Pick a corner

Always a first. Was successful this time. I need to remember and try again. 

Mother Goose Program

SAMs got an amazing teacher, mrs. Ipson, who also is in our ward. She has a mother goose program every year. Every kid recites a nursery rhyme and the class recited a couple together. It was so cute!!!!

SAMs picture of what he thought jack be nimble should jump over. A wall. 

SAMs rhyme was One, Two, Three, Four, Five and he was adorable. 

School carnival

We spent 3 hours and plenty of money at the school carnival this year. Jack and Jesse ran around together, Sam and benson ran together, and Thomas was with a variety of the big sixth graders all evening. I spent an hour and a half running a game with kids trying to throw toilet paper into a toilet. Hahahahaha. 

And this is it for pictures. It was a nice evening nonetheless. 

Maybe there's more pics on my phone. I'll add them if there is. 

Strong

How do you narrow down pictures when every picture was so important to them?!  So here they are. They felt so buff and warm with their 12 layers of clothes on. Leah even joined the party with 2 shirts. She claimed 12. I love them so much!!

Sam and his snowman

Made in kindergarten with his "buddy".

Basketball

John is Jack's coach for the second season.  They keep calling to ask and he keeps saying yes.  He enjoys it.  The kids love to play and Sam can't wait until his turn.  Sam is their greatest fan.  John, Thomas, and Jack are playing right now and they are doing great.  I wish I could get to more games but they are all on Wednesdays and so are guitar lessons.  Usually right in the middle of two games so I'll end up only making a couple games each.  Darn.  John took the team to the Jazz game.  Thomas was there with his team.  Then a couple days later, he went with little John to the Jimmer game with his team.  John is a rock star and took the boys in his car to McDonalds after the game.  He's a great guy.  :)

(side note:  see Jack's cute hair?  It's getting long and needs cut but I was enjoying it's beauty.  A couple days ago I wondered if he had been wearing a hat because of how it looked.  Turns out he just decided to chop the front of it off himself.  It's kind of the Jim Carey look in Dumb and Dumber.  He likes it though, at least is pretending too.  Although I have seen him try to hide under a hat.)

Cute kids

Jack said, "mom, does Heavenly Father know if I win my next game?"
I said, "yes, He knows."
Jack said, "I hope He knows that I won."


John asked Sam if there was snow on the driveway. Sam said there wasn't any.
John asked "there's no snow at all?"
Sam said "well there's just crumbs of snow on the driveway".

Thankful Sam

Kindergarten Thanksgiving Feast in the lunchroom at school.  I went for the last five minutes to snap a picture but instead, while I was trying to delete some pictures from my phone so I had room to take a picture, Leah flipped off the bench she was standing on and landed on the floor.  She cried for a while and my nice friend from high school that lives down the street, jumped in to save the day!  She offered to take a couple pictures for me.  Thank you Kelly!!!  I think it's time I invest in a camera.

Sam's friend Joseph was between these two but I wasn't quick enough and he left.  They were so cute sitting there together.  I LOVE kindergartners.  They are so sweet and innocent. 

Buddies

Brothers

Jack started swimming lessons today.  He threw a fit and said he never wants to swim.  This stems from his near drowning 4 years ago and his fear of water, without a life jacket.

It is private lessons from a neighbor and after much coercing, I told him I would stay with him the whole time and we would say a prayer before we left.

He agreed.

His lesson was at 3:10.  We left before 3:00 to find where the lesson would be held (the teachers pool is being renovated this week so lessons are being held at another pool).  We searched for 30 minutes for the place.  We used teo different phones with GPS, both giving wrong directions.  After searching and searching, I finally found the place.  At the Pitt's.  She was gone, the pool was closed.  Had I known it was at the Pitts, we would have been there in 3 minutes tops but because it is a newly constructed area, the maps couldn't find it.

I woke up one morning to this.  Jack climbed into bed with Sam and it must have been comforting for both of them.

I was driving with Sam and Leah to pick up Emily from a volleyball camp when I called Jack at home to tell him about swimming lessons.  Sam could hear that Jack was not happy about it and  my 5 year old Sam kept asking to talk to his 8 year old brother Jack.  I gave the phone to Sam and he sweetly talked through it with Jack.  He told him that it is not scary and that he was going to learn how to swim too and it will be good to learn how to swim and that Jack would be okay.  It was adorable.

