First Days of School

The kids have gone to school and now I'm down to one at home!  Teagan started 4th grade this year and Eloise started kindergarten.  Adeline is doing joy school with Heston Huntsman and Vivian Christensen.

The girls weren't ready yet when Teagan left, but they still wanted to wear their backpacks and take pictures!

Mason Murdoch, Eli Heath, Teagan, and Ashtyn Davis

Kenzie Heath, Ashtyn, Teagan, Eli, Mason, ?, ?

Eloise was so excited to wear her new outfit for her first day of school.  She was doing the sign for the letter "K" for kindergarten.  

Hazel Albertson and Eloise are in the same class so they stuck together the first day.  They have Mrs. Jensen who is fabulous.

Adeline loved her first day of Joy School.  Shantel said that she was really good but mostly just kept to herself and played with the toys.  She is enjoying all the alone time that she gets while Teagan and Eloise are at school.  She is definitely my introvert and doesn't mind quiet and playing by herself.  She also loves our kitty, Nox.  She talks to her and holds her and plays with her constantly. 

The Solar Eclipse

The solar eclipse will make it into my top 10 experiences in life so far.  It is hard to explain but our whole family loved it so much.  We rented out our house out which was a little crazy, but lucrative.  We went to stay with my dad and Beth with the Lewis family.  It was really fun.

We walked down the road to an open field so that we would be able to see the 360 degree sunset during the total eclipse. It was amazing.  The temperature slowly decreased over the course of the hour while the moon covered the sun.  We all used our special glasses to watch it happen.  It was really cool to watch.  When the moon covered the sun completely we all started squealing and cheering.  The kids were jumping around and loving it.  I was just amazed, it was better than I could have imagined.  When it ended all the kids started yelling "noooooooooo" but we all couldn't wipe the smile of our faces.  We are all looking forward to the next one and planning our trip now. 

Afterwards we headed home and about an hour later the traffic started getting crazy.  There was a steady line of cars on Hanson for a few hours trying to take a shortcut off the freeway.  They were basically standing still, only moving every few minutes.  Teagan and Eli decided to set up a hose to fill up people's water bottles and had fun for a few hours out there.  I came and watched and was able to meet some of the travelers.  It was a very enjoyable afternoon, especially since we weren't on the road.

I made this lovely rock to remember the fun, amazing, once in a life experience.

Lewis Cousin fun!

We had so much fun with our Lewis cousins!  They came for the Durtschi reunion and then stayed for the week and then the next weekend was the eclipse.  It was so fun!  We would have loved to have them for another month!  Julie helped me in a million ways and made me relax so that I didn't go into labor early.  She helped me do freezer meals, cleaned my house and was so much fun to hang out with.  

The kids and a blast together, as usual, and I don't think there was any fighting or problems with the older 4.  The younger ones started bickering a little at the end, but it wasn't too bad, especially since they'd been together for 12 days!

Throughout the week we were able to get together with some of our other cousins at a park which was a huge highlight.  Teagan was climbing trees that didn't have any branches.  It was a bit of a mystery how he was able to get up there!  Adeline convinced Kate and Julie and Elise to push her in the swing for most of the time.  Eloise had a lot of fun pushing the babies in the swings.  She is a baby lover for sure.

We were a little crazy and rented our house out for the eclipse so we had to leave for the weekend.  We went to stay at Grandma and Grandpa Durtschi's house with the Lewis family and it was so much fun.  We definitely had fun in the lake and the solar eclipse was nothing short of amazing.

I hope this becomes a yearly tradition because it was a highlight of the summer for all of us!

Family Pictures

Part of the Durtschi Reunion was getting our family pictures taken by uncle Mark.  While we waited for our turn for our family, Zac took a bunch of pictures of the kids with his fancy phone and the cool portrait settings.  I have to admit that the kids are looking really grown up and all so beautiful and handsome.  I think we will just use these for our wall pictures this year!

Eloise has been doing jobs to earn clip on earrings and she loves them so much.  Somehow she snuck them on for all the sibling pictures.  She is sure a cute girl!

Here I am almost 36 weeks pregnant.  That is a big belly and some crazy hair!  It's good to document it though, right?  It's always nice to get dressed up and take pictures.

Durtschi Reunion

We had such a fun time at the Durtschi reunion last weekend.  I definitely didn't take enough pictures, but here are a few that I have.  Adeline loves grandpa Durtschi and she made us all laugh when she snuck next to him and he snuck her candies.  She kind of got on a sugar high hand started acting pretty funny.  We sure love her.

A highlight was going to bear world.  We got to see a ton of bears up close and afterwards there was a little amusement park and petting zoo.  Everything is more fun with cousins!

All three kids LOVED the rides and couldn't get enough.  Adeline definitely hesitated at first, but after the first ride she was hooked.  Teagan and Eloise ran around from ride to ride with their cousins and had zero hesitation.  They are already roller coaster addicts.

There aren't any pictures of us playing on the pond for hours every day.  That was the favorite part of the reunion for everyone, oh, and lots of slammo/spike ball.

On the last day I wasn't very smart and I played spike ball a ton and played on the kayak a ton.  I ended up putting myself into labor (35 weeks!)  I started having contractions every 5 minutes and that went on for an hour or two, then all the sudden they went from every four minutes to every 3 minutes and I got scared so we abandoned the home remedies (drinking lots of water and putting my feet up) and headed to the hospital.  They gave me a shot and checked me (I was at a 2) and the contractions started becoming irregular and not hurting so much so they sent me home.  I had a few contractions throughout night that woke me up and scared me so I took the day off and rested.  I was super sore...perhaps from contractions or from all the physical activity.  I am feeling good now though, with a renewed urgency to get ready for this baby to come.  I got my bag packed, now I just need to make her blanket and pick out a name.  yikes!

Baby Grayson

We were so excited to get a surprise visit from Jesse, Bri, Quinn and Grayson.  We hadn't met the new baby yet and the girls were so excited to hold and snuggle him!  Teagan was super excited to meet his first boy cousin on the Daniels' side of the family.  He is so excited to finally not be the only boy with all the girls.  Grayson was adorable and we wish we could have had them stay for longer!

Shelley Football

Teagan just started his first season of tackle football and he is so excited about it!  Zac is one of the coaches so they get to have special male bonding time from 5-7 every night for practice.  It is definitely keeping our family busy.  I know that they are both enjoying it so I try not to whine too much about being alone for dinner every night with the girls.  It is only temporary, right?  I am curious how things will go after the baby comes, 5-7 pm might become our movie time to help me stay sane.  

Teagan loves to play and is making a lot of new friends and Zac is enjoying having something besides work to look forward too.  I'm glad that the boys have something to bond over...