First Day of School!!

It was August 11th, the first day of school! We went to the open house the night before to take the kids school supplies and meet their teachers. Austin got Mrs. Roseborough as his second grade teacher. He was very excited and especially so because one of his good friends, Silas, is in his class. You can already tell he likes this year much better, he never complains about going to school anymore! (Hopefully I didn't just jinx myself!)

Avery was my child who couldn't wait for school to start again! Even though I missed my friends during the summer, I was never anxious for school to start back up. She also has one of her best friends, Kaitlyn, in her class so she was super happy about that. Mrs. England is Avery's fourth grade teacher. Avery found out that Mrs. England is expecting a baby in February, and her favorite thing right now is that Mrs. England brings snacks for everyone because she needs to have snacks throughout the day. Avery loves her snacks!

Ranch Heights Elementary recently went through an amazing renovation which included a new 4 year old Pre-K wing. Yes, we have all day Pre-K in our schools. Addie's teacher is Mrs. Eason. Addie was so excited to see her new school... and she was most excited to finally get to ride the bus with the kids to school. I was going to take them to school for their first few days but Addie really wanted to ride the bus! That turned out great because I heard the car line was crazy! When they got home from school after their first day, Addie was beaming from ear to ear! It was so fun to see her excitement!

Ashton, on the otherhand, was not excited for Addie, Austin and Avery to go to school and leave her behind. The first three days, Ashton cried to ride the bus with the kids. Two more years AJ! It will go by fast!

Saying goodbye to summer!

It was our very last day of summer! Yes, we are barely into our 2nd week of August and summer is over! Sniff, sniff. We wanted to take it for all it was worth so we headed up to Independence, KS to spend the afternoon with Auntie Jen and at the Independence Waterpark. Sadly, this was also our first time up to the waterpark this summer! I don't know what took us so long! WE LOVED IT!!

This was Ashton's first time to the waterpark... and I think she mistaked it for heaven! She was so happy! That girl was a water baby from the very beginning. You couldn't keep her head out of the water. I finally had to put her floaties on just to keep myself from having a panic attack. She is crazy!

Other years I would always wait for a weekend to take the kids up to Kansas because I get nervous in waterparks by myself with my kids. I always wanted Randy with me. Jen was the best! She is such a big help and we had such a good time. She hung out with the younger girls while I took some pictures and then she took the big kids over to the diving boards. They all had so much fun.

The waterpark doesn't open til 1pm, so we went early and brought lunch over to Jen and Jordan's house and hung out for a while. The only sad part was that the kids open house at school was that night, so we could only stay for a couple hours before we had to head back. Thanks for the fun day, Jen! We love you!

Happy Birthday, Addie!

Wow! Another year has flown by! Addie was so excited for her birthday to finally be here! It's hard for Addie because all of her siblings have birthdays before her... so she feels like hers takes forever to get here. But for me, I can't believe she is four! We started the day at, where else, the doughnut shop!

After the doughnut shop we swung by Walmart for Addie to pick out a few things for her birthday. Next we hit the pool to hang out for the afternoon. This summer has been ridiculously HOT. If you are not in the pool, you are inside! The thing about Oklahoma heat combined with the humidity is that you just can't breath! But the pool was very refreshing and my kids LOVE the pool!

After lots of fun at the pool, it was time for lunch! Addie chose none other than McDonalds for her birthday lunch! They continued their fun in the playground area until it was time to head to Gum-Gum's house for a little birthday party for Addie with Nana and Gum-Gum (my mom and grandma). Addie was so excited about her new shirt, princess umbrella, and princess plate, bowl and glass. I have to make sure her dishes are washed everyday because she wants to use them for breakfast each morning.

Two plus two equals four!! This was one of Addie's special purchases when we went to Walmart! Happy Birthday, Addie!! You have grown up so fast! You are such a special girl and we love you so much!!

Family Fun Times

I took a million pictures while my family was all in town, so I figured the best way to talk about our week was to make a few collages. My Uncle Ed has a million hawaiian shirts and brought some for everyone, hence all the hawaiian shirts! One day was all for grandma. We let her know that this gathering was all for her and we sang happy birthday to her. My sister, Ann, made a beautiful quilt as a present. It was a crossword puzzle, which she loves to do, with names of her ancestors before and after. We also made one day about my nephew, Kyson, who is leaving on his mission to Bulgaria for our church in 2 days! We had Austin dress in a suit and missionary tag, while the cousins all sang "I Hope They Call Me on a Mission". We all signed a laundry bag for him to take with him.

And what is summer without swimming! We spent a couple HOT days over at my mom's condo swimming to stay cool!

And you can't come back to Bartlesville without visiting Woolaroc. I actually hadn't been out there for a long time, so I was excited. I don't know if the weather was cooler that day or if we were just out there earlier, but the buffalo, deer and longhorns were all over the road! I couldn't believe how close I was to them! I got some great pics! It was a great day!

And another Bartlesville classic, The Kiddie Park! There's something about the Kiddie Park that brings the "kid" out in you! We went on a great night... all train rides were FREE!!

Grandma's 85th celebration

It has been a really long time since our family has all gotten together. With my grandma turning 85 this year, my mom thought it would be a good excuse to get everyone together and celebrate her life. Even though her birthday is in March, we waited til July to celebrate. My family is very patriotic and one of my grandma's favorite holidays is the fourth of July, so we used that weekend to get everyone together... not to mention all the kids would be out of school. Most of our cousins weren't able to make it, but my mom, her two brothers and their wives and two of my cousins that still live at home were able to be here. And I was so excited that ALL my brothers and sisters made it for the celebration! This was the first time in 9 years that we were all at the same place at the same time. Miracles do still happen! We were just all glad that grandma has been doing so much better and we were able to take her out of the nursing home most of the days to join us in what we were doing. She even made it out to the Vaclaws for the firework show... which was AMAZING as always! I know it meant a lot to my grandma to have everyone there for her. She is such a special lady! Side note: She is now out of the nursing home and back in her house! She still has good and bad days but its nice to have her back at home. My mom has put in a LOT of time and effort into getting grandma's bathroom remodeled so she would have a safe walk-in shower. It looks great!

