May--the rest of the fun

And now for a post about the rest of the stuff we've been doing that is not child-specific.

Jacob went out and took some pictures of the prickly pear cacti when they were in the process of blooming. My favorite are the purple pads covered in yellow flowers (if he had gone back out about 3 days later he would have caught most of those buds in blossom).

The desert does have it's beauty, so long as you don't try and touch it. :)

When I took Rachel up to the math competition in Phoenix, Jacob held down the fort here at home. Which, as usual, involved a trip to the park.

 Jacob and Ryan went on a Father/Son campout with our ward, which meant that us girls were back at home having a girls' night. We invited McKenzie and Peyton for some girl time and they all had a blast together. We had pizza and rootbeer, painted nails, and watched a movie.

The next day when Jacob and Ryan got home from camping we headed over to the splash pad by McKenzie and Peyton's house to celebrate McKenzie's birthday.

 Peyton had decided to do whatever Megan told her to, so Megan was having a ball dragging Peyton along with her.

 Ryan was having a blast with the buckets dumping out at random intervals until he collided with another kid and got hurt.

 After that he was in a pretty grumpy mood for most of our time there, almost missing out on cake and Eegees because he wouldn't even come over to sit with us.

 Luckily he came out of his mood with 10 minutes to spare and got another run in the splash pad so we all left happy.

For a mutual night a few weeks ago the Laurels invited one of the ladies in our ward who is an artist to come teach us how to paint. 

 It was a fun activity and I was pretty amazed at how well mine turned out for how much of an amateur I am.

 For mutual this week (the last week of school) we had a cookout in the Allen's back yard. It was partially for girls camp prep (since we aren't allowed to light fires because of fire restrictions, and cooking is only allowed in the kitchen because of bears and skunks and such), but also just a chance to get together for fun and to celebrate the end of school.

 Stacy Compton, our camp director, taught everyone how to make cast iron pizzas, and they really turned out really well.

 Towards the end of the night the girls ran through their lip sync to "I've Got a Dream" from Tangled, as well.

 For the end of the school year we decided to have a friend movie night. We used to do this a lot more often, but I think since I've been the YW president I feel like I plan enough parties all the time, and see enough people that my socializing bucket is full. When I was serving in primary I felt more need to connect and invite friends over to socialize while their kids watched movies with my kids. Anyway, so each kid picked 2-3 friends to invite over for movie night. And thankfully at least one came for each of them.

 We watched The Incredibles, so now we're ready to go see The Incredibles 2 one of these days, maybe when it gets to the cheap theaters.

 Megan's friends Kensie and Mikaela enjoyed the movie for a while, but eventually the pull of Megan's toys pulled them, and later Megan, upstairs where they played for the rest of the time until their mom came to pick them up.

 Rachel's friends Madisyn and Daryne were actually about the same, though I think it was Rachel that instigated their departure from the movie room, with their silly antics. Only Laura and Annie held out for the whole movie, though Ryan made it most of the way through. (His friend ended up leaving early.)

Saturday is our family's sugar cereal day, which usually means either Trix or Lucky Charms. Today it was Lucky Charms. And Rachel must have already been missing school, as the last day was yesterday, so she was doing her own bar graph exploring how many of each marshmallow comes in a bowl-full of Lucky Charms.

 So school is over for the year. Our schedule is greatly simplified, which I am very looking forward to. We'll have synchro, swim lessons, karate, piano, and gymnastics to worry about, but a lot more freedom during the day to do who-knows-what. We're ready for the summer fun to unfold.

May--Rachel

May was super busy for Rachel. She started off on the first Saturday with the State Mathleague Competition. We drove up with our neighbor/friend Melissa Hager, whose son Lucas was also in the state competition.

 They took math tests all morning while Melissa and I and another mom drove around Phoenix passing the time.

 Her friend, Cameron, qualified for Nationals in Texas, which was pretty cool. Rachel came in somewhere around 20th in the state, which is pretty darn good. I was proud of her for participating in the competition, since at the beginning of the year she joined Math Club on the condition that she would not do any of the competitions. What great strides she made!

The 4th grade does a Living Wax Museum. The kids have to research a famous person that has ties to Arizona. Rachel chose Sandra Day O'Connor.

 Ryan and Megan came with me and got a kick out of pushing the kids' buttons. We would push them and they would recite the speech they had prepared about the person they had researched.

 This semester in ELP (the gifted program that Rachel attends about once a week) they've been focusing on building bridges, both in real life, and on a computer simulation.

Rachel teamed up with her friend Rachel and the bridge they built got 2nd place overall for the strongest bridge in the class.

Rachel's card she made for me for Mother's Day:

 Pretty flowers, pretty words...

 She signed it, "I 💛 U with most* of my heart!"
Then below: *when you're angry I don't.
Such love. And honesty. Haha!

Rachel was invited to apply for National Elementary Honor Society, which involved getting a letter of recommendation, recommendations from teachers, and filling out an application including activities and service she has been involved it. She got selected as one of 12 students in her grade of 170ish students to be inducted into the NEHS. We attended her induction ceremony where she was happy to see some of her friends, especially Madisyn, one of her best friends that has been in her class the last couple of years.

 They had a swearing in of sorts, and were welcomed into the Honor Society by the principal.

 They are supposed to be a student-run group that does service in the community and school as they develop leadership skills at the same time.

 Hopefully it'll be a good experience for her.

