The last day of school

And then, the school year ended! 

This was Adam with his teacher on the first day of school...

And here they are on the last day of school...

Kindergarten was such a great experience for Adam. I am so thankful for his teacher!  She was seriously the best teacher he could have had.  She was consistently at school (the other full day teacher had a baby half way through the year, and the half day teacher was sick a lot, so she missed a lot of school days) - Adam had a hard time the few days that there was a substitute in his class.  There wasn't anyone I talked to that had experience with Mrs. Dumo before (even though she has been teaching at Hilltop for 6 years - she's always taught full day), so I didn't know anything about her.  She was great!  I really enjoyed volunteering and spending time in the classroom.
When I ask Adam what his favorite thing about Kindergarten was, he always says PE.   When we talk about it more, he says his favorite thing they did in class was reading Charlotte's Web. 
Adam learned so much and really grew up during the year.  He learned to read a few words, he learned to sound things out and to do some writing.  He can count to 100, and do simple addition and subtraction.  He loves to explore and figure out how things work.  It's fun to have a conversation with him - once in a while he just spouts out random bits of knowledge (like strawberries have more vitamin C than oranges - he likes to point that out a lot).  He likes to listen to longer chapter books, and loves to go to the library to check out books (we even got him his own library card!)
I think Adam has had a great first experience at school.  Hopefully, the experience just keeps getting better and better!

Last day of school

This is Jackson with a slightly evil laugh.  We just tod him we could make summer plans since Adam would be home all summer!

Bug Hunters!

One of Adam's friends came over for a play date the other day after school.  He is in 2nd grade, and they've been doing a unit about bugs.  He has a cool bug catcher kit that he brings to school every day and he catches bugs at recess.  He brought his bugs over when he came to play, and ever since, the boys have been catching every bug they find.  Lots of potato bugs and beetles.  I found these cute bug catcher kits at Toys R Us, and now they are really in business!  As long as they don't bring them in the house - they can catch all the bugs they want!

The end of another season...

Adam had his last official T-ball game!  Next year he will move on to coach pitch, and he is so excited!  It's been fun to watch his skills sharpen this past season.  I think playing on a real team with coaches who know what they are doing really helped (go figure!)  He still has a crazy fun (think Phoebe from the TV show friends!), but he is much more coordinated, can really hit the ball if he concentrates, and has quite the arm!

Here are a few pics from his last game. 

Ready and waiting - playing second base...

 The last few games, the coach would give each kid three pitches, and if they didn't hit it, the could hit off the tee.  Adam smashed this ball into centerfield!

 He's ready to run!!

 Crazy spectator!

 After the game, they had a quick party, right at the ball field, which I thought was brilliant!  No need to plan for a separate time!  They served cake and the coaches handed out trophies.  Notice Jackson - first in line for the cake!  That kid will never pass up any food!

 Enjoying cake with his team mates.

 Adam was so excited about getting another trophy. 

One funny thing - Scott and Adam were watching the end of the NBA finals when the Miami Heat won.  Adam was asking about the trophy and talking about how he really wanted a trophy for playing basketball.  Scott told him that LeBron James had been playing professional basketball for 20 years (or however long he's been playing), and this was the first time he had ever won a trophy.  Adam just didn't understand why he didn't get a trophy every time...  Not sure what we teach them by giving them a trophy at the end of every season...

Field Trip

Adam had a fun end of the year field trip, and Jackson and I decided to tag a long.  We weren't able to ride the bus, so we carpooled with a friend over to Alki beach.  There is a scuba diving school located right there.  The diving students do their practice dives there, and bring stuff up from the bottom and put them in little pools for the kids to look at.  It was a very cool experience! They found lots of starfish, sea cucumbers, and anenomes.  The kids also caught a bunch of sand crabs. 

A couple of the divers.



 

The view of the Seattle skyline across the water.  I was kind of a grey day, but the skyline was still beautiful...

Adam with a crab...

And a starfish...

Jackson just wanted to walk in the water in his rain boots.

Adam's class all go together for a picture. I missed my chance to get a good picture - so here's some of his class with Seattle in the back ground.

This was one of the very cool star fish they brought up.  

