Family Pictures 2022

Shout out to Aubrey Prestwich for doing our family pictures this August! It was super rainy when we were trying to get our pictures taken. We had to cancel one day and then decided to brave it even though there was some evening rain forecasted. We got drizzled on a bit, and the mosquitos absolutely wrecked us, but I'm super happy with how these turned out! We went to the place that my kids call "the fairy garden" past the safari trail. 

We didn't get a single picture with all of us smiling, so Aaron face swapped Isaac's face in this one

Check out that tongue action

This kid has the best funny faces

Annie posing by the statue of a toad reading a book under a toadstool. Why this statue exists, nobody knows. 

Our little sweet pea

Isaac did not grasp the idea of family pictures and kept getting mad at us for pulling him out of the bushes where he was trying to play in the mud. Things went better when we let him hold a stick or flower. 

Elliot came close to blasting ice beams out of his eyes in this picture

Aubrey told us to "act cute." We didn't quite know how to do that. 

These running action shots turned out so cute!

It seems like sticking out your tongue when doing anything involving coordination is a trait that Aaron passed to our kids

Isaac will 100% of the time come and sit on any family member who makes the mistake of lying down in his presence

I really do love being a mom, even if I do have to spend a considerable amount of time preventing toddlers from falling onto cacti

The Blood girls <3

Annie Starts Preschool

Annie is a VERY enthusiastic preschooler! She was a bit apprehensive about her first day but was very quickly won over. Crafts? Friends? A play area with a play kitchen? What is there not to love!

A friend in the ward, Ginger Hunsaker, started an in-home preschool this year that we are sending her to. She lives within walking distance, and it is oh so convenient. 

Annie with her "first day of preschool" regalia. She loves showing me all the stuff in her backpack that she comes home with. 

Annie is the oldest kid in her class because she just missed the kindergarten cutoff, but she doesn't seem to notice. Ginger says that she is the popular girl in the class because she's developmentally a bit more mature than the rest, so she assumes a ringleader role. 

Annie comes home singing nursery rhymes and talking about all sorts of things that make me think "I should have taught her that!"

Annie is developing a hearty love of crafts

The field trip to the fire station was cut short when they had to respond to a call, but at least we got this cute picture by the fire truck!

Annie has started reading Bob books, but she is definitely much more interested in writing than she is in reading. She is constantly asking me how to spell things so that she can write it out. She will have friends over for playdates, and they will fill pages and pages with random letters. She is also getting much better at drawing but gets frustrated when her pictures don't match her creative vision. Overall this girl is thriving!

First Day of Public School

Elliot started 2nd Grade on August 8! This is our first public school experience after 2 years of Prenda. We wanted to keep going with Prenda but couldn't find a guide in Rancho that was doing 2nd grade. 

This picture was taken way too early in the morning. His school bus comes at 6:27am. 

I love this kid so much! He was not at all scared about going to the much bigger school. We went to a back to school open house where we practiced walking to his classroom from where the bus would drop him off. I walked him to and from the bus stop for one week. After that, I asked if he would be comfortable walking home from the bus stop and maybe eventually walking there in the mornings by himself. He was on board right away. He now wakes up by himself, gets himself breakfast, packs himself a snack, and walks to the bus stop every morning all by himself. I don't even wake up for it anymore. Aaron is up and working, so he checks on him to make sure he's up and gives him a morning hug. This is completely miraculous to me. Last year it was a struggle to drag him to school on time at 8:30, and this year he does it all by himself two hours earlier! For whatever reason, he decided to take ownership of getting himself to school, and he's completely rocking it. 

There was a teacher shortage this year, so Elliot's teacher is technically still a student at the U of A. She would normally be doing her student teaching this semester, but they were so short staffed that the school district gave all the student teachers their own classes instead of having them help in a veteran teacher's classroom. Miss O'Brien is great. 

Elliot's class at the library! They had a day in October where they learned about squash. 

Usually when I ask Elliot about what he does in school, he says "stuff." Here are some tidbits I have been able to piece together about the first part of his 2nd grade experience:

• He tries to be the first one to the bus stop so that he can stand by this specific bush so that he can be first in line to get on the bus. This seems pointless because they have assigned seats. He said "most of the other kids play and climb trees in the morning, but to me it's worth it to miss out on that to be the first one on the bus." There is one other kid that knows the bush secret and tries to be first, but he lacks Elliot's dedication so Elliot wins the undeclared competition most mornings. 
• His favorite "special" is computer class but also loves library and PE when they do obstacle courses or funny relay races. 
• His classroom had groups of 4 desks pushed together to form tables. Kids who talked too much got their tables broken up and have to sit with their desks in spaced out rows. Elliot is part of the only table that has not been broken up. 
• His buddy James Mills is in a different class, but they have recess at the same time. Each day they play "Age of Empires" or other video game inspired games with piles of sand. He dumps massive quantities of sand out of his shoes after school every day. 
• His teacher says that he is quiet most of the time and very well behaved. He does his trademark "I'm proud of myself" grin whenever he answers a question right in front of the class. 
• The work that he brings home seems super easy for him, but he says it feels the same amount hard as Prenda was and that he liked both of them. 

Annie Sings of Cheese

Once upon a time, Annie started singing about the cheese on her mocked tamale casserole. I started rolling the video and she really poured out her heart in cheese-themed song. 

The best quotes are "This is good cheese, Baybay!" and "I never wanna die, or else I won't get to eat cheese"

For the true Annie fans out there, here's round two featuring  "Cheese can go under a tunnel" and "My favorite thing in the whole world (except unicorns) is cheese"

Another dinner, another adventure. This time Annie wouldn't eat her noodles but insisted on licking the table over and over. This picture has been the lock screen on Aaron's phone for a while. 

Who needs TV when you can watch dinner cooking!

Throwing this one here because it's food related. We attempted to harvest mesquite pods this year with disappointing results. We picked them before leaving on vacation because we knew the monsoons were coming and you aren't supposed to eat them after monsoons start because there is a type of fungus that grows on them. We picked a couple of bags full and left them in the truck of Aaron's car in the garage to dry out while we were gone. They hung out in our kitchen for a week or so until we got Stephen and his wheat grinder over. Our theory is that the humidity in the house got to the pods because they refused to be ground up in Stephen's grinder or our food processor- they left this gummy stuff all over the blades instead of being turned to dry powder. I tried drying them out again but then bugs got into it so I threw the whole thing out. We will try again next year and try to grind them right after drying them out!

Provo Airport Party

 After the friend reunion came to a close, we headed to the Provo Airport to fly home. The good news was that the airport was newly remodeled with an awesome family room! It featured these firm foam shapes that kids can use to make tunnels and obstacle courses. So great for kids to be able to blow off steam while waiting for the plane! We were also the only flight going out that afternoon, so it wasn't crowded at all. 

The bad news was that our plane was delayed. By 5 hours. Apparently we had the honor of being the first delayed flight ever at