Catching up

Whenever lots of things are going on that I want to document and remember it unfortunately also means that I get too busy (and thus tired) and it seems like blogging is the first thing that drops of my list.

But late is better than never, so I am going to take some time to jot down some things. If you are a casual reader of my humble blog feel free to skip this one; I'll have some vacation photos coming up very soon.

Here is some of the stuff that we've been up to lately:

• We went to the Monet to Picasso exhibit at the Utah Museum of Fine Art. I was very impressed. They also had works from Dali, Van Gogh, Rodin, Manet. They had these great handsets that narrated information about all of the exhibits. Lisette really got into it and listed to most everything. I did hear "this is boring" from Ian, and "can we go yet?" from Miles, but I think deep down they really liked it.
• Lisette and I had a Daddy-Daughter date put on by our stake primary. They had a faux Italian restaurant complete with candlelight and dressed up waiters. Lisette and I had a very nice time together. We danced the waltz and the swing, ate dessert from a chocolate fountain and we made tinfoil roses.
• The kids finished their super summer session swimming instruction. Miles and Ian didn't want to continue, but since Lisette and Saffron were still swimming, they decided it was better to swim then just sit there and wait for them. Ian got much better and Miles was very brave and even swam across the deep end of the pool. We'll have a bunch of swimmers before we know it.
  
• We've been busy getting Lisette ready for school. She is going to attend public school in the morning, and then homeschool in the afternoon. We still love homeschooling and it works very well for our family. However, we've felt that Lisette has reached the age where she needs more adult mentors. We really like the unschooling philosophy were you give them free rein to explore and learn all on their own. But we also thought that it would be good for Lisette to try out a set schedule for some of her academics. It is also her last year in elementary, and we thought it would be a good time for her to go to some of public school just for the experience of it.
• Saffron had to have one of her front teeth pulled out. She fell on it when she was one and the tooth died. We took her to the dentist and unfortunately he found out that it had abcessed. So the dentist pulled it out while she was under anethesisia. It was so sad to see our little girl missing a tooth, but she is still as cute as ever.
• We drove to Brigham City to visit Ruth and Darius while they're still in Utah at my Grandma's house. Ruth made us the most yummy apple and cherry pies. We hadfun playing with Zach and Ben and visiting with everyone. Saffron even gave Great Grandma a kiss (after she gave her a dollar).

Saffron loves her little cousin Zach. Here's the kids meeting their cousins for the first time. Melinda is holding Ben and Lisette is holding Zach.
Ruth and Darius courageously took the bus and the train in the summer heat to come visit us. I love their little baby carriers; when Lisette was born Ruth gave us one of these.
Phew! I think I'm almost caught up now. Now I can get on to our vacation. Wahoo!