Clowning Around....

Sleeping Habits - Bad Parenting...

Darin has been working like a mad man lately and is EXTREMELY tired ALL THE TIME! Nash has always been a terrible sleeper and will get up at least 2 or 3 times in the middle of the night. We usually usher him back into his room, but lately both of us have been too tired to do that and we just throw him into our bed. A couple of times we have woken up to find Nash in our bed and we have no clue how he got there. I have learned that he sleeps longer in our bed which makes life so much happier through out the day, so I don't mind it as much. Darin likes him sleeping with us because that is about the only time he gets to be with Nash. SOOOO sadly I think we have created a monster...oh well for now we are enjoying our sweet little boy.

Preschool...

Our little boy is now a BIG preschooler! Darin and I scouted out the preschools last spring and decided to enroll Nash in the Faith Church, Building Blocks Preschool. It isn't far from our home, and I have several friends who have children there. Darin and I attended a class and spoke to the teacher and felt really good about it. I guess it was a good choice because soon after we had 3 other friends follow our lead and enroll their children as well. :)

Nash requested "blue pancakes" for his first day of school breakfast.

We went a little early so we could snap some pictures in front of the church. Nash is wearing his awesome new dragon shirt. He was so excited to go to school!

His teacher is Mrs. Flamisch, she has 2 assistants Mrs. Landis and Mrs. Cowell. Nash LOVES all of them, especially the assistants. He will see one of them and get the biggest smile on his face. The week before school started they had an open house to meet the teacher and talk to the parents. Nash was pretty nervous, but his buddy Madden just took his hand and helped him feel safe. It brought tears to my eyes. The first day of school Nash was shy but said good-bye and didn't look back. He goes to school Tuesday and Thursday's 9 - 11:30am. Hopefully he will be able to do the extended day on Thursdays from 9 - 2:30pm. The program is awesome and I know he will enjoy all the activities they do. We liked this school because we didn't feel like they tried to indoctrinate the children with the churches beliefs. We appreciated that the curriculum was centered around a Christian base where the kids are introduced to Christian beliefs but not enough that there would be a confusion between religions. I like that they pray together, and learn about the scriptures while learning their ABC's. I even think I will let Nash do their vacation bible school next summer! :)

Dragon...

My friend Jess made this cute little dragon beany for Nash. HE LOVES IT! Although trying to take a picture of him with it on was TORTURE!!!






Isn't it so cute! Thanks Jess!!!

Piano...

A while back I found a piano on free-cycle that a church in the area was giving away. I went and checked it out. It was an upright piano, 2 of the keys didn't work and all of the keys were well worn. BUT I fell in love with it and Darin and I both wanted a piano in the house. So we asked some friends for help. We should have asked MORE friends for help because the piano ended up being a beast! We had a hard time getting it out of the church onto the truck. The piano was EXTREMELY heavy and would only load on its side. I was afraid it would break the tail-gate. The church was located about 20 minutes from our house. We had to take the free-way to get home. Our friend drove really slow then we had our other friend drive behind us as a buffer if the piano decided to fly out. I seriously thought we were going to kill someone! Thankfully Riley had some mad Marine knot tying skills and we made it safely!

We recruited a neighbor to help unload...but I am positive we could have used 3 more men. The piano was so heavy it scratched the concrete as they were bringing it in. I was a little worried about my floors.Sarah and Lucus our neighbors helped supervise.

Nash fell asleep on the way home and this is where he sat during the process. Probably better that way so he wasn't under their feet.

I LOVE our piano! My friend Brook let me borrow some music (I am terrible) and it has been fun playing and relearning the piano! Thanks to everyone that busted their backs to get this beast to our home. Now I think we will sale the house with it in it! haha

Messy Little Boy...

Here are Nash's best friends....
Where ever Nash is, you will find the dinosaurs close by. One day I caught them all being a little naughty. Nash thought it needed to snow soap....
I wasn't too happy with him but I was in the process of mopping the rest of the house so it wasn't that big of a deal. This is what Nash does when I sweep and mop the house...
Such a big helper!

Canning...

I decided this was the year I was going to learn to can. Our ward did a RS meeting on it and I took notes, asked a lot of questions, bought the stuff and TRIED IT! I surprised at how easy it really was. This summer I really took advantage of the Mennonite Farmers Markets, I loved buying their produce as well as talking with them each week. Such nice people! Although at the end of the summer I realized there was a farmers market just down the block from my house! (walking distance!) Oh well I enjoyed going out to the Mennonite farms anyway!

I made salsa for Darin. He loves salsa but he doesn't like it REALLY HOT! So I tried to make it mild. Sadly I just made it really bland....BOOO! It was a good try for my first time.

Nash and I and few other friends went peach picking. We picked so many peaches and used every single one of them. I couldn't get enough of them. Peaches are my favorite fruit! Darin and Nash were big helpers in cutting and canning them.

This is Nash's favorite thing to do in the kitchen. Play in the water.

He also thinks his dinosaurs need to help with the cooking.

And don't you dare move them...he is watching and will put them right back!

Thank goodness for chocolate milk to cause a distraction.

Our final product!

We made freezer jam although it didn't set up so it is more of a syrup. I think it is super good. Darin is a little skeptical of EVERYTHING we made. Hopefully next year I can get it all right.

Sadly almost all of the frozen peaches are gone. We LOVE smoothies.