This Sam of mine scares me sometimes.  He is so full of life and he is so good at finding joy in life and making the most of life.  He smiles almost always and is very sweet.  He is smart and athletic and loves our family in a very sweet way.  When he does sweet things like he did today with Jack, it scares me a little more.

But I won't live in fear (at least try not to).  I will continue to enjoy every little bit of him and the rest of my kids.  I'm grateful for sweet kids and that the good in them far outweighs the hard parts about each of them. (usually.  Heaven help me when I'm in the thick of it and feel like I'll never be able to get through it.)

Update:
So we went to Jack's baseball teams swim party tonight at the coaches parents house.  It was fun and for the first time in four years, Jack got in the pool without his lifejacket and was braver than ever.  Thank goodness.  I was scared but he did it.  Sam got brave too which i didn't like but I kept a hawkeye on all six kids so there wasn't much of a chance for something to go wrong.  I just hoped every parent was doing the same for their children too.

John is out of town and Jack has stepped up to the plate.  Anything I ask, he is the first to volunteer from helping clean, helping with kids, getting things for me, and even playing with my hair (my favorite thing ever).  He has been so sweet and cute.  I love my kids.

We drove home watching a fire on our mountain right above our house.  We drove around a bit and checked in on the Pitts and Robisons.  Looks like they'll be okay.  Kind of cool.  Kind of scary.

Sam Rides Again

Sam first learned to ride a bike when he was 3 but didn't ride last summer.  He claimed Jack's bike as his own and is riding again.
He can't get enough of it but we are still working on staying out of the road rule.

Sams day with dad

While Lil John was home recovering from leg surgery, we went to see city creek. Sam stayed at work with John after and rode the bus home with him.
What a special day that was!!

5 on Thursday!

Happy Birthday Sam!!

Sam's favorite day is Thursday. Somewhere in there, a couple years ago, I must have said something about not playing video games until Thursday. He grasped onto that and every day for a year he asked "Is it Thursday?" If it was, he'd say "Yay!!!"

Benson turned 5 last month and it has taken A LONG TIME since then for Sam to turn 5.

Sam has preschool with Benson on Tuesdays at Benson's and Thursday's at our house. Wednesday's he goes to Ms. Connie's for two hours. He is there with 10 other kids and he LOVES it.

Yesterday I got to go in and talk about Sam and give the kids a treat.

Sam loves Jake and the Neverland Pirates. He loves video games and sports but above all, he loves GeoTrax. So for his birthday we walked the aisles of Target for 30 minutes. He saw several things he wanted and would put some in the cart only to take them back out. When he saw it, he knew it was the thing to get. It was a piece of track to add to the GeoTrax that Thomas got for Christmas a few years back. I wrapped it up and this morning he was so excited to get to work on it.

Before John went to bed last night, he set up the rest of the GeoTrax so it was ready to play with. Jack tried to stay home from school so he could play. But when I reminded him there was an AR party carnival at school. That won.

Sam is wild and fun and happy and lives life to it's fullest. Everything is a JOY for him. he loves primary and preschool and being home and going places and playing with friends and cousins.

He had his 5 year appt. on Monday and got 6 shots in his legs. He was tough and today, him and Benson talked about how they both just got there shots. Next thing I know, they both pulled down their pants to show each other their legs. It was so funny.

He is super excited for Kindergarten. He loves to play with Jack and Thomas and even Leah. He loves "little John" and wants to be like him. He has recently made a connection with Emily.

He climbs in bed with us, or me, every morning and says "It's morning time". See?!! It's light outside. This morning he said "I slept for a long time when it was daytime."

Hopefully his desire to be an early riser always sticks. It's a good habit to have.

He shares a room with Jack. His favorite color is dark blue. Favorite food is crisp bean burritos. I can bribe him to do anything for a crisp bean burrito. He loves to write his name and BYU and the numbers 4 and 5 everywhere. I'm sure he'll drop the 4 now.

Post birthday: We had a really busy day with voice lessons, basketball games, Financial Peace University, and a BYU game at the theatre but we blocked out 30 minutes for pizza and cake and ice cream. Then we were all off again. Luckily he was just fine with it. He got to watch a movie and was happy with his GeoTrax. What a great kid.

Life is so much better with him around.