*first day of school 2012*

Although I always get a little sad when my kids have to go back to school, it is nice in a way so there is a little structure in our lives.

I was dreading this year of all years since my baby would be going all. day. long. and I knew that it would be super hard on me. When did he big enough to start first grade?

So my good friend, who's baby is starting all day kindergarten, and I planned to spend the day together to ease the pain.

The boys were a little nervous since they would be starting new schools this year but super excited to meet new friends.

I saw one of the boys off early in the morning...Nick to eighth grade:



then later on my three littles.

Liam to first,




Luke to fifth,






and Andrew to sixth.

King of the school.




We live super close to our new school so we were able to walk together and Liam held my hand the whole way.


It was uber chaotic when we arrived. Kids everywhere. I didn't know where to have the kids line up and since the school didn't have a back to school night before school started we had no idea what their teachers looked like. And the fact that the younger boys didn't know very many kids made it more stressful for them.

I was not impressed.


As we waited in some random line, Liam began to cry and I was heartbroken. I just wanted to tell him he didn't have to go and that he could stay home with me today. But I knew that wasn't good so I tried not to cry myself and luckily held it together and stayed strong.

I walked him to his class and got him situated.

And he did just fine.




Andrew was too cool to hang out with me so I just snapped random pictures from afar.


Luke found his class and settled in.

Success.


Walking back home, I called Justin and lost it. I told him how I hated how unorganized it was and that Liam was crying and how I hated leaving him there.

He was a sweet dad and picked him up for lunch.

My friend and I went to lunch and got pedicures. It was wonderful.

Then we had a swimming party with some of our new friends in the neighborhood.

Just a funny side note: Justin met me at the party after Nick and Andrew's football practice. Nick was wearing his sleeveless shirt and he actually is pretty muscular. One of our friend's three year olds saw him getting out of our car and she said: "Whoa. That's a tough guy."

I thought it was pretty cute.

I also snapped these on the second day of school. Andrew again was too cool to hang out with me so I didn't get one of him.




The second day went much smoother.

Thank goodness.

*our last hurrah*

The last weekend of summer.

*sigh*

We made sure we packed in all we could in just three short days.

Justin took the day off on Friday and we headed up to Snowbird. We bought a pass that allowed us to enjoy all of their fun activities and I don't know why we didn't do it sooner. It was also nice because at my favorite gas station if you bought your soda in this special green cup for one dollar, each cup gave you $10 off the ticket price. It was totally worth keeping up my diet coke habit for that. I mean, someone has to sacrifice, right?

It was a beautiful day, sunny, warm, delightful.

First, we took our turn on the mountain flyer, a giant zip line. We went on this multiple times.







The alpine slide was a hit. Unfortunately for Liam, he rode with me and I thought I was going fast but not fast enough for him. He realized that if you push the lever forward, it made you go faster and he said he wanted to ride by himself. I just imagined him flying off into the bushes. The line was super long when we went to do it again later in the day so he will have to wait until next year. Phew.







Then Luke polished his skills on the climbing wall. He made it up so fast on his turn that the guy said he could go again. And again. Luke was super happy.




There was a fun jumping pillow that the younger three tried out.

















Then a fun ride on the tram.











Instead of riding the tram back down, we hiked down the mountain to the ski lift and rode it to the bottom. It was so pretty and refreshing being in the mountain air. I even saw a moose and her baby. Made my entire summer.



Then Justin and the boys played on the ropes course.




















So coming back next year!

Then....football started. It was our inauguration game against Murray. We have three games to look forward to every Saturday. It is like a full time job! We are basically at the field from 9 am until 3. It will be nice though because since Skyline's program is so small there is just one team per age group so even when we travel away, each boy plays on the same field and none of them will ever play at the same time so we are able to see all the games. It was tricky last year trying to juggle who was going to what game and that was only with two players! I was relieved that I was being eased into this year with three.

Nick is #20:





Andrew is #52:




(I love this intense picture of him coming through the line :) )


and Luke is wearing his dad's #70.








After a full day of games, we had the Scrapper's baseball banquet. So fun. One of the moms set up a waterslide and the boys had a blast.










Then there was waterslide baseball.


The moms couldn't let all the boys have the fun so we decided to take a turn.










After the women went down, the dad's decided it was okay to join in. We had such a fun night and what a great way to end the summer.