Eden's Preschool Visit Day!

Yesterday, Eden and I went to visit her new school, meet her teacher's, and allow Eden to feel comfortable with her surroundings prior to the first day of school.  

 The outdoor learning lab has a play ground, surrounded by tricycles and buliding stations and a few school pets and gardens...  The outdoor kitchen was her favorite!

 Her teachers welcomed her to her class and got her comofortable with the experience by playing with beads,

 The indoor kitchen/dress up/play area was also a favorite!

 She LOVED her teachers and was SO excited that she gets to be with them for the year!

 Something felt very real and very grown up about the thought of leaving my girl at school...

 She can not wait for her first day tomorrow!!!

The visit could not have gone better and we could not be moe EXCITED for all that this year holds.  What a blessing this preschool will be for us!

garden time prayer

Ryder asked me once why I loved gardening and yard work so much. I told him that it's a great time to be outside in God's creation and just talk to Jesus in prayer.

So Ryder came across these pieces of wood and asked Kit to help him make a cross for our garden area.  

One of the reasons that he told us he made it was for when I talked to Jesus when I am doing yard work.  That it was a good reminder for our family...  It makes my heart so happy!

(I'm waiting for our first friend to ask us what pet is buried there, but we know the symbol it is of my son's heart and boy, I look at it and just smile...❤︎)

Labor Day Weekend 2016

Our three day weekend had some really fun family moments and we just enjoyed every second that we were able to be off together.

We made an apple crisp on Friday to take to a swim party that night with our Life Group family:

(I didn't get one picture of our time community time together and we stayed out until almost midnight!) 

 Soccer is starting this week...

Guess who needed new shoes?  

Yep, Ryder is currently in a size 1.

Stop growing!!!

Kit told Eden that she could be his assistant coach and she is INSISTING that she should get a whistle too.  Lord help us all... 

They then headed in the back to practice passing!

Then Kit showed Ryder some basis bike mechanics while he prepped for a ride that Kit has coming up...

(You can take the mechanic out of the bike shop, but you can't take the bike shop out of the mechanic... or something like that...❤︎)

We made our favorite dinner and we used deer meat from our cousin's recent hunting trip.

It was REALLY good!  It was the kids first time eating deer and they were really big fans!

We had a bike ride and playground time:

Ryder did his first pick up game of football and he made some amazing catches and tackles and was leveled only once, but came away saying how much fun he had making new friends.  We really love where we live...

Oh the men in my life are the silliest ever...

These weekends are made for the kids slumber partying together in Ryder's room, sleeping in, making pancakes and drinking huge cups of coffee, gardening and puttering around the house,  and just hanging out and enjoying each other's company.

I worked on Monday and though I love my job, one of the best parts of it is this:

The walk that takes me to my car at the end of a long shift...

While I was there, these were the photos that I got of my favorites...

I am ready for this week.  We have Eden's preschool open house and her first day of preschool.  I am excited for her.  She is so ready.

snap shots of our first week of school...

We are very slowly getting into a groove with the school schedule.  Next week Eden will start Preschool and Ryder and Kit will start soccer, so we hold things very loosely around here.  So for now here are little snap shots of our weekdays with school...

Drop off:

(Ryder BEGGED me to drop him off through the car line the third day of school and to watch him bound out of the car with hugs and kisses and then greeting his friends with high fives made my heart so proud, but also gave me that ache that you get when you watch your babies grow up!)

While he is at school, we ran to Costco and Trader Joes:

So that we could do our usual meal planning and lunch packing:

And Eden and I spent lots of time at home because it was SO HOT this week!

From cooking to playing dress up, and coloring, to painting our toes, reading books, and watching movies... We really tried to enjoy each second that we had together while Ryder was at school! (And man did we MISS him while he was gone!)

And we tackled a few special sewing/craft projects:

Making the orange pillow for our front porch...

 Making a scrap tie garland for a party that I am cooking up...

When he comes home I am so happy to hear how great it all is going at school and how much fun he is having with his friends and learning new things...  Each day brings something new and I am so thankful for this time of life and the ages that they are.  It really is so sweet!

Patio pavers!

When you last saw the back patio, it looked like this:

It was so nice to have the new paint up and all the plants gone and the patio cover power washed, but for now, the final little step for our patio was this brick slab.
The wood framing was completely rotted and the cement edge was cracking into sharp jagged edges, which has led to more stubbed toes than I would care to mention...

So we decided to take a few afternoons and tackle this project...

Kit dug out the old rocks to make it more level before we put the base down.

 Making a pattern...

I love how it turned out and though it was more work than we had anticipated, it still came to less than concrete and we were able to get rid of the wood rot frame and chipped bricks, which makes such a difference on our little kitchen view and the outdoor space for the kiddos!