Mother and Daughter Outing

One of the things I love about our stake is that each year it holds a Mother & Daughter outing. Emma and Samantha and I were able to go up last weekend for a few hours and enjoy the company of the other mothers and daughters from Church. I love spending time with my daughters. They are very special little girls.
There is a rickety old bridge that crosses over Catherine Creek. It swings when you walk over it so, of course, all the kids have to run as fast as they can because it messes up your balance. They think it's great fun!

There was a craft pavilion where the girls were able to paint rocks and make popcorn trees and flowers out of yarn.

The Circus Comes to Town

Last week the circus came to La Grande and we decided to go as a family. We have never been to a circus before and figured that a quality circus would never come to rural Oregon. However, we were pleasantly surprised. There were some really exciting acts and some fun animals like the tigers, lions, and elephants. Despite the rain and wind and cold, we had a wonderful time together. Here is a picture of the girls standing by a bear. The video is of the girls riding the elephant!! Are our girls cool or what? For the rest of their lives they'll be able to tell people that they once rode on an elephant!

Living Room Campout

The girls decided that they wanted to have a campout outside. This would have been just fine except that the nights are still too cold here to be sleeping outside. So we camp up with a compromise and they camped out in the living room instead. We thought that they would give up during the night and just crawl into their beds but they made it through the whole night of sleeping on the hardwood floor and lots of blankets. It was pretty cute!

Joy School Graduation

Samantha completed her first year of preschool and we are quite proud of our little girl. We had a family dinner with the other families involved in the joy school program and a little graduation ceremony where Samantha and her classmates sang songs and received a "diploma" from Miss Karen. She learned so much this year and is looking forward to one more year of preschool.

Last Day of School

Emma completed her kindergarten school year on June 4th. Samantha and I were able to go to her classroom and sing songs and play games with the rest of the kindergarten class and then there was a school wide BBQ afterwards. The year went by so quickly and Emma loved every minute of it! She is going to miss Mrs. Huntington as her teacher and miss all of her classmates. We're so proud of Emma and all of her accomplishments!!!