1st Day of School

Dear teachers of my children:

Please love these guys, as they are some of the best guys I know. They are smart and fun and a little unsure of themselves and rowdy and whiny and very, very wonderful. They mean the world to me, and I hope you can love them and teach them and inspire them and mold them and get them to stop picking their noses. (just one of them, really.) I hope you can see beyond the things they're working on and right into their good hearts. I hope you will make them behave, help them to love school, teach them to be kind to themselves and others, hold them accountable, correct their mistakes, and let them feel your trust and confidence in them. Let them know you are crazy about them, for I sure am. Oh, and get them ready for college while you're at it, okay? 

P.S. And if it's not asking too much, could we ditch the big poster collage projects and and science fair stuff?  That's all. And maybe consider getting rid of "dress like your favorite community worker day". Just sayin'. And thanks for all you do!

8th

5th

2nd

Off to school they go....By Sam King

See this face? This is the face of some serious summer fun. This is what I look like during summer: happy. But then today I learned that my BFFs are headed back to school, so now I look like this:

It's true---they are all ditching me and my thumb-sucking ways to spend time with their teachers.Sigh.

We've had a really fun summer, though. I will miss playing at Seven Peaks with my peeps, going on picnics, and spending time with the people we love:

I try not to think about how they will be gone 6 whole hours every day, or how I will just have boring old mom to play with and all she ever wants to do is "run errands".

I will miss how Ben teases me until I scream, and I will miss playing "police" with C and G.

I will miss Garrett breaking bones and running through the sprinklers with me with his cast covered in plastic wrap.

But maybe, just maybe, they will miss me too (even though they are so excited to go back). 

Thanks for a great summer B,C, and G!

Love,

Your thumb-sucking smarty pants Sam-I-Am.

SD

Recently we drove 800 miles south and west and despite a few bumps in the road......had an amazing time.

There was a little of this (whatever this is)......

and a lot of that (so fun to have Aunt Melissa come down from L.A.)

and even some

and some

.

We enjoyed time together (here Cass talks Sam into smiling nicely for the camera)

(which sort of worked),

and some solitary time, too.

We rode rides at Sea World...

(Ben is wearing the yellow shirt in the middle)

and saw every whale/dolphin/sea lion/otter show available.

We loved our time in La Jolla...

even though some of us think "bunny ears" are so funny AND original.

Sleeping arrangements were really fun, especially if you got to sleep next to the cast-wielding one-armed bandit (klunk!).

We met up with Uncle Maul at Legoland......

and ran into Mr.Vader, too.

We rode some more rides.....

and some people even made their mom do their dirty work for them because of a broken arm!

A highlight of the trip was hanging out with cousins (you read that right, our cousins) at the SD Zoo.

So fun to meet baby Derek and see JT on his 5th birthday!

We played, we drove, we laughed, we cried (just me), we waited in myriad lines, we rode awesome rides, we got sandy and salt-watery and basked in the 70 degree sunshine without sweating to death. We sat in traffic, emptied our wallets, and had our car broken into and our ipods stolen. We stuffed ourselves at the hotel breakfast each morning, snacked on Skittles and Starburst continually, and had the best dinner ever at a shack of a restaurant on the Ocean Beach Pier during sunset. We loved California, missed Utah, were glad to get back to Lehi, and can't wait to go again.

Come to Zion Come to Zion

Like the wild and crazy people we are, we went on holiday to St.George, Utah for some rest, relaxation, and  red dirt.

We rented a gorgeous condo with a fabulous pool. I love this picture of B and S, mostly because I think B looks so grown up. Just.stop.it.

It was a simple but fun vacay. I took way too many pictures and now it's hard to decide which are blog-worthy. I think my family is so cute I want to post them ALL!

Really there are two types of photos---the ones that tell what you did, and the ones that you just love mostly because you love the people in them so much. So first things first.....here's what we did:

Our first day in St.George we drove to Zion. It poured rain and we loved every minute of it. The temperatures were cool and despite the red mud, we managed to time our hikes just right in between showers. Above, we spent an extra long time waiting under the ledge at Water-in-the-Rock, waiting for the rain to stop. It allowed for lots of picture taking moments:

This is Rich bringing-down-the-hammer just moments after Garrett almost plunges to his death over the side of the cliff. Can't you almost here R's lecture????

Photographing Zion in the rain was really beautiful. The lighting was perfecto!

And don't forget the critters. The kids are obsessed with photographing bugs in macro mode.

Day 2 of our weekend-away found us in Snow Canyon, a favorite place of ours:

Pioneer Names

Non-Pioneer Faces

Jenny's Canyon

Our trip also included lots of swimming in the awesome pool, a splash park and a really hot park (it was 106 on Saturday), and lots of sleeping in, watching movies, and eating yummy food together. We went to a Sacrament meeting down there and marveled at how you can go any where in the world and feel at home in an LDS chapel. 

Rich and I also took an off-road excursion. We ditched the kids at the condo (they were in the movie-zone and probably didn't realize we were gone) and went and explored the old town of Leeds, a few miles north of St. George. Rich loves to have the 'Burban in 4WD and I love love love exploring back roads, pioneer cemeteries, ghost towns, etc. We make a good team.

The "tithing office" in :Leeds and a gravestone from one of the cemeteries nearby.

Now for the second type of pictures, my faves.......

King-of-the-world!