SUZ

We started the month out at Culver's for Scoops of Thanks Day.

Phin loved the custard...not just his...I think he finished at least two of the other kid's off. He also loved the cheese curds we ordered.

We have been loving the warmer weather and walked to a local park to play.

Lou is fitting in one of my favorite vintage dresses.

I spent a lot of time weeding garden beds and flower beds...Lou was my biggest helper. She made friends with kids that were out at recess and loved to be outside in the afternoon.

Millie had her final Bridges recital. She played the song "A Million Dreams."

Lou cracks me up...one night we gave her some peanut butter with apple slices and she picked the apple up in one hand and then just dipped her fingers right into the PB.

Phin had an egg drop at school. The fire department came out and dropped the eggs off their extended ladder.

Here he is checking to see if his egg survived.

It survived!

One of my favorite teachers from the school is retiring. We headed over to her retirement party and the kids loved the soda bar.

Lou is absolutely in her princess era...here she is dressed up as Elsa playing with her Frozen dolls.

Silas is so close to riding his bike.

We went to my cousin Ryan's daughter's wedding. It was beautiful and the sparkler send off was my favorite. I loved catching up with so many of my cousins.

It was nice to have a special date to the reception with Seth.

A new community that Seth's company built opened and we went to the grand opening. We had yummy sliders and some delicious ice cream sandwiches.

Then we walked through the houses that were open. Our kids loved this little playroom.

The kids spoiled me with little presents and hand-written cards on Mother's Day.

We set a timer on my camera to get an after church Mother's Day picture.

We had my side of the family over for smash burgers on Mother's day. It was a little gusty but the weather held.

Lou loved the combined Pajama and water day that she had at school.

She loves strawberries and harvesting strawberries from our garden is one of her favorite things to do with Daddy.

Phin's teacher challenged all of her students to read 40 books during the school year. Each book had to be at least 100 pages at the student's lexile level. Phin worked really hard and had a blast at the 40 book celebration. He walked to the car after school with quite a swagger and a mug engraved with 40 book challenge.

Millie earned a Crave cookie for completing all of her piano practice this year.

Phin has been loving Young Men's. For this activity they went to plant a garden at one of their leader's homes and they made homemade pizza.

It's moments like this that I want to remember forever.

The kids all had talent shows the final couple weeks of school. Silas said his talent was building. So he had me take a picture of one of his Blockaroo builds.

The day of the talent show he showed everyone the picture and then he proceeded to fold the picture into an airplane as a second talent.

Lou has absolutely loved school this year. Here she is making her grilled cheese sandwich into heart shape.

Lou had an end of year celebration with all the kids at her preschool. She was brave enough to sing one of the songs with the group this year.

I was able to go down to a work conference at BYU in May. It took quite a bit of juggling to get all the kids where they needed to be but it was definitely worth it. Here is a view from the conference center. Deseret Towers once stood just South of where this picture was taken.

Here is a photo of Lou at the end of her last day of school for the year. It was a carnival paint...which is why she has face paint. She also immediately changed into a princess dress-up when she got home.

I can't believe how much Lou has grown this year.

Phin had another camping trip...on this one he made quesadillas.

Phin also gave his first talk in Sacrament meeting.

Lou got to spend a few days snuggling with Nona during the last week of school.

I also got a few snuggles when she fell asleep on the way home one day.

I was able to teach the Activity Day girls how to decorate cakes for one of their activities. It was so fun to see Millie in her element. Activity Days is one of her favorite things in the world.

Seth and I were able to join Phin for a 6th grade picnic. We brought him Chick-Fil-A.

Phin was promoted to 7th grade. He is going to miss his teachers that made this school year so incredibly memorable.

Phin with his besties Milo and Titus.

Louis is another good friend. He wasn't in Phin's class this year but they have had several other years in Elementary together.

The final day of school finally came.

Time is a thief. It feels like Kindergarten was just yesterday.

I was also able to get a photo of Silas and Millie with their incredible teachers.

Our neighbor was kind enough to show us their baby chicks...Millie even got to hold one.

The kids kicked off the start of summer with a little overnight trip to their Great Uncle Eric's cabin. I had been feeling under the weather for over a week and still had quite a cough so I stayed home with Lou and Seth took the three oldest kids. On Saturday morning they headed out on the boat to do some fishing.

Seth caught his first fish.

Millie loved hanging with Eric and Teresa's dog Satch.

Our Arizona cousins arrived! The kids were so excited to be reunited. Conrad was kind enough to let them all try out his Mario go-cart.

I made a belated birthday cake for my brother Jeff's birthday.

On Memorial Day we headed up to the Syracuse Temple Open House. We waited about 40 minutes to get inside.

We invited family over for a Memorial Day cook-out.

We roasted hot dogs, s'mores and tried out the Woof'em sticks that Seth and Phin made with the deacons quorum.

We also met Sarah and Jack at Lagoon for Jack's birthday trip.

Pizza picnic lunch with cousins.

Then I found the kids playing "Witches." One of them jumps off the little car onto the swing and then swings over the other kids cackling as they go. The kids on the ground roll to get away...probably not the safest game but hey we are going for a 90s summer...so play on.

Then we pulled out the stomp rocket.

We have been going on lots of walks in the evening. Lou often asks to go see the goats. She calls this one her "friend" he is usually the first one to come up and greet her at the fence.