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We started out with the Halloween Parade!  Carter was the coach of the Philadelphia Eagles this year (he forgot his clipboard of plays but we made it back with it in time!) and Emma was matching babies with Meg.  Love that after all of these years I finally figured out to sit with all of my smart neighborhood friends on the stage!  Best seats and best company.  The parade seemed short and incomplete without Zach!  (He didn't miss it at all.)

  

Meg and I came back a little later to help with Emma's class party – they were out to recess when we arrived and as we were walking in to the school Emma spotted Meg from across the playground and ran to give her a huge hug.  She insisted on taking her to the playground with her for the rest of recess while I went to set up – I love that even though these girls are 6 years apart they can have so much fun together.  

 (Notice the pacifier in Meg's mouth?  They wanted to use real ones (old ones of Meg's) and I told them they could only put them in their mouths for pictures.  :)

They played some crazy games and Emma won the donut eating contest out of her group – and those matching babies continued to be inseparable for the entire party.  It made my heart smile.  :)

  

Just folded the load of swim towels and had to have a moment of mourning the pool days of summer 2015.  I so love summers with my kids and send them back to school reluctantly!  

Lots of good memories this summer.   Lots of them with those towels.  

 

We took a trip to maple ton to try a new berry farm this year – nowhere is quite like our MN berry farm, but we had a good time and picked plenty of berries for eating and freezing.  

     

 

(Carter's berries always remind me of what Sal's bucket must have looked like in Blueberries for Sal after the little bear takes a "tremendous mouthful" 🙂

(yeah, Meg can't take a normal picture these days.  Today it's a pig nose.)

And apparently it is contagious.  :)

Love our tradition of mom adventure days.  It always takes me a while to adjust what I call them (last year they were Mom Wednesdays and I keep thinking Lego Movie style, "It's Mom Wednesday!  But still on a THURSDAY!")  

It had been forever since we'd been to the zoo (we actually let our pass expire for a year) and we didn't have a ton of time this day, so the zoo it was!  

Carter showing his tongue is nearly as long as the giraffe's while we waited for the train:

The girls both wanted to bring their "Ellies" (and Zach is pretending not to be a part of something so embarrassing.  :)  

After the zoo we swung by Sam's club to fulfill a promise I had made of soft pretzels and Icees for lunch  - look at that line!!!

  

Then we picked up Quinn and Jane and spent the afternoon with them before heading out to baseball… I think sleeping on the stairs means it was a good and busy day!  :)

We started out the first Monday of summer with an Adams family cousins outing to the lake! 

It was so fun to watch everyone join in to help Carter make his big hole and river down to the lake!  They would have stayed all day if we could.  :)

It was a beautiful HOT day and felt just like summer had begun!  

Wow, the year went by fast!  The last 7 did, actually…

First day of elementary school — last day of elementary school!  Seriously, where has the time gone?!

We had to get a picture of Emma with her cute teacher while they stacked desks and chairs (I remember doing that like it was yesterday.)

Zach had a pool party with the 6th grade boys right after school, and then we grabbed him to head to the pool together and to dinner at Culver's to celebrate.  

It was a great year, but we are ready for SUMMER!  

  

It was a Mankato Sunday, and Meg cried when Nate left till she fell asleep with me on the couch:  

After a little nap, we went to Great-Grandma Woodward's to ask her some questions about her life (Zach recorded them and put them on family tree) and she gave the kids the leftover balloons from her birthday party (which they thought was the greatest thing ever.)  I loved that she said quietly to me, "When you get home you can just do what I always did and pop them with a pin."  :)

While the kids climbed in the car (and fought a little bit) I talked with her on her front porch, and couldn't help taking a picture of her there by her roses with her hand full of weeds that she pulled while we talked.  She is a wonderful, wonderful woman.

 I had envisioned making it home for an early dinner and the first installment of Anne of Green Gables, but we talked so long it was a late-ish dinner and the kids talked me into the entire first DVD, so it was a little bit of a late night.  It reminded me of finals week my freshman year at BYU when we watched all 8 hours of Anne while we should have been studying… fun to share the classic with my kids.  (Nate was not super sad he missed that part of the day 🙂

Saturdays this spring were full of dividing and conquering (and usually meeting up at baseball since it was 6 hours long 🙂

After dropping off Emma for pre-game warmups, and picking up Meg from her princess party at Isa's (it was no small task to get her away from that!) we headed back to Emma's soccer game.  

This was Emma's last game of the season – she really improved this year in being aggressive, and was her team's favorite goalie!  

 Meg is such a good sport to sit through all of these things.  She loves to pack her own bag and make the best of it – today she was helping me take pictures of the game.  :)

  

 

We met Nate in Park City for the second half of Zach's doubleheader.  Following Meg over to the playground got me in just the right place at the right time to catch Zach stealing 3rd on camera.  This was one of their teams' best games, and a lot of fun to see so much hitting!  

The littles were so hot after spending all day in the sun that they wanted me to spray them with the hose…

They screamed and laughed until I laughed with them.  Good day.  

 

4th grade had a "Utah Day", where they had a rendezvous to trade the goods they had made at home over the last few weeks.  We were able to pull a spur-of-the-moment pioneer costume off thanks to a neighbor with a bonnet:  

  

Emma had been working for weeks to prepare for the trading:  making soap carving kits, bookmarks, and friendship bracelets.  She came home with all sorts of treasures too – the whole thing was just the kind of stuff that Emma loves most – crafting, sharing, and stuff.  :)

Next, it was off to Carter's class to watch his reader's theater – he really enjoyed doing these throughout the year, and his cute teacher invited parents to come watch their last ones.  Carter did "The Red Balloon", and got to be the boy in the story… he was so cute holding the balloon and my favorite part was when he said (after the balloon had gotten away) "Why?  That red balloon was my friend!"  Carter has sure turned into a great reader this year!

  

(His teacher let him bring the balloon home at the end of the day, but he gave it away to someone who wished that it was theirs, sweet boy!)  

Next we grabbed Zach to take him to lunch (to make good on a promise I had made him about his 6th grade Lagoon trip).  Lucky for us Grandpa B was nearby and needed a lunch break too, so we met him at Cafe Rio!  

It's pretty awesome to live close enough to do stuff like that.  

Then after picking up from school we ran Emma to a  birthday party and took Carter to what turned out to be his last baseball game (the second loss in a double elimination tournament.)  He sure had a fun season with a bunch of friends from school!  

  

The cute coache's wife had made every kid an individualized treat:  Carter's was a huge package of starbursts that said "Thanks for being our STAR catcher!" since he caught most of the time… by the time we got home he was surrounded by empty starburst wrappers and was completely over the loss.  :)

Wow, it seems like every day in May is busy!  We started off this day with a field trip for Meg to the fire station with her preschool class:

(don't you just love the outfit Meg chose this morning?  There was no talking her out of any part of it.)

Got these texts from Zach who was at Lagoon with the 6th graders on an adventure a little out of his comfort zone 🙂

  

And Meg and I enjoyed Emma's Utah program, complete with the Utah counties song and the Rock Cycle song (which Meg sang the rest of the week.)   I love watching Emma in school programs.  She is awesome.