Still Loves Rocks

Anya still loves rocks. Since she was old enough to pick up and hold them, she has been carrying them around. We have been doing some work in our backyard. It is a mess and the kids love it. We dug lot of rocks out of the ground and put them in some containers so that when we get the sod pulled up for the raised garden we can put some rocks at the bottom for drainage (we have clay instead of dirt). One day Anya was outside by herself for quite some time, singing loudly to herself and telling "Mario stories". When I looked out to see what she was up to this is what I saw her doing.

She was taking rocks out of the containers, sometimes by the dress-full.

Carrying them over to the kids pool.

And dumping them in.

When she saw me with the camera she turned around so that I could take a picture of her and then started putting the rocks back were they were supposed to be. Please take note of the pink Hello Kitty boots. She loves all things Hello Kitty and stomping in mud.

The Lord Is My Light

We sang, The Lord Is My Light, is Sacrament meeting a month ago and Talmage fell in love with it. He insisted on me singing it with him over and over because he needed someone to sing the girl part. When my voice gave out I showed him the hymns on the internet. He was very excited. This video is what Aaron found him doing when he got home from his meetings.

Talmage's top three favorite songs, all tied for first are... Angel's We Have Heard on High (discovered when he was 2), O, My Father (discovered at age 5), and, The Lord Is My Light (age 6).

A Tux

A year and a half ago we bought Talmage a suit for Christmas. Just before he grew out of it I found a good deal on the same suit just a size bigger, so I bought that. Like the short legged Kay boy he is, he was able to keep wearing the pants from the old suit, with the hem I put in taken out, and the new jacket. He's started taking the suit for granted though. He wears it every Sunday and loves it but the clip on ties were wearing on his nerves. They are so not real. So for this Easter I found an amazing sale on real boy's ties. He got a blue one to match Anya's dress (that's still important some Sundays). He was so excited about the tie that he spent the Saturday morning session of conference figuring out how to tie it. This was an excellent quiet activity for him. He then periodically practiced perfecting his tie tying skills through out the remaining sessions. Now he can tie it quick and accurately with the tales just the right length on the first try. That's more than Aaron can claim. Pretty good for a six year old.

Now the only problem is he's asking for a tuxedo-- not a tux-- a tuxedo. I told him that he can wear one when Aunt Stephie get's married. He thought that sounded like a good deal, until the Stake Roadshow this weekend.

At the roadshow we were sitting next to the 1st counselor in our stake presidency who is also the husband of Talmage's piano teacher. He noticed Talmage's hair was styled different and told Talmage, " I like your hair parted that way. I can just imaging you in a tux playing the piano, looking like a maestro." Talmage glowed with the thought and I wanted to stuff a sock in the poor man's mouth. So now Talmage is dreaming of tuxedo's again.

I asked Talmage what he'd do with a tuxedo and he responded, "wear it."

He's Reading What?

Talmage has always loved books. He's been attempting to read them since he was a baby. Now he reads nearly everything he can get his eyes on. He is currently reading The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien to himself and sometimes to Anya if she asks politely.

Here is a few videos of Talmage "reading" just after his first birthday.




We bought him a "reading" light to have beside his bed and he loves using it to read at night before bed and sometimes in the mornings when the LEGOS aren't beckoning him too loudly.

This is how I found him one Saturday morning. He was excited to find a book on the shelf written by James E. Talmage. He read a few pages before breakfast. I was nervous he might read past where I have read-- that would be embarrassing.

Wildseed Farm

After picking strawberries today, we headed over to a wildflower farm.

This field of red corn poppies was so pretty I wanted to get a nice picture of the kids in front of it.

After several attempts Anya couldn't stand the wind blowing her hair or dust into her face. I don't blame her. So I gave up on the cute picture.

The farm had mowed paths in fields of wildflowers. The kids liked following the paths. They weren't so excited about sitting for a picture. But I made them do it anyway.

Anya did like the bench out in the middle of the field. You can see it by the smile on her face.

Talmage thought the bench was a great idea.

These pictures were only a very small part of this "Farm". It also had a high end nursery, restaurant, brew house, gift shop, butterfly house, and lots more stuff we didn't even get a chance to see.
I bought some Strawberry Jalapeno jelly that is amazingly good. And Talmage, who dislikes ice cream, had an ice cream sandwich that he really enjoyed because "ice cream sandwiches are not as cold as ice cream".

Strawberry Picking

Today the kids and I went with a friend and her kids to Marburger Orchard to pick strawberries. This has been a great year for berries because we had such a wet winter.

There were tons of berries. We picked a little over 10lbs in a very short amount of time.

It was a cool 60 degrees or so in the morning so Anya wore her jacket. You can see by her grass stained knee that she already found a green spot to fall on. She sometimes practices her falls on purpose.

The kids, a friend, and I didn't even pick one full row in one of the strawberry fields.

Talmage was very pleased with his picking skills. Maybe he'll grow up to be a migrant worker. He liked finding the dark red, perfectly shaped ones.


Here are the kids at the end of the hour or so we spent picking.

Natural Bridge Caverns

For Aaron's birthday this year we went up to Natural Bridge Caverns. We had a lot of fun on the tours we took. The kids weren't afraid of any of it. They even thought the "total darkness" experience was cool. We learned all about stalactites, stalagmites, soda straws, ribbons, curtains . . . It was fun and educational.

These statues are out in the parking lot area. I'm not sure what they have to do with the caverns but they were fun for the kids.

We took lots of pictures inside both caverns.
These first few are from the Illuminations Tour. They used special lighting to show off the amazing and intricate formations. It was very humid in the caverns because they keep the entrance and exit closed with series of doors. This allows the formations to continue growing.

The following pictures are from the Discovery Tour. The formations in this cavern are huge. We also got to see the tiny crack/tunnel the original explorers went through when they discovered these caverns. It was amazing that anyone fit though there and to see what they found. I would have been way to scared. I liked all the safety lighting-- it would have been creepy to feel the huge dark expanse and only be able to illuminate a small part of it with an old 1960's head lamp.

Happy Birthday Elmo

Anya had been telling me for months that Elmo's birthday was on the same day as mine. I didn't think much about it because she tells me a lot of interesting things about Elmo everyday. He is her imaginary friend as well as her stuffed animal and scape goat. He sometimes gets into mischief and keeps Anya awake late into the night. So when Anya went downstairs on the morning my birthday she was very pleased to see that Dad had decorated for Elmo's birthday. I didn't have the heart to tell her he'd done it for my birthday, not Elmo's. We had a great birthday party for Elmo at lunch time. We made little finger sandwiches and fruit salad. We also made him a little cake with two candles on it. Anya dragged out the baby seat and all his stuffed animal friends. It ended up being a bigger party than I expected and we didn't have enough seating for all his friends. Several had to sit on a blanket next to the table.


When we lit the candles on his cake, Talmage ran to the piano to play "Happy Birthday",
while Anya and I sang.

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Anya was very satisfied with the party. Talmage enjoyed the party so much that he announced that the next day was Puppy's birthday.