Birthday Boys and Lost Treasure

This evening we attended a family party in honor of Papa and Uncle Rob's birthdays. We ate a delicious dinner, played hide & seek, tossed the bocce balls around, then went inside for dessert.

Joy helped serenade the birthday boys . . .

. . . then assisted Rob as he opened his presents.

If you look carefully, you'll see a big box of Junior Mints in front of Papa. Joy was so inspired by all the gift giving last Sunday that she wanted to give Papa a late Father's Day present today. We bought him some Junior Mints earlier this week and wrapped them up, then for some reason Joy decided to hide them. Of course, we couldn't find them for days. Fortunately, I finally happened upon them last night. The Lord truly answers prayers.

Sweet Reward

We filled up our Sweet Jar earlier this week . . .

. . . and had our sweet reward. Mmm . . . Menchie's. :)

While there's no doubt that we enjoyed our fro yo, it's harder to say whether the exercise in recognizing each other's kindness significantly benefited our family. I felt like most of the pom poms were put in by yours truly, acknowledging things people would have done even if the Sweet Jar wasn't sitting on our table. Ah well - if nothing else we got a sweet outing out of the deal.

Trikes, Trouble, and Purplish Frog

Pink Grandma came to visit today.

She colored a pop-up card with Joy . . .

. . . and they played a round of Trouble, . . .

. . . then Grandma read a few books with Daniel before taking him for a ride around the block on his tricycle. A good time was had by all.

Thanks for visiting, Grandma!

Father's Day Weekend

We've had a fun Father's Day weekend.

Saturday evening Phillip's dad joined us for dinner and helped us make a new model train setup.

Sunday evening we joined my family to honor all the dads (present and future) in our clan.

We guessed whose shoes were whose (any guess which ones are Phillip's?), . . .

. . . admired the manly centerpieces, . . .

. . . and did a little hiking . . .

. . . and rock climbing. :)

Love to all the dads in our lives, especially you, Phillip. Thanks for working so hard and loving us so much.

Pom Pom Games

At Family Home Evening this week we started a Sweet Jar.

Every time we see a family member do something sweet (e.g. helping out or playing nicely), we comment on it and put a pom pom in the Sweet Jar. Once it's full, we'll go someplace sweet: Menchie's!

When Papa came to visit the next day, he showed Joy some fun things to do with the spare pom poms. Joy had so much fun that she and I took turns making up more pom pom games today.

We made a pom pom rainbow . . .

. . . and pom pom pyramids . . .

. . . and even pom pom people.

And, just in case you're wondering, Joy does know how to smile.

Sew Easy and Sew Fun

This evening, the ward Relief Society got together to make T-shirt dresses for children in third world countries. Once they're finished, they'll be shipped to the Church's Humanitarian Center for distribution wherever the need is greatest (probably Africa).

Many sisters brought their own machines, and we worked assembly line fashion. I have minimal sewing skills and no machine, so I brought my iron and ironing board to press seams instead. And I helped everyone eat the snacks we brought.

We have a goal to finish 100 dresses this summer. Tonight we started 65 and finished about 25 of them. Sometime later in the summer we'll have another activity to pick up where we left off and finish the rest.

Jammin'

My mom, sister, and I got together to make some strawberry freezer jam this afternoon.

Heather says mashing berries is SOOO much fun. :)

Mmmm . . . just look at all the ruby red goodness in those jars. Thanks, Mom.

Groupers and Pigeons and Sharks--Oh My!

We visited the Aquarium of the Pacific with some friends today.

We had a lot of fun checking out the endless variety of fish ("Just a little closer, Dad--I can almost reach that shiny, silver one").

The giant spider crab is still the freakiest thing in the aquarium (and possibly the planet), but it was also kind of unnerving to see Joy standing next to a huge grouper that looked like it could swallow her whole.

On the other hand, I had a good laugh observing homo sapiens windexia (a glass-cleaning subspecies of human).

Joy is a fan of Finding Nemo, so she was pretty excited when we found a tank full of clown fish and blue tangs.

She also enjoyed petting the bamboo sharks, which I had to agree was pretty cool.

Daniel's favorite part of the outing was chasing pigeons around.

Stickers and Swivels

We gave Pink and Red Grandma notepad frames for Mother's Day this year.

Pink Grandma and Joy decorated one of the pages when we visited today.

Joy's pretty proud of the result, and rightfully so. I'm amazed at what they created with just some stickers and colored pencils.

And speaking of fun, back at home our neighbor let Joy try out his unique scooter. You don't have to put your foot on the ground to move it forward--you just swivel your hips. Joy swiveled her head more than anything else, but she still managed to propel it at a decent clip.

Graduation Party

Joy's preschool group held their graduation party today.

The kids decorated their initials . . .

. . . then heard a story and played a fun alphabet game.

Time for a class picture - smile and say "summer vacation!"

Here's Joy receiving her certificate. It's been a fun year.