  Water + heat, of course the bees like it!

 

And of course we always take a picture by the sculpture.  It's almost as good for watching growth as the marks on the back of the kitchen door.

Bon Voyage!

Today Caroline and Elizabeth are leaving on a trip they have been anticipating ALL SCHOOL YEAR!

They'll fly to Washington D.C. tonight and start touring just about as soon as they get there tomorrow morning.  They have had hours and hours of extra classes to learn about the history of Washington D.C., and by extension, about American history.  When they arrive for a tour of the White House or the Washington Monument or the Holocaust Museum, they will know why it's important to our history and to them personally.

Happy 12th!

Caroline and Elizabeth have been looking forward to turning twelve for months!  Twelve means moving from Primary to Young Women at Church (children's program to teenager program) and it's a big milestone.  Also, since they have relatively late birthdays, they are some of the last 6th graders to turn twelve.

Here they are with their cake that assumes knowledge of place value:

 

 Including me behind the camera, here is the gang who celebrated their birthday with them:

Caroline is on the honor roll!

The 6th grade teachers and the PTA put on a nice continental breakfast for the honorees this morning and invited parents to come along as well. 

The principal called each child up to receive a handshake, a certificate, a pencil, and a bumper sticker for the parents' car.

Do you like that Halloween ghost she has on her hairband?

Caroline brought a little friend home on her walk from the bus

Look at the cute little lizard she chased down and brought home:

And yes, it is now safely outdoors.

Back to Mexico after a 5 month hiatus

The last time I went to Mexico to take Caroline to the orthodontist was March 29.  There were some problems and I didn't go back.  Then Bill and I had to send our passports away to get some travel visas, so we couldn't go to Mexico.

Our passports are now in hand, so I made Caroline an appointment for today at 4 pm so she wouldn't miss much school and also so we could see the orthodontist vs. a technician.  It's the first time we've gone so late in the day and I was surprised at how much was going on in the outdoors.

I picked up some old wax transfers last night from the sharing table at homemaking meeting.  Now I see I could have just bought some preprinted ones from this stand.  Just kidding.  I don't know what to do with "table scarves" anyway.  Or are those napkins?

 

It doesn't cost much to open a restaurant in this city.  Block out a parking space with your motorcycle, set up three chairs, roll your food stand out and you're in business!  His food handler's permit and business license are probably tucked under that basket.

So here is the follow-up on the linked post above.  When I made the appointment I told the receptionist I wanted to talk to the office manager and why. She said the manager would be in when we came for Caroline's appointment.  Part of what ticked me off was that I sent a letter to the office telling them why I was unhappy and what I wanted them to do about it. Crickets.  I sat down with the manager and in my skilled and practiced Spanish I told her what happened that day in March, showed her the original appointment card and my parking ticket, and had her read a new copy of the letter I'd written in early April.  Haha, just checking to see if you're really paying attention.  I'm not sure I could negotiate for a baby's lollipop in Spanish if my life depended on it.  Luckily the manager's English was very adequate and in the end she credited Caroline's account with the $100 I had asked for, along with offering a sincere apology.

I had suspected the line at the border would be challenging, and in fact Caroline and I each brought along a book to read in line.  This is what we were met with when we got there:

Those people you can see were talking to the Mexican guard, not standing in line.  The people in line were waaaaay up past where the line angles to the left.  Our total wait was about 7 minutes.

Such a good trip to the orthodontist.

Breakfast before school

Breakfast is a pretty casual and help-yourself affair most school mornings.  I used to make a simple but nutritious breakfast every morning.

Then I began working early in the morning, extending until after they leave for school some days.

I usually set out what I want them to eat, along with whatever dishes and utensils they'll need.  Today was a choice of peanut butter toast (on Emily's delicious bread) or cold cereal, both with milk.  None of the three girls is a big eater first thing in the morning, so I'm glad when they'll eat a modest breakfast.

What would you do?

Yesterday Caroline needed to go to the doctor but hers was out of town, so the office asked if I would mind her seeing the new associate.  I somewhat reluctantly said all right.

Okay, here's the problem:  I LOVED the new doctor and so did Caroline!  The two of them were truly hilarious with each other, although Caroline probably didn't realize it.  Later Caroline asked me if she could see the new doctor in the future instead of the old doctor.  I was wondering the same thing.

What should I do?

Any excuse for a little art . . . .

Caroline loves to draw and uses any opportunity to do so.  The other day Bill told the girls they could each have one Nutty Bar bar, so Caroline made a sign just to make sure the girls knew what was theirs.

A sort-of trip to the temple

Our ward has been sponsoring a trip to the LDS temple 2 hours away twice a year as long as we've been living here and we haven't missed one yet.  We provide our own transportation, but they provide babysitting near the temple, along with lunch after our temple session of worship.

In all this time Bill and I have never been asked to babysit, but today was finally our turn.  We were assigned to watch the children for the first half of the time the parents would be gone, then we would go to the temple and do some faster-than-normal things there due to the shortened time.

But!  There was a wreck on the way to the big city that didn't hold *us* up because we passed it only about 10 minutes after it happend and the freeway wasn't closed yet, but almost everyone else behind us got caught in the traffic jam as they rerouted traffic off the freeway and then back on.  And then the temple apparently was PACKED!  There were weddings!  There were guests!  There were photographers!  There were bridesmaids in their pretty, matching dresses!  There were more regular temple attendees than normal, even for an August Saturday because of some internal changes!  We decided to just stay at the babysitting place and skip the extreme hustle and bustle of the temple today!

Honestly, one reason I go to the temple is to feel the peace of Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.  I wanted to feel that today and I feared I wouldn't, or at least not to the extent I usually do.

So the picture is of the girls as we got ready to leave.  You can see how excited Elizabeth was to leave.  The girls really love this semi-annual activity and guess what?  Our ward juuuust changed it to a quarterly activity, so we'll be going at least four times a year from now on.  So happy about that!

Back to our schedule!

This summer was pretty free-form as far as schedules and plans went.  Now the girls are back in school our days have more structure.  Actually, that's a good thing.  I think some moms like the summer because they can sleep in later in the morning with the kids, but my job gets me up uber early year 'round, so summer is no advantage to me there.  Even though homework time can be a bit hair-raising around here, doesn't this look sweet?

A few new clothes

Yesterday David, Alicia, and I took the girls to the mall, mostly out of boredom and partly to stay cool.

I didn't plan to buy anything, but I did stop in at GapKids because I found good things on their sale rack earlier this year.  This time I found a tunic top that Caroline is wearing above, a cream top with rosettes on it, and a sun dress which will be worn with a shirt under it.  Everything, including tax, was less than $13.

Years ago when my big kids were this age and younger, I shopped GapKids frequently.  I have never actually paid retail for anything there, but had a mental formula for how much I was willing to pay for something based on its quality, appropriateness for the season, and size.  Now that I have rediscovered GapKids, I think I'll have to dust off my formula and shop there a little more often.

Great low-tech library activity

Several Saturdays a month our library had a good kids' activity.  Here is the prep for it:

 Put up some tables, including one lying flat on the floor with its legs still folded up.

Put out lots of bins FULL of Lego pieces. 

Let the kids create.

After the children make their pieces, they put them on that library cart behind Caroline and they go into a display case.  The next time we go to the library we'll be able to see the girls' creations.  And although we will be going back on Thursday anyway, you can bet the girls will not let me forget!