Finished Bedroom

Saturday we were so productive. Ashlin and I FINALLY recovered her photo board from her last bedroom, with new fabric (above)

...to match the colors of her new bedroom:    Yellow and Grey     Her room is right at the bottom of the basement stairs....

Ashlin's last bedroom was avacado green, with orange accents. She told me she wanted a new color for   our new house... but wanted me to surprise her. The other kids chose their bedroom colors, but Ashlin wanted me to pick and not tell her. 

There are 4 kids in the basement. Instead of doing a 2nd bathroom, to save room, we put a sink in Ashlin's room. It's where she gets ready.

Ashlin made these cute little plates in pottery at school.

They matched her room, so we got plate holders to hang them up.

That lucky duck has the prettiest cream chandelier fan.

 Ashlin is such a little doodler, actually a really darling artist... she has BOXES of cute little drawings. She painted the frame white on our black chalk board from our last house. We put it in her bedroom, so she could doodle... 

 I told Ashlin she now has the only finished room in the house, ha ha. Lucky Girl! I also told her I love the view from her bedroom door... the basement stairs

 Besides finally hanging up all the stuff on Ashlin's bedroom walls... we also played A LOT in the rain and mud on saturday... more of those crazy pictures to come.

Lily's Balloon

Lily was so super excited that she didn't miss a single day of school in the 1st 100 days, which means she got to let off a balloon at this mornings flag ceremony.{Sad story- last year she was so excited to let off a balloon that we brought all our children to the morning flag ceremony to watch her... then found out you only got to let off a balloon if you didn't miss school for the first 100 days, ha ha, we were newbies and didn't realize that. We still enjoyed the balloon show though} 

But THIS year, she earned her balloon. 

So Bruce, me, and the Sophe-ster all went with Logan and Lily to the special flag ceremony. 

They called the perfect attendance names one at a time, and they came up and got their balloons.  *Only 3 kids in Lily's class got a balloon*  It is actually a really cute tradition, and really pretty to watch all those balloons floating up to the sky.

PS- Logan is not in any of these pictures because as soon as we got to school, he took off with his buddies.

Total Different Subject: Tonight when I was putting Sophie in bed, I told her she couldn't lock her door in the middle of the night, like she has been doing every night. Then she told me "but the lions will get in" (like she tells me every night). At some point in the middle of the night all week she's been getting scared lions will get in, then gets up and locks her door. So I told her, "Lions live in the jungle, really far away, they can't get you".  Then Lily told her they live in the zoo too.  Sophie immediately said, "I want to go to the different zoo with NO lions, and only bunnies and butterflies and frogs..." then after thinking a minute, "and no crocodiles".

So tender to me that her perfect little mind is so precious and pure and innocent, that the only thing she can think to be scared of is lions and crocodiles. ♥♥

A Day Off

Knowing the kids were out of school monday... all sunday night I was trying to think of something awesome to go do as a family the next day. Unfortunately, I didn't come up with anything awesome. But good ol' Lily wanted to rollerblade to the park and have a picnic... and Logan suggested the "3 story" park... so thats what we did. Well, except, we ended up watching my 2 little cousins also... so we just drove to the park and brought our rollerblades. 

Even with rollerblades & a fun 3 story play thing...

the kiddos mostly played with leaves.

Lily even found her new little friend Lyric there...

 

Roman & Laney are the cute little twin-sies we got to play with all day.

It was nothing fancy. But the weather was beautiful, and Sophie told me afterwards that I was her best friend (and went to sleep at 6pm tonight)...  So must have been a good day.

More Day Off...

 And for the record,

Dallin did not go with us to the park. 

He had way awesomer things to do.... 

Dr. Vernon was awesome 

and just go a pet snake for his office. 

Since Dallin ♥'s snakes... naturally he wanted to go to work with his dad and ♥♥♥ on the new Ball Python.  He invited Isaac. Bruce was riding his bike to work, so the boys got to ride bikes with Dr. Vernon to his hospital for the day. 

And funny thing, 

Dr. Vernon even has a pet duck right now.

Dallin came home so excited about the videos he took with his phone of the duck in the sink eating the 30 little fishes that Isaac and Dallin bought him. ha ha.

♥Arizona♥

1 reason to ♥ Arizona, we have THE BEST oranges.

But the weird thing about living here, is that most grocery stores get their oranges from California or Florida (GROSS).  You cannot buy your oranges from the grocery store.  You either have to pick them off a tree.... or go to the cutest store ever in north Mesa (Lehi) called: 

THE ORANGE PATCH

Sophie runs in to the darling old fashion store right to the back....

pulls a chair over to the big display of Orange Patch honey...

so she can watch... 

...THE BEEHIVE!

They have this glass front beehive, with a tube going to the outside. You can stand there and watch the bees flying in and out doing there thing.

We really go there every year for their delicious secret recipe sweet ♥oranges♥, but they also sell liquid gold AKA, fresh squeezed orange juice. Yummmmmmm. Its a $12  treat worth indulging in.

 So many cute packaged treats and native to Arizona things all over...

It was hard for Sophie to decide which treat to buy... not me!  Homemade cinnamon honey butter and the below:

I love the cute cafe inside and exploring out back where the orange tree orchard, packing plant and tractors are...

Sophie was SO excited to go to The Orange Patch today, she talked about "the bees" the whole drive there. BUT it would have been worth the trip just because of the treat she picked out.  She chose a container of "wal-u-welon"(watermelon) taffys.  Aaaaand we can't get enough of asking her what kind of treats she bought.... because of how cute she says "wal-u-welon"...

I was especially glad we went there, because its out by my dads house. He was home sick, so Sophie and I surprised him and brought him a half gallon of fresh squeezed orange juice and some oranges. And turns out he needed some cheering up.