Gretchen's first day of school!

Gretchen started Kindergarten on Monday, 8/25. She is in the afternoon session, so she doesn't have to be at school until 12:30. It was a beautiful day for walking to school and a lot of other parents were there too. Gretchen wore her favorite Hello Kitty shirt and a cute pair of jeans. She even let me put her hair in a pony tail, which lasted until right after soccer practice Monday night.

When she walked in, we found her cubby and put her folder in it. Then hung up her backpack and found the nametag with her name on it. It had monkeys on it, which matched her backpack. That was cool.

She had some homework from when we first met her teacher, which was a paper with pictures of her family and her and some of her favorite things. She was able to color some of the paper and write down her favorite things and we pasted pictures of the family on it. She turned that paper in and went to find a book to read on the rug.

That's when mom lost it. Yes, I cried. Well, I teared up and had to leave before Gretchen noticed. She was so happy and excited, I didn't want her to think something was wrong. I will blame it on the pregnancy, but really it's just hard to see your kids grow up. After school she said it was fantastic and she is excited every morning now when she gets up because she gets to go to school. She even sang us a song she learned on Tuesday, which was very cute.

Here are a few more pictures of her. One on the first day and the others from her second day. Her outfit was so cute, I had to take a picture.

Swimming at Strawberry Res.

After the soccer games, we packed up and drove to Strawberry Resevoir to camp with Aaron's family. We missed seeing Matt, Marni, McKay and Miley because they had to head home early and Gretchen was bummed she didn't get to play with the kids. But, they still had a good time. Gretchen even told everyone a really scary story around the camp fire.

We fished on Saturday afternoon and caught nothing, but the girls had a blast swimming. After we packed up camp on Sunday, we took everyone back out to another part of the lake and had a great day of both fishing and swimming. The girls enjoyed some great weather for the first hour or so, so they floated and puttered around in the water while we hooked a few fish. Then the wind picked up and lightening was striking off in the distance, so we got the girls back in the boat to dry off. That's when the fishing picked up and in just a few minutes, we were catching fish after fish. We stayed an extra 2 hours because we were having so much fun.

One of the funniest things that happened over the weekend was when our dog, Ashes, climbed on the back of the boat, looked around and jumped in the water. She paddled around and then realized that she couldn't get back into the boat. We were laughing while Aaron directed her to the swim step and ended up pulling her out of the water. I think she had fun, but my guess is that she won't be jumping in again anytime soon.

A rain storm ended up hitting up and forced us off the lake, which is probably a good thing because we didn't even have time to go home before racing down the canyon and over to Jami and Leslie's house for Brittney's b-day party. It was a busy weekend, but it was fun.

Gretchen and Shelby started soccer recently and had their first games on Saturday. Shelby plays with one other girl from our neighborhood and Gretchen plays with 2 girls from our neighborhood. Both teams lost, but they both played really well for being their very first game ever.

Gretchen's team all seemed to flock around the ball, so it was hard to see it, but Gretchie got a couple of really good kicks in and helped to score one of our goals. She really likes to play and I hope that continues as the season moves forward. She is very agressive for a 5 year old and on par with the other boys on her team.

Shelby's team has some very experienced players on it. Shelby played as a defender during the game and did a really good job following the ball and working to keep it out of the goal. She has been practicing her dribbling in the backyard this week and I know she'll get the hang of it and start kicking some butt on the field.

Both girls look very cute in their uniforms and think it's cool that they get to wear shin guards. Luckily, Shelby's game was at 8 am so it wasn't as hot as Gretchen's. Hopefully it will cool down soon because the next few weekends have both girls with games later in the day.

Shelby's in 5th grade!

Shelby started 5th grade on August 18th. She has Mrs. Hadfield for her teacher and says she sits next to a really funny kid named Tristan. In reporting her first day of class, she said that Tristan talks alot and he gets into trouble, but she thinks he might like her. (how cute is that?) She also said she had grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch and despite the sign that says they are fresh off the grill, hers was cold and tasted like plastic.

Tour of Utah

The Tour of Utah returned in 2008 after taking a year off. We were so excited to see it come back and took the kids up on the big mountain stage to see the racers. For those who don't know what it is, The Tour of Utah is a bicycle race, similar to the Tour de France, but held here in Utah. It doesn't have as much media coverage or the same caliber of riders, but it's still fun and it's local.

One of the teams this year included this year was the Garmin-Chipotle team which did ride in the Tour de France. Their riders include David Zabriske (from SLC) and David Millar (a great British time trialist) Another team was Rock Racing, which included such former greats and former Lance Armstrong teammates as Tyler Hamilton (in the picture on the right) and Victor Hugo Pena.

