Kindergarten!

Ethan is a Kindergartener!!!
This is the 3rd week of school and I think we are just now getting used to our new routine. Ethan's in school full-day and I'm now working 3 days/week, so Cal and Teagan are adjusting to more daycare. Everyone stepped it up a notch this Fall.

Ethan was, of course, nervous and excited for his first day of school. There were tears (mostly mine), but it couldn't have gone better. Ethan is eager to get to school in the morning now and we have a very nice walk to and from school everyday. Even on the first day of school he just gave me a quick wave goodbye and ran into the classroom. I was the one lingering and wanting more hugs and kisses before I could bring myself to walk away! I definitely left in tears, but that just means we did a great job preparing him for school. I can't imagine how hard it will be when the kids go to college! Yikes, just thinking about that makes me tear up.

These first two pictures are of Ethan with his "Count Down to Kindergarten Chain." He made the chain at camp a few weeks before school and then he ripped one chain off every night before bed until the first day of school.

Here are a few pictures we took before his 1st day of Kindergarten. Smiles were hard to come by until he got on his scooter to ride to school.

Summer 2010

With summer already coming to an end I wanted to put together a slideshow of some of our highlights.
This summer has been SO much fun! We've been to the cabin often (of course), swimming, camping, playing at the pool and beaches, running and biking as a family every weekend morning, and Nick and I even joined a softball team.
With Cal and Teagan now 2 1/2 we have more freedom in the fun things we can do together as a family. They are adventurous and full of energy and love to follow after Ethan.
Here I am awake at midnight tonight looking thru all of our summer pictures and it makes me sad to think about this summer being over. Reality hit this evening when we went to Ethan's Kindergarten Open House. Ethan met his teacher and spent some time in his classroom. We were all very excited and it was a wonderful evening.
But that open house marked the end of summer, and the end of Ethan being home all the time with me.

Our baby goes to Kindergarten in 5 days.
And I'm crying already!

Ok, enough. That's not where I wanted to go with this blog. We still have 5 days of summer and I plan to pack in a ton more fun.
Enjoy some of the fun pictures from our summer. I'm sure I'll write a sob-blog after Ethan's first day of school. :)

Last Day of Preschool

Ethan graduated from Preschool a couple weeks ago! We're excited to be moving up to Kindergarten next year!

Copmare this picture to the one I took on his very fisrt day of preschool in 2007... http://waltons5.blogspot.com/2007/09/big-week.html

Where did the years go?

Annual Linden Hills Fest

Our 5th celebration in the neighborhood...

Blurry but Cute

Recent pajama photo shoot...
The animal PJs Teagan is wearing are actually the PJs Cal wore 1 year earlier. As long as Teagan still doesn't mind, she can fit into Cals hand-me-downs. :)

Stillwater 12k

In January I blogged about my New Years "goal" of taking care of myself and training to run my first race. After 5 months of working out and running 3-4 times a week...

I DID IT!!!!

(I should say "we" did it)

My mom, Shalene and I ran the Stillwater 12k (7.2 miles) on Sunday! I loved it! We ran the entire race without stopping and crossed the finish line at 1 hour and 10 minutes (9.41 minute miles). The hilly course didn't slow us down at all. I'm now officially addicted to racing and can't wait to run another one. Maybe we can find a 10-mile run, and then we'll go for the 1/2 marathon.

My official results were: 9.41min/mile, OVERALL placed 257 out of 591 people, of all WOMEN racers I placed 126 out of 368 women, and I placed 31 out of 86 women in my age group (30-34yrs).

Very cool!

Ethan-Date Night

For almost a couple years now, since Cal and Teagan were only a few months old, we've made a point to have Ethan-Date Nights.


That means Ethan, Nick and I go out to dinner and a movie. It's nice to spend time with Ethan and treat him to a night out without the twins. We've been good about doing this at least once a month.

Ethan usually gets to pick the restaurant, as long as we feel like eating his favorite food that night.


And his favorite food is.....

SUSHI!!!

Ethan loves seaweed salad!

And his favorite movie these days, which he's seen twice in the theater already, is How to Train Your Dragon in 3D. It's actually a very good movie.

FOOD, INC.

Earth Day is one of my favorite holidays. For me every day is Earth Day, but I love seeing everyone else thinking about our environment this week the way I think about it on a daily basis. You may think I'm exagerating, but I'm not.

Here are some of the "green" things we do on a daily basis:
-Compost, compost, compost (every meal, everyday)
-Recycle the basics (glass, paper, aluminum, plastic)
-Recycle plastic bags seperately at the Co-op
-Always use reusable cloth bags when shopping (not just groceries either!)
-Use environmentally friendly cleaning products
-Lights off if you're not in the room, and use the "green" lightbulbs
-Walk, run, bike to our destination whenever possible (yes, even with 3 kids)
-We built a very green house!
-We have a rain barrel
Plus many more little things, like turn the water off while brushing teeth...
and so on

For years we have been very concious of the food we eat, for our health and also for the environment (which is why I was a vegitarian for 8 years). We try to buy locally and eat organic food when possible, but it's expensive so we haven't made it a priority....UNTIL NOW!

Last night we watch the movie FOOD, INC.
WOW! I loved it! You must watch this movie. Don't worry, this is not a movie to push you to become a vegitarian. :) Not at all. It simply opens your eyes to think about where you food comes from, and therefore how to make better choices in what you eat and where you buy it.
From now on we will be choosing Organic and LOCAL foods. We will shop at out Co-op more. It will be much healthier for our bodies and our environment.

Just watch the movie. Happy Earth Day!!