Brian Buttars Memorial Golf Tournament

So the first part of our summer we stayed super busy with camps, clinics and lessons. But I took a little break in the middle to join Randy on a "parent's only" vacation up to Utah for the golf tournament he was putting on to benefit Brian's kids. I would like to thank Dan and Jan for helping us get back out to Utah, and my mom for watching our kids so that I could be a part of this special event. And believe me, it was very memorable!

I must have really been needing a vacation because I, of all people, forgot my camera! Obviously I was on the verge of loosing my mind as normally my camera is the first thing to be packed anywhere I go! Hopefully pictures will come soon, but I needed to post so I could start blogging again. Even though we were really busy making sure everything went smoothly at the tournament, it was still an AWESOME vacation. I recommend "parent's only" vacations once a year to everyone!

We stayed with Jared and Courtney Geisler and family, which was so much fun! I don't think I've laughed so hard my entire life. And our great friend, Russ Madsen, was with us most of the time too- joining in on all the fun. They always make us feel right at home and we love them to death. We played some golf (well, Courtney and I caddied), hung out at Russ' golf and hockey shop up in Park City, and ate great food all weekend long (oh Cafe Rio, I miss you already). I also got to meet some new friends, Eliza and Trent Guzy who were such a blast! Eliza even came over and did mine and Courtney's hair which I was so grateful for! Miles and Chelsea Lowder were able to hang out with us a lot too and I loved it because I felt like I got to know them a lot more... and they are hilarious! I did feel bad that our kids weren't there to play with Gabe and Jada, but again it was great to have a little time alone with Randy.

The golf tournament was amazing... we couldn't have asked for more! The golf course was beautiful, the weather was beautiful, and the staff was awesome! Randy has been a part of many golf tournaments and I always get to hear how good they turn out, but this was the first time that I was able to see it for myself, and boy was I impressed! Randy had been working so hard to make this a success... with GREAT help from Courtney and Jared and the rest of the family and close friends. We really had a hard time saying good-bye to Brian and not knowing what we could do to help out. When Randy came up with this idea to do a memorial golf tournament we could only hope that we would get support from family and friends... and they all came out! Courtney and I went around taking pictures of all the teams and everyone was so friendly and just having a blast being there. The prizes were amazing, lunch was amazing and everyone was there for the same reason... to support Brian and his family. When Randy was making his speech after the tournament was over he mentioned how this was his little joke on Brian. He had been trying for years to get Brian to pick up the game of golf so they could play together... and now he had no choice! We knew that Brian was there with us... we all felt his presence and knew he was enjoying the day right along with us. I could just see that million dollar smile!

As I said, the tournament was a success, Randy even received a standing ovation for all his hard work. I couldn't have been more proud of my husband! We were able to raise $2000 for each of his three children to put toward their college education. We are hoping for this to be an annual event where we can all get together as family and friends to remember Brian. June is a special month as it is Brian's birthday and Father's Day, and we already have the course booked for next June. We are super excited to do this again!

The next day we joined the Buttars at their house for a cook-out and to hang out with everyone. It was so much fun! And on Monday we took Miles' boat up to Park City for an entertaining boat ride! Miles and Trent are AMAZING on the wakeboard and I was so excited to see them do their tricks! Our trip came and went so fast! The Geislers are heading down to Oklahoma in October and we are all counting down the months to see them again! It's always so hard to say good-bye to them... we love them all so much!

Kickin' it at the Kiddie Park!

As I mentioned, we finally took the kids (minus Avery) to the Kiddie Park. It was SUPER hot and humid, so we told the kids they could pick 3 rides each and then we would go get some treats and ride the train. Addie and AJ wanted to ride the little airplane, but when we got there AJ chickened out. Addie was more than happy to show her that there was nothing to be afraid of!

But Ashton still wasn't quite ready to try it herself, so we went over to watch Austin ride the rollercoaster. It was fun watching him ride all by himself- he had a blast. I remember when I thought that was such a big, fast ride. It was my favorite thing to do... I know that's how he feels too!After watching Addie and Austin ride their rides, Ashton was ready to try it herself. She did great on the airplane until at the very end when it jerked from up high to all the way down. It kind of freaked her out and she started crying. Luckily the ride was over anyway. Addie and Austin had gone over to ride the big airplanes while Ashton was riding the smaller one, so I didn't get a picture of them. But after, they all wanted to ride the carosel. However, Ashton was completely opposed to sitting on the horse by herself, as you can tell in this picture! So...I had to sit with her on the horse! I was so worried it wouldn't work with me on it! But as long as I was with her she enjoyed it.Austin, of course, enjoyed the whole thing. He wouldn't get off the horse until it completely stopped. He was really wanting it to stop at the top so his horse was taller than Addie's horse.Last year Addie was really timid on the carosel but she was excited to ride this time!Ashton still had one more ride to pick and she chose the cars. This time she did really great. Now that she was comfortable with the rides... we were done and ready for the train!The kids picked out their treat and we went over to ride the train. It was a fun... HOT, night and we were super worn out by the time the night was over.

One last picture on the train ride. It would have been nice if Randy mentioned my hair was in my face for this picture! :-) Oh well, I was too hot to care!