After exploring the beach for a bit, we joined all the kindergartners for lunch, and then they loaded the buses and headed back to the school - it was a fun way to spend the afternoon.

 

Below is Scott's sisters take on the field trip - she offered to help me get caught up on my blog while whe was here - she did this entry and one other.  Can anyone find the other entry she did???

 



Here we are at the end of the school year, on our last field trip!  I can't believe how fast the school year went.  I was hoping our trip to the ocean was going to be at Myrtle Beach, NC!  It would have been so sunny and warm and my two sisters in North Carolina were prepared to bring their kids and join us for our field trip....  but Obama hasn't put enough money into our school systems so we settled for 15 miles from home and went to Alki Beach! 

We had a great time exploring and touching the star fish.  Adam even held a tiny little crab.  Jackson had a little fright when the two scubba divers just "popped" out of the water.  It was a great day!

Gateway Mall Spray Park

After lunch, we walked down to the fountain at the mall and let the kids run wild.  It was seriously a hot day!  I think the temperature got close to 100 degrees that day.  The kiddos had such a fun time!  Jackson was dancing around and it was so funny!  I tried to get a good video, but wasn't sucessfull.  Here are several pictures of the dancing!

 Adam and Noah watched some older boys do this, and thought it was hilarious!  Monkey see, monkey do!

Kate spent most of the time at the fountain like this!  

After playing for a bit, we found some ice cream for the kids to enjoy.  Kate LOVES ice cream.

"Mom - that's mine!!"

We wore the kids out good at the fountain.   Jackson fell asleep on the train ride back to Tiffy's house, and we were even able to transfer him to the stoller withouy waking him up.  That's what all that dancing can do for ya!

That night, Nate and Shae headed back to Evanston, and the next morning, we got in the car and headed home.  We had planned on stopping somewhere in Oregon for the night, but as we were driving, grandma and I decided to just power through and get home.  The kids did well, and we made it home about 10:30 that night.  It was a short trip, but it was a fun break from the normal goings on.

Temple Square

Sunday night, we drove back to Aunt Tiffy's house and took grandpa to the airport.  Shae and the kids came too, so we could spend some more time with them. 

Adam, Aiden and Talia camped out in the hallway for sleeping!

Kate had a hard time sleeping, so she sacked out with me.  She loves that little pink bear lovey!

Monday morning, Tiff went into work for a little bit, and then met us at the trax station to head into Salt Lake.  Adam really wanted to go see temple square.  It was a super hot day - close to 100 degrees! 

Aunt Tiffy had recently been to Disneyland, and she brought back tshirts for all the kids.  Here's most of them waiting to get on trax.

Jackson LOVED riding the train!  Noah was nice to sit with him!

We walked around temple square a bit.  Here are most of the kids at the door of the temple.

We also walked up to see the Christus.

After walking around temple square, we headed down to Gateway mall.  We stopped into Applebees for some lunch.  I love this pic of all the kids as we waited for them to get our table ready.

Kate was having a grand time!  That's Eli sitting next to her looking at Noah.

Exploring in Wyoming

After the baptism, everyone went back to Nate and Shae's house for dinner.  We were planning on staying the night, so after everyone left, we enjoyed some time hanging out with cousins.  Adam finally agreed to pose for a picture with Noah, and was excited to show that he is just a bit taller than Noah now. 

We went down to the river walk in down town Evantson, and enjoyed spending some time outside...  The kids loved throwing rocks in the water.

Kate wasn't too happy with the water - even though it was very hot out!

Jackson didn't have any problems with the water temperature.

Collecting rocks - of course!

Happy from a distance.



Love this picture of Jackson and Asher walking back towards the car.

Noah's Baptism

We got up the next morning and headed to Evanston!  We drove straight to the chapel and got there just in time to snap a picture or two.  Here's Noah and Nate. 

Adam refused to pose for a picture with his cousin, but Jackson was anxious to get in there!

It was a nice baptismal service.  Adam is always excited to watch baptisms.  It was neat to see my brother baptize his own son.  Here's Noah, dressed up in his new suit after the baptism.

And here's the full crew that came for the baptism.