Ivy's Birthday

 Ivy's happy to be 11, but more happy that next year she'll be 12. 

I have asked her if she wouldn't mind to slow it down a little bit, but no one ever listens to me.

Here she, Annie, and Emma change the color of her Barbie's hair by painting it with cold water. Why can't someone come up with a trick like that for MY hair?

Ella came was there. 

(She's growing her bangs out.)

Cake!!

Fire!

Dancing!!

Boys!

Best 11 year old birthday party EVER.

Graduation!!

We made it through another school year. The last two weeks were filled with plays,concerts, field trips, finals, stress, and relief.

Ivy's class put on an educational program about the history of America. 

It was lovely.

Eli graduated from the sixth grade with all A's and B's. I told him he did a great job, as you can see he was hoping for a trip to Hawaii. (Also, what the heck is Nate doing back there?)

Here Ivy displays the traditional last day of school shirt. 

Also known as the Summer Rolodex.

Speaking of graduation.....

Wesley graduated from Mountain View.

Here he practices the face he plans to make when they tell him there was an error and he actually IS the valedictorian.

Here he just practices being a dork.

And Nate, well, who knows what Nate does. 

This is his Tiger pose. Based on the variety and originality of his pose selections I think we should expect to see him on the runway during fashion week soon.

Look! Graduates!! 

Aren't they cute?

Here we have Wes, Edge, and Jessica. (Yes~That Jessica)

Congratulations Wesley!!!!

Mother's Day

*WARNING* I may have gotten a little carried away with the picture posting. Maybe you can think of it as a really slow video of the day.

I'm not a huge fan of church on Mother's Day so for the past few years we've skipped church (gasp!) and it has become our unrighteous tradition to go hiking and out for Mexican food.

Eli was super excited to have a reason to wear his fanny pack.

This is a picture of Edge and Wesley eating an egg salad sandwich at 10:00 am that they bought from a vending machine. I don't even know where to start. Oh, wait, yes I do. 

FROM A VENDING MACHINE!!!

Gross.

It was very lovely and deserty at ye old Boyce Thompson Arboretum.

Right after we got there we noticed smoke. Turns out there was a big fire. (Which, later in the day, would cause us to have to take a 3 hour detour on the way home. Sweet.)

For a while Eli held on to the camera.

It was fine until I noticed that he was taking pictures of things like signs that say "Gay". (Because, you know, he's 12.)

And giant spiderwebs (because, you know, he's a boy.)

There were also like 50 shots that seemingly had no focal point. 

He just loves nature.

The arboretum has an interesting Aboriginal Outback area, which I have to say left me a little puzzled, I probably could have read the signs for an explanation but it was Mother's Day, which = DAY OFF. So I didn't.

But, hey, look! Really big Australian trees! 

Bless his heart. Wesley was trying so hard not to text during family time, but some important business came up and he was FORCED to. 

I believe the sign said this is an old shack used by hillybillys to make moonshine. But I was just skimming that sign (day off) so I could be wrong.

This is me begging for a normal picture.

With no luck.

Mother's Day ROCKS!

The Swing

I'm pretty clever with the titles, huh?

Ivy has been begging to have a swing in the tree in the front yard.

 Sylvan, being the biggest sucker best dad ever, finally made her one a couple of weeks ago.  I have to admit, as swings go, this one is pretty cool.

Ivy loves it.

And so do her brothers.

How many chickens does it take.....?

Between the hard boiled eggs and the empty shells we probably dyed close to 1000 eggs this Easter. Or maybe it just felt that way.

Last Saturday Annie and Emma came over, we got them all hopped up on the positive energy of High School Musical (and possibly a little sugar) and they danced their little guts out.

Annie is an especially enthusiastic dancer.

And Ivy got some new glasses. She can see all kinds of things now.

Family Pictures

Yay!

Thanks Kacey!!

More here.