All About School

These three girls all had fantastic years at school this year. They all grew and learned so much. They did great and all passed on to the next grade with flying colors. This is a post highlighting some of their artwork and accomplishments at school (Preschool for Kyla.) They all had great years and I am super proud of everything they have learned and accomplished this year. 

I am going to start off talking a little bit about miss Annalyn. She had a fantastic first grade teacher (Mrs. Dalke) and has become a super great little reader. Towards the end of the year her reading sure just picked up out of nowhere and she started reading everything she could find. At the start of the year I really couldn't read any of her writings, but now she is writing some pretty great stories. I love first grade writing so I am going to include several of her stories from throughout the school year.  

This writing sample was taken from the beginning of the school year. She had lots of letters on that paper but mostly she just seemed to write random things like the ABCs and her name.

This one seem to be from sometime around December and as you can see her writing is getting better. She says, "I love Mrs. Dalke is the best teacher. Love Annalyn." 

I think this first one says, "I don't know if it is, is is a fox. No." The second one is talking about dogs. 

This was a note for me that she wrote on her birthday in March. It says "Dear mom, It's my birthday today so if Bryn gets to be rude, tell her no. Love, Anna" Annalyn wrote about Unicorns a lot. Below the note for me you can see one of the unicorn stories that she wrote. It says... " I have a unicorn kitty cat. I lost she (her). I don't know where she is. I looked and looked. I could not find her until... I found her and never lost she again.:

This writing is from April. It says, "My dad wanted meat and we had a big pig. So my dad decided to kill our pig. I said no but he didn't. So he killed it and then we had meat."

Here is another one from April. "I like the Mixed up Chameleon Book because it is funny. I think you should read it because it is my favorite book. You can read to someone. You should read the book to find out the rest of the story. Dun Dun dun." The earth picture says "I can care for the earth by being helpful."

Here is a little book Annalyn wrote all about rats. "I am writing about rats. Rats are bad because they bite you. Rats have ears, rats have red eyes too and they have sharp teeth like cats and they have black hair all over them. They can be white or black or gray or brown They are different to everyone and rats poop. You stick your hand in the ground and you git bit by a rat and you hated it so much you never do it again."

This one is about birthdays. It takes place on several different pages. It say "I love Birthdays because they are fun. Birthdays are fun because presents and cake too. I love birthdays. Birthdays have pinatas and cake and ice cream. Birthdays also have the presents. I want a unicorn. I want my own stuffed animal, I want my own squishy ball, I want everything. I know how to have the best birthday. First invite all of your friends. Then you throw a party."

This last one says " I think the hamburger is the worst because one reason, it has cheese. Also it has lettuce and the other reason it's spicy. " 

Annalyn got an award during the end of year assembly for running lots of miles, I think she did 20 for mile club. My mom got to work at Annalyn's school with the first graders so she was able to snap a quick picture of Annalyn with her teacher on the last day of school. 

Brynlee also loved her third grade teacher, Miss Gray, this year. My mom was also able to sneak a picture of Brynlee with her teacher for the last day. By the end of third grade she also looked so much older. It is crazy what a year will do. She has always been a great reader and this year she devoured almost every single book in our house. She can sit down and read an entire chapter book in one evening. She likes math, music, and just recently decided she loves basketball and likes to take her ball with her so she could play foursquare at recess. In a lot of ways this was a really hard year for Brynlee. There were 36 kids in her class for most of the year and she had a hard time finding friends to play with. Luckily her teacher was fantastic and was great at taking the time to help Brynlee on the days she struggled. Brynlee really looks up to and admired her teacher this year. I am sure grateful for great teachers that have helped to have a positive influence on my kids.  

Brynlee didn't bring home a lot of writing and craft projects this year so I only have a few of hers to share. She really is a fantastic little artist so I will have to find some drawing of hers to share on another post. This first paper is a thanksgiving paper. It says, "I'm so thankful! Thanksgiving reminds me of all the things I'm thankful for. I appreciate my family, clothes, God. I'm especially thankful for my family because they help me do hard things that are hard and because they love me! I also appreciate clothes because they cover your body so you are appropriate. Finally I'm thankful for God because he made earth special Me! As I enjoy this holiday season, I realize that I have many reasons to be thankful. My family, clothes, and God are very important to Me!