On Saturday, 8/16, the big mountain stage was held. In this stage, the cyclists ride from Park City, down Provo Canyon, up past Sundance, down American Fork Canyon, up Suncrest, and up Little Cottonwood canyon to a mountain top finish. It is one of the hardest stages in any race held in the US.

We decided to go to Suncrest, which just happened to be right by our house, and sit on the hill where the riders would be going up, to increase our chances of seeing them. Unfortunately, even at this steep incline, they still flew past us.

As you can see from the photos, the riders were clumped in several groups. The first group, the biggest, was the overall race contenders. That is where riders like Tyler Hamilton and Freddie Rodriguez were riding. They were going too fast for me to get any good pictures of them. The next groups would be riders who were helping the overall contenders, but were not going to win the overall race, so they didn't need to keep up with the big group (these helpers are called domestiques). The domestiques may go back to the team car and get water bottles for the other team members, or they may ride in front of their team leader to block the wind, which makes the leaders ride a lot easier and gives them the best chance to have "fresh legs" for the last climb. The last few riders were those who were mainly sprinters (and don't do well on the mountain stages) or those domestiques who had been in the bigger group helping and had given all they had on some of the previous climbs for that day.

After these groups went past, and after getting a free water bottle thrown at us, we took off in the car and chased the riders up Little Cottonwood canyon. We had to stop for gas, so we were pretty far behind the leaders and missed seeing them cross the finish line. but we were able to scavenge another water bottle from the side of the canyon road. (as the riders finish their water bottles, they throw them to the side of the road. as in most races, the discarded water bottles don't stay there long as spectators scoop them up pretty quickly.)

We got to the top and walked over to the Rock Racing truck and were lucky enough to see Freddie Rodriguez giving an interview.

We didn't get any pictures with him, because on the other side of the truck was Tyler Hamilton. Quick history on Tyler. He rode with Lance Armstrong on his US Postal Service team for a few years. He left and went to his own team, team CSC, and ended up placing 4th in the Tour de France in 2003. In 2004 he raced in the Olympics and won the gold medal in the individual time trial, but ran up against some contraversy as one of his doping tests came back positive. They always take 2 samples from athletes, but Tyler's second sample had been frozen and they weren't able to get the results from that sample. So, Tyler kept his medal. In that same year, he tested positive in two other samples taken for a win in the Vuelta a Espana (Spain's big cycling race). Tyler's team basically fired him and he had to look for a new team. Though Tyler denies any doping, it's hard to argue against test results. Anyway, Rock Racing picked him up in September 2007 and he has been riding with them, but cannot participate in races with rules against people who have been busted doping.

I still think Tyler is a decent rider and was thrilled to get a chance to meet him. I was very surprised at how small he is. Here are a few photos.

After we met Tyler, Shelby asked him to sign her shirt. He was very nice and everyone who wanted to get pictures with him was able to. He signed water bottles, shirts, programs, hats, and anything else people would shove at him.

Check out that huge belly!!!! I am 23 weeks along in this picture.

Smurfette

We had ice cream the other night from Maggie Moo's. Gretchen got Cotton Candy flavored, which just happened to be bright blue. By the time we got home, she had it all over her face. No biggie, right? Just wash it off and we should be good to go. Nope. This one left blue stains on her face. It was awesome! We called her smurf or smurfette all night.

Last Summer Vacation

The cabin was great! We got in late on Thursday night and stayed until Tuesday afternoon. We relaxed, fished, explored and watched the Olympics. The weather was fantastic. It reached the 80's during the day and dropped down into the 50's at night. a few rain storms hit, but that's part of the fun up there, I think.

Here is a short recount of some of our activities, as well as some pictures.

We went down to the Henry's Fork river a few times and let the girls swim. They both wore life jackets and would walk up the river a ways and then float down. The water was freezing cold at first, but with it being so hot outside, they quickly got use to it and were happily floating around. I think the deepest the water got was to Gretchen's waist, but I still felt more comfortable with them in life jackets.

We discovered that the dog really likes the water. Something that Aaron was a little nervous about. She was timid at first, but eventually started jumping in and catching the sticks we'd throw in the water. She also enjoyed ducking her head in the water to try and grab rocks off the bottom. It was quick funny to watch. She made some friends with a few other dogs that were playing by the river.

One of the days we took a drive into Yellowstone and drove over to the NorthEast entrance, which I think leads to Cooke City, WY. Over in that part of the park, most of the buffalo spend their summers because it's a little cooler than the rest of the park. We saw 3 coyotes on the way and tons of elk. No bears this time. bummer! There are a few rivers in that part of the park that Aaron enjoys fishing. The Soda Butte is the river we usually fish. Well, Aaron fishes and the girls and I look for cool rocks, bugs, animal tracks and sometimes even find animal parts. (one year Shelby found a bison hoof - Yuck!)

