Birthday Girl

Greta turned 9 years old yesterday. Where does the time go? Greta is a sweet girl, very compassionate. She's very into arts and crafts, sewing and making stuffed animals and slime. Every morning I wake up to find her sitting online looking at YouTube videos about slime making. This summer was a very slimy summer and things got out of hand with her leaving slime all over the house and ruining some furniture. So she lost her slime privileges. I was done. But since it was her birthday I decided to be nice and let her and her friends make slime at her birthday party today (although it will only be played with at the table).

She invited several girls from school (but mom they are all my best friends...) and we ended up with 10 girls total plus her brother and Alex. It was a full house with lots of screaming and giggling. Greta loves unicorns and had a unicorn themed party. I tried my best at a unicorn cake but think it turned out just ok. Too much frosting made all the layers unstable and it turned into the leaning tower of frosting. The girls liked it and that's all that mattered. I did have fun making each cake layer a different pastel color and making a horn out of marshmallow fondant.

Happy Birthday sweet girl!

First Day!

Man, this was a long summer. We did a lot, saw a lot and am now happy to say the kids are back in school. Today I dropped my oldest off at middle school. He was nervous, I was nervous for him. I'm happy he's got his buddy Alex there with him so they can both be confused together.

Greta is in 3rd grade although she looked old enough to go into middle school with her brother. She keeps growing like a weed and I suspect will be taller than her brother any day now.

Mayor for the Day

What an exciting day Miss Greta had! There was a coloring contest in the elementary school for kindergarten through second grade. The entries were collected and the mayor had to pick her favorite. The winner this year was Greta! As a prize she got to ride with the mayor and Santa in the Christmas parade and throw out candy. She also won $25 and a plaque. She was so excited!

She anxiously took her money to Build-a-Bear (.com) and ordered a reindeer stuffed animal with her $25. Here is her winning picture. Good job Greta!

Autumn

There is roughly one nice day a year in which the leaves are very yellow on the maple trees lining the driveway. Then the next day they have all fallen. I caught that perfect day and drug the kids out to take some pictures. We are skipping the family pictures this year so this might be their replacement.

Birthday Girl!

Greta just had her eighth birthday. Crazy how times flies! She sure is a good kid, kind and gentle (well to everyone except her brother). She's a happy kid that makes friends easily. We let her invite three girls from her class this year in addition to Jessica's kids (that are like cousins). It was a crazy fun party with 9 kids running, screaming and having fun.

Eight years with the same hat and same cute girl.

 We went to Olive Garden (her favorite place to eat) and then to Build-A-Bear (her favorite place to go) for her annual Birthday outing.

Our church likes to put the spotlight on the kids celebrating a birthday and this year was no different. She got to wear this to Sunday school and to the church service.

She's very much into arts and crafts and sewing. We thought it might be the perfect time to introduce a sewing machine since she's been asking about learning to use one for months. My parents got her one and we set it up and sewed a few items now.

First Day

School started back up again last week. This year Wesley is moving into the 5th grade and Greta into 2nd grade. Wesley is kind of sad that this is his last year in the elementary school. Greta is excited to see her friends again.

We had a really fun summer and I'm sad to see that end, but a little happy to get back to sculpting full time again (the orders were backing up!). 

Spectacles

School is officially out for the summer! We're super excited for all the things we plan to do. We sat  and wrote down everything we each want to do this summer and made a nice list. I'm most excited about sleeping in past 6:30 each morning, although the dogs aren't going to let me I'm sure.

Both kids had sleep overs last night which allowed me to sleep in until 9:30 this morning. I'm pretty sure I haven't slept that long in nearly a decade. It was heavenly. 

Greta started complaining about things being blurry a couple of weeks ago so off to the eye doctor we went. Sure enough she needed glasses. She doesn't need to wear them all of the time but only as needed. She thinks she looks like a grandma, which is what she was pretending to be in the second picture.

1st Grade Field Trip

Greta and her first grade class got to go to the same wildlife park that Wesley's class went to a few years ago. Once again it was cold and damp and once again all the kids seemed to have left their jackets at school. Poor freezing kids.The monkeys seemed to have the same feelings about the weather. 

It did warm up after a bit and the sun actually emerged. It was lovely seeing all the animals. They have a nice petting zoo with big tortoises (several large sulcatas, same tortoise that we have). I can't wait until Billy Bob is this size.

Feeding of giraffes was a kid favorite.

Greta and her best bud Jackson.

My favorite picture of the day was the family of baby ducks competing with the giant koi for food being thrown out. I kept thinking those tiny ducklings would fit in the mouths of those giant fish, but they left them alone thankfully.