Big beds

A week ago, Megan's and Matthew's beds looked like this:

We decided that since they've been climbing out of them for months, maybe it was time to make a change. So we did. And they are happy about it. So happy that they run around at night not wanting to go to sleep. And then get up super early in the morning (around 5 am) and start playing. Makes for a couple of tired kids and one tired mom. Hopefully this will get better soon. Anyhow, here are a few pictures post the change:

One night, U peeked into the room and wondered, "Where is Matthew?"

"Oh! There he is."

Another night, we checked on them and found Megan like this. For some reason she likes sleeping with her sunglasses on right now.

And here's Matthew. Yeah, he ends up on the floor a lot. And kind of moves around the whole room. What a cutie!

Duplo Creations

Matthew and Megan LOVE playing with Duplos. These days, the most popular thing to build is a really tall trailer being pulled by a car. Animals and people are often perched up top, enjoying the ride around the room. Megan can build hers really tall, so tall that it may not be stable and fall over very easily. We try to teach her ways to make it more stable (isn't that like us???) and she often finds she needs to make it shorter to be able to push it around. So much fun to watch!!!

Swim team update

Earlier this month was the all city swim meet. The four Chandler recreational swim teams had a meet. Sarah was able to sign up for 2 events and chose to swim the butterfly and freestyle.

Butterfly: 27.16 s (her best time yet and 7th out of 21 girls swimming)
Freestyle: 25.34 s (again, her best time and this was done without goggles as she forgot them when she lined up for the race; she finished 16th out of 42 girls swimming)

In the evening after the swim meet, there was a family party at one of the pools. There was lots of food and lots of swimming. We especially liked going around the lazy river on tubes.

The 5 1/2-8 year old group on the day of photos. There were 75 kids in this group (obviously not all there the day of the photo). Can you see Sarah?

Photos the last day of swim practice. It's a lot easier to see Sarah here! There weren't so many kids as the city meet had already happened. However, Sarah thought it was the best swim day ever as they played a bunch of games in the pool and then got otter pops.

Everyone is being a dolphin as their team is the Arrowhead Dolphins.

Sarah really enjoyed swim team and is looking forward to doing it again next year. She really, really likes the competition and the socialization. There's actually one more meet this coming Saturday so stay tuned for those results. She'll be swimming the butterfly, breaststroke and freestyle.

Budding Photographers

Megan and Matthew wanted to take some pictures today. So I let them each take one picture. And what better to take a picture of than your not-quite-twin.

What do you think of our budding photographers???

Helper Matthew

Matthew is such a little helper. He almost always wants to help with anything that is going on. A favorite is taking the trash/recycling/compost out. 

Not sure why he has started holding his shirt in his mouth.

Why wear your crocs when you find mom's first?

Hungry?

Matthew has made this delectable feast and he's eager to share.

1st Day of 3rd Grade!!!!

Today was Sarah's first day of 3rd grade. She was so excited!

She had a great day and really likes her teacher, Mrs. Bhatti. She is looking forward to lots of fun and learning. It's crazy to me that she's already in 3rd grade. I have lots of good memories from when I was in 3rd grade.

Megan and Matthew wanted to join in the picture-taking fun. Gotta love Matthew's shoes!

Arizona Science Center--Sesame Street

We took a trip to the Science Center to see their exhibit "Sesame Street Presents: The Body." Megan and Matthew loved seeing Elmo, Cookie Monster, Bert and Ernie and the rest of the crew. There was lots of information about the body and how it works and how to make healthy choices.

Each doorbell on this door was a different Sesame Street character talking to you.

So many choices of healthy food to buy.

Sarah scans her choices.

Matthew's yummy hamburger.

Megan loved collecting lots of fruit and veggies.

Sarah serving Megan and Matthew.

Here you go!

We also visited a few other places in the museum and ate lunch in the lunch room. It was a fun morning!

Mermaid hair

Megan loves to play in the water. During her bath, she will often lay down and close her eyes. (This peace is usually short lived with one or two siblings sharing the tub.) one of my favorite looks is her mermaid hair. It floats in the current just like Ariel's.

The case of the missing family

This morning I woke up and my wife was missing! I looked around and couldn't find her. Had she fallen out of bed? No. Was she in the bathroom? No.

I decided to go hunting. Looking into Sarah's room I saw that she was also missing. Curiouser and curiouser. Although I try to stay out of there when kids are sleeping, I peeked into M&Ms room. There neatly laid out was my whole family. I didn't want to wake them so you'll have to look hard to see them here. Sarah is on the floor at the left, Me is sleeping on the floor in the middle and the cribs are just barely visible with their normal occupants.

We had a thunder storm late last night which woke up everyone but me. Me went in to help kids and everyone ended up sleeping there. What a great mom!

Handsome chef

He's wearing an apron his Grandma O made. Doesn't he look handsome? Especially when it means he's making dinner and I'm not?!?

The trip home

We had a LOOOOOOONG drive home. The first day we drove to Gallup, NM. We thought this was an 8 hour drive. However, we discovered it was 9. Oh, the difference between 8 and 9 hours when you are sitting in the car with a bunch of little kids is huge. On the plus side, it meant our drive the second day was only 5 hours:) The kids did really well in the car. We stopped in Las Vegas after 5 hours to play at a park and then stopped in Albuquerque for dinner at McDonalds. The trip was really pretty uneventful except for Megan crying really hard and turning completely red (we think she had 5th disease).  After a night's sleep and a yummy breakfast, we headed out again. We stopped briefly in Payson to get out and play a bit and then drove home.

What a cute kid!

The park in Las Vegas had 3 old school metal slides. Lots of fun!

Our hotel room in Gallup. Not a lot of room to spare.

A few other Colorado happenings

On Sunday was U's 20th high school reunion. He enjoyed connecting with some old classmates and the kids enjoyed playing at the park. We left the next morning to start the long drive home!

Matthew putting beads on grandpa--how cute!

Couple shots with Grandma and Grandpa.

Me with my parents

The family

Hugs!

Grass!!!

Megan and Matthew enjoyed playing in the grass in Colorado. So much nicer than the stuff we have in Arizona!