We also spent some time exploring a new part of the park. You can't get there through any of the normal entrances. You have to do down through Ashton, ID and drive up into Wyoming from there. It is only about 45 min outside Ashton, so the drive was pretty short. anyway, it takes you into Yellowstone to a place called Cave Falls. It is about 1 mile into the park and that's all you can drive to from that entrance. If you want to do some hiking, you can walk trails back to several other waterfalls, but this was our destination for this trip. The falls were really pretty. They are about 35 feet tall and they do have a cave off to one side that we hiked into and took pictures. We didn't know until after that we weren't suppose to take our dog on the trail. Oops! Anyway, here are some photos.

On the way back from Cave Falls, we went through the Mesa Scenic Highway and stopped off to see Mesa Falls. It's been a few years since we've been back there. These falls are pretty impressive and the kids enjoyed hiking around and learning more about the area.

The falls are broken into an Upper and Lower falls. the lower falls are only visible from a distance. The upper falls have boardwalks built close enough that you can feel the spray from the falls. The lower falls are a group of several falls packed tightly together, while the upper falls is just one big huge waterfall. Both are impressive. Aaron said he saw a picture in one of the local gas stations of a guy kyaking off the lower falls. The picture to the left is a good shot of the upper falls. The boardwalk takes you right up to the drop off. This one taken from another vantage point further away.

This last picture is of Shelby overlooking the lower falls. Kind of hard to see all the different falls, but it still looks impressive.

The first photo a the top of this post is from the upper falls area.

Well, that's pretty much our trip. The Olympics were awesome and we were really glad we had the satellite so we could see all the action. Go USA!

Cabin and craft projects

We're headed up to the cabin in Island Park again this weekend. We will be there until Tuesday, 8/12. I am taking some craft projects to work on during the vacation. I am going to buy some fleece for Shelby. We will cut it into squares and she will tie the squares together to make a blanket. I am going to work on my very first crochet-edged blanket. I have 3 already hemstitched, so I'm excited to test my skills. Never done it before, so I'm sure there will be plenty of cursing and re-do's.

Shelby is excited to starts school. She doesn't know who her teacher is yet and will have to wait until we come back from the cabin to find out. She is pretty bummed about that, but I'm sure she'll forget as soon as we get up there and start having fun. Shelby and I sat down over the past weekend and had "The Talk". I wanted her to know some of the basics of things that will start happening to her as she gets older. Unfortunately, the book I gave her, went into a little more details on the s-e-x portion of things that I would have wanted. My bad for not reading the whole thing before giving it to her. Oh well. She asked a bunch of questions and seems to be doing ok with this new knowledge.

Gretchen starts kindergarten on 8/25. We meet her teacher on 8/20. She cant' wait. We went shopping for school supplies and clothes. She has a cute new monkey backpack and is all set to learn. Gretchen has been warned that she will have to have her hair done for school now, so she needs to get prepared to have it brushed every day, by mom. Not the quick brushing she gives it these days. Gretchen has a nice tan this summer from playing with her friends. The girls across the street have a cool blow-up water slide and the girls both spend a lot of time over there.

Aaron and I have had some great rides on the Harley this summer. I really love that bike. Aaron keeps it nice a clean / polished. He and I have also spent a lot of time weeding our flowerbeds. We are both sore and tired. We also moved one of our apple trees to give them a little more room to grow. Next year we'll get the rest of the shrubs and trees planted.

We are interviewing nannies over the next few days. Trying to find someone who can watch the girls before and after school on a couple of days during the week. Keep your fingers crossed that we find someone good.

'til next time! Be safe everyone!

3's A Charm

It's official! We're having another girl. The doctor's words were "Oh yeah, no question about it. This one's a girl."

The doctors visit was good. As always, we waited a long time for the visit to start, but he took a lot of time measuring and showing us details on her. He was able to see everything he needed to, except the spine and he wants to do one more measurement on some space in her brain, but he wasn't concerned at all about anything he saw.

She was turned so her spine was at the top of my stomach, head to the left, arms up on either side of her head and feet right by her chest. She spent a lot of time kicking me in the bladder during the ultrasound. It was fun to see her moving around so much.

I am feeling her move more and more every day. Aaron actually felt a kick for the first time the other night. He had his hand resting on my belly while we were watching a movie and she decided to give him a boot to the hand. Fun stuff!!

We are really excited to see a healthy baby girl come December.