Hailey's First Day of Preschool

After watching her brother go to school for 3 years while she had to stay home, it was finally Hailey's first day of preschool! Needless to say she was so excited! All morning she was bouncing off the walls and asking me every 5 minutes if it was time yet. Yes, it was a LONG two hours of telling her, not yet!

Finally the time arrived and we got her all ready to go. She's such a little diva - it took her at least 5 minutes to decide what to wear her first day! This is what she decided on and I thought she looked darling!


Think she's just the least bit excited?


Here she is with her ladybug backpack on.


I asked her if she wanted to get another backpack for school, but she said no. She told me this was her favorite and she wanted to use it for preschool.


After that, we headed on down the street to preschool. We're lucky to have a lady in our ward that teaches preschool and lives just down the road. It sure makes getting her there and picking her up nice and easy. Mrs Sandra is her teacher and just the sweetest lady ever! We feel very lucky to have Hailey in her preschool.

When it was time, Tate and I headed down to get her. She was all smiles and talked excitedly the whole walk home about all the fun things they did like playing with toys, reading stories, doing art, playing outside on the trampoline, and having a birthday party for a boy in the class. She was so happy, it was just so cute to see. When we got home, she showed us what she made that day. Here's the sign of her name that she was able to glue glitter and such on.


She really was proud of it and we took it up and hung it in her room.


She definitely had a wonderful first day at preschool and can't wait to go back tomorrow!


As a side note, we also finally got her hair cut as well. I was hoping to have it done before the first day, but the lady that does it had a few things going on before, as did we, so we ended up having to do it yesterday afternoon instead.

So here's the before ...


and the after. As you can see, it had grown quite a bit since we last had it cut. I've been meaning to get it cut for months now, but thing after thing kept coming up and then we had the baby which postponed it even more, but we finally got it done and boy does it look cute!


These aren't the cutest pictures - I think she's a little tired of having her picture taken because every time I take more than a couple of pictures, I get the "painful grin" as the smile.


Oh well, at least you can see it - it turned out great and fits her little personality so perfectly! Yesterday was definitely a fun day - and we can't wait for preschool tomorrow!

Hogle Zoo

Last Friday we were able to take our annual trip to Hogle Zoo. The kids look forward to this every year and I was so glad we were able to make it this year. Thanks to coke rewards and some coupons, we were able to get all of us in for a pretty good deal - nothing like finding bargains!

Here we all are (except Nana, who is taking the picture) just as we're getting to the zoo.


Here's little Tate on his first zoo trip - all dressed for a long hot day of seeing the animals. Even though it was sunny, it wasn't too hot, a perfect day for the zoo.


One of the first stops were the elephants, the kids love to watch them play with all their toys!


Of course, baby elephant Zuri was so cute! We got a picture of her playing in the mud - the kids just laughed and laughed.


Here's everyone watching the elephants - such a good looking group!


Once Hailey figured out we were all wearing sunglasses, she decided she had to wear hers as well. Too cute!


Here's Zach in front of the rhinos.


This scale shows how your weight compares to different animals. The four kids didn't even register as the first animal on the chart - we have some skinny kids!


Here are a couple of quick poses by the rhino statue.


And on the rhino statue - first Zach ...


and then Hailey.


The kids were so funny as they would cluster around certain windows - I thought this one was funny since Hailey had her glasses on ... indoors!


The zoo was very smart and put up a carousel with zoo animals for kids to ride - of course it's extra, but we decided that since we got such a great deal on our entrance fees, that we'd let them ride the carousel this year. Hailey of course chose the ladybug.


And Zach chose the leopard (or is that a cheetah?) - I'm not great on my "big cat" identification.


Here's Nana and the kids posing on the tiger statue. Tate really was there, but spent most of his time in the stroller sleeping - he was such a good boy!


We just happened upon the giraffe area as one came right up to the fence. Almost looks like they could have reached out and touched it!


A bunch of monkeys!


I couldn't help but take the annual pictures of the kids in front of the gorilla chart ...


they are both getting so big!


I snapped this one of Aunt Awa (Kylie) without her knowing it - she took quite a bit of convincing to even stand up there. See her cute little pregnant belly? Only 2 months away from little Libby's arrival!


And last, but not least, the ride on the train. Thanks to Aunt Awa for taking this picture and going with the kids on the train while I fed the baby.


Yep, it was a pretty fun day! We all had a great time and can't wait until we visit the animals next year!

The Cool Down

After a long, hot day at the zoo, there's nothing better than going back to Nana and Papa's house and playing in the water to cool down. Nana had a primary activity the next day and had over 100 water balloons to fill up. Thanks to some extras, the kids were able to play with some and had a blast!

Zach tried really hard to keep his from popping ...


while Hailey ran out and popped her first one within 5 seconds.


The kids had fun playing catch with Ashy and Brans.



While we finished filling up the rest of the water balloons for Nana, Papa turned on a sprinkler out back for the kids to play with.



Such a fun day, thanks Nana and Papa for letting us play in your water!

Splash Park

A friend of mine posted about a splash park in South Salt Lake last summer where she took her girls. Ever since then, I've been thinking about taking our kids there to play and cool off. Having the baby has postponed a lot of things we've wanted to do this summer, but last week we finally made it to the splash park! We took our cousins and Nana with us so they could enjoy it too!

Here are all 4 kids playing in the water.


These water guns were a big hit. Hailey loved the Nemo one.


The whole park had a farm theme - this "water" tractor was a lot of fun!


Zach loved standing under the waterfall falling from the water tower.


Hailey and Branson spent all of their time together. Those two are inseparable when we get together for play dates.


Zach also loved the water spraying up from the ground.


I loved that they had a dry play area as well. Every once in a while the wind would pick up and make the water a bit cool, so the kids would play over on the dry area for a bit and warm up. I loved the barn theme, so darling!


My kids were thrilled to pose for this picture, as you can tell from the look on Hailey's face! But the tractor was cute and I wanted a picture of them together.


We were lucky to get there in time to get a picnic bench under the pavilion, so the adults and baby stayed out of the sun. More often than once, the kids would come back to sit down, dry off, and get a snack.

Zach and Ashton - best friends.


Hailey and Branson - best buddies.


Tate even had a great time. He loves being outside and is always really good. It was a bit difficult to hold him since it was a bit breezy that day, so he spent a lot of time laying down in his stroller or in his car seat.


Yep, we all had a great time and can't wait to head back there again! Thanks Nana, Aunt Shell, Ashy, and Brans for coming with us - we have so much fun with you!

Smiling!

I have tried in vain to get pictures of Tate smiling. Seems like every time I get him going, then grab the camera, he seems to focus on that rather than me and the smiling stops. He's been smiling for over a month now and I've tried numerous times without success.

I got close a couple of times


And then finally last Monday I caught a few pictures and some video while my Mom was making him smile.






Nothing like the smile of a new baby to lift your heart! Tate is such a cutie and his smile just melts my heart! I LOVE THIS LITTLE BOY!!