"Slam. My mom quick slammed on the brakes and pulled over on the side of the road. My mom had a worried look on her face. I said "mom, what's going on?" My mom quick got out and checked her tire it was Flat! My mom quickly got back in. She turned on the T.V - R.C and waited and waited then finally my grandma came and rescued us. I will never forget that day."

Kyla is probably the kid that grew the most and learned the most this year. This girl loves gaining new knowledge and seems to just soak it up and learns quickly. She went to preschool at the school my mom started just two days a week and loved it. She learned all of her letters and sounds, can spell her entire name, and can count to 100 and write all of her numbers. She can sound out and read and write simple words and loves to add small number. She just loves to learn and is quick about picking up on new things. 

Kyla did lots of letter crafts at preschool and I saved most of them. She also did lots of other fun crafts at preschool. 

Here is a small sampling so you can see an example of Kyla's coloring and writing at the end of preschol. Then I will include some of her projects from the library. 

Kyla made lots of friends this year and cannot wait to start kindergarten. She is going to do great things and do so well next year. I will miss having her home all day with me.

Summer didn't get to go to school this year but she did do lots of crafts at the library. Most of her crafts don't last for long because she still likes to take off all the things she creates and rip and unglue her projects. I bet she will have a lot more next year and we might even get a few projects from little Miriam. It will be weird to only have Summer and Miriam home with me during the days. For now we are going to soak up the time we have at home during the summer.

Camping

For Christmas last year Joel bought us a new big tent and a bunch of camping gear and we have all been excited to get out and try everything out. The girls had a day off of school at the end of May so we decided that was a perfect time for Joel to take a day off of work and for us to take out this tent. This is the first time we ever went camping with just our family. We decided all our gear would not fit in our mini van so we loaded up the Suburban and hoped the weather would not be too hot so we didn't melt on the ride up there. Luckily it was a nice day and we had a fantastic hour drive up to Bruneau Sand Dunes on a Thursday night after Joel came home from work. We snapped a quick car selfie before we left which is when I discovered that Summer was sucking on the babies soother. I took it from her which is why she is crying in the next picture. 

As soon as we got to camp we set up our tent and started a fire so that we could roast some hot dogs. Joel and I both had bacon covered hot dogs which are super yummy. After the hot dogs we made some smores and the girls had fun organizing their little areas in the tent. Annalyn accidentally threw a big log for the fire at Brynlee's head, she was trying to throw it out of the car and Brynlee got right in the way, which caused her forehead to bleed and get huge. Despite that we still had a fun evening. The girls were really wanting to check out the sand hills around where we were staying so we decided to take a little drive and play in the sand for a little while. 

The girls had a blast playing in the sand. It was getting late so we didn't stay for very long. It was a pretty tall hill and all of the girls climbed up to the very top of the hill right away. I only made it three fourths of the way since I was holding Miriam and it was a steep climb. I was impressed that they climbed up there so easily. I meant to bring the baby carrier for Miriam but I forgot it. Luckily she was fine to sit in the sand and play. I thought she would keep trying to eat the sand but she really only tried it once and then was content to just sit in the sand and watch what everyone else was doing.

After playing in the sand a little bit we came back to the campsite and the kids got ready for bed while Joel popped some popcorn over the campfire. The girls decided that was the best popcorn they have ever had. Kyla packed warm pajamas in her bag but decided to put on shorts and a t-shirt and froze. She didn't want to put her warm pajamas on. I made Summer put pants on under her nightgown but it got super cold that night. After reading some scriptures we tucked the girls in their beds and then we all tried to go to bed. Miriam woke up a few times to eat but slept really well bundled up next to me. The other girls also woke up a few times and all woke up freezing in the morning. No one wanted to get out of bed because they were too cold.  

After getting dressed and eating a fast and simple breakfast, we had to take down our tent and put everything away. Brynlee claimed she was freezing and spent most of the morning wrapped up in a blanket hiding in the Suburban. As soon as everything was loaded up and ready to go, we got in the Suburban and drove back to the sand dunes where we spent several hours playing in the sand. We got our sleds out and took turns sliding down the hill. The girls went pretty fast down that hill. We dug holes, went for walks, and had a super fun morning playing in the sand. 

Around lunch time we all got back in the Suburban and headed home. It was a super fun trip. We had a lot of fun spending time with our family and made some fun memories. We can't wait to go camping again.