She closed out the year with a mellow last week of school, enjoying time with friends and her classmates and teacher, who have all been fabulous this year. Rachel was happy to find out that Daryne will be in her class next year (with Mrs. Chamberlain who she loved as her 3rd grade teacher), but bummed that Madisyn will be in Mrs. Curtin's class (who she loved as her 2nd grade teacher) without her. At least they'll still see each other at recess and NEHS stuff.

May--Annie

The last month of school had some fun for Annie. We started off going on a Mommy-Daughter Date to the middle school play Honk! Jr. A couple of my Beehives were in it, so it was fun to see them perform.

 Annie loves music and plays, and her best friend, Laura had a sister in the play, too, so Annie was super happy to sit with her to watch the play.

Annie did a great job on her Reading Fair Project on the Gum Girl book Gum Luck.

 Annie has been running in the Mileage Club all year long. They practice every Tuesday and Thursday during lunch recess, racking up the miles they run, then have a race about once a month.

 Annie wanted Grandma and Grandpa to come to her last race and we were all able to make it, which made her day.

 Her friends Emilee and Jasper have been in mileage club with her this year and she has loved it.

Annie made this for me for Mother's Day.

 I weigh 73 pounds and spend most of my money on food. :D I say "maybe" a lot (it's true--"Can we watch a show later?" "Maybe." "Can we go swimming tomorrow?" "Maybe." "Can we go to Chuckee Cheese this summer?" "Maybe.") My job is Relief Society (even though I spend almost all my church time in Young Women). We do like to cook together. And I do like naps. :)

Monday we went to the awards ceremony for the Mileage Club. Annie has run 28 miles this year, which is amazing to me!

 She was only a mile and a half behind her friend Emilee who won top girl for first grade, having run 29.5 miles, the most of all the first graders.

 Annie and all the girls in her class (including Ms. Esham) at the 1st grade water day:

For the last day of school, which was a half day, the kids had already cleaned out all their desks and moved them out of the way, so they had a fun day which involved PJ day, bringing a blanket to lay on, and watching Chicken Little. Megan and I dropped by to bring some popcorn and licorice for the class.

Annie was sharing her blanket with another good friend of hers from this year, Ethan. Annie is really hoping some of her friends get to be in the same class next year.

May--Ryan

Ryan had a few exciting things happen this month.

The kindergarners got to have an egg drop.

 Ryan wanted a parachute and cotton balls all around the egg. It worked and his egg survived!

 We watched some Reimann kids for a few hours one day and everyone got out the dress ups.

 Ryan's was the funniest by far.

 I was kind of dreading the Reading Fair Projects with Ryan since he stopped loving homework months ago and it usually was like pulling teeth to get him to do it. But he finally got excited about doing it on the book Creepy Carrots and every day wrote on one more carrot about the plot or the main characters, or whatever. It turned out to be a lot less painful than I thought it would be. He did a great job.

 And he got second place out of all the kindergarteners, so he was pretty proud of himself for a job well done.

Ryan made me this for Mother's Day.

 It says: My mom's name is Clleet
She is 37 years old.
She is as pretty as: a flowr.
She smells like: a flowr.
I love it when she: play with me.
If I could buy her anything I would buy her a: bread.
I lover my mom more than: enebude. (anybody)

I've been volunteering all year in Ryan's class and it's been fun getting to know his classmates and his teacher. Mrs. Parks is just great. We've loved her so much. This last month they've had duck and chick eggs in an incubator. The duck egg hatched first and I got to supervise the reading group that came to watch the duck, then write a sentence about it and draw a picture about it. 

 The kids were supposed to keep their hands in their laps and just observe. It was really hard for some of the kindergartners to control themselves when the duck got so close. They named the duck Fluffy.

One night my neighbor, who happens to be the parapro in Ryan's class (Mrs. Hager) called me and asked if we wanted to babysit Fluffy overnight. I knew that would make everyone's day so I said yes. Annie especially was excited to have a pet for a night.

 She even tried reading to Fluffy.

That duck is such a spoiled little pet, if we left him alone in a room for 2 minutes he would start chirping and chirping. As soon as we walked back into the room he quieted down. He just didn't want to be lonely. I was afraid that he would do that all night long, but after about 5 minutes with the lights turned out he quieted down. We are glad we could have him for one night (and no more). It served to remind us why we are happy without pets, though fanned the flames of the kids wanting a pet.

Ryan got into Daddy's clothes and convinced Megan to dress up in my clothes (she changed before I got a picture). They had quite a fun time being Mommy and Daddy for a while.

Ryan is still loving Karate or Kung Fu or whatever it is he's learning. 

 He had a belt test and got moved up from yellow belt to yellow with white stripe belt.

 He wanted both me and Jacob to come to the belt ceremony (last time only Jacob went because it doesn't even start until 8pm). We got a babysitter this time so we could both go and it made his day.

 The last big thing of the month was kindergarten graduation.

 The kids sang a few songs, then got their diplomas.

 Afterwards we headed back to the classroom for pictures and party time.

 Ryan with his friend Micah:

 (Ryan took off his button up shirt as soon as he could--he put it over his t-shirt when he was getting dressed that morning just so he could take it off ASAP.)

Ryan and his buddies Caleb and Easton:

 Ryan and Megan:

 I'm glad these two love each other so much.

And Ryan and Mrs. Parks The Great:

 They made this great collage of some of the highlights of Kindergarten:

He sure had a great year and has improved his reading and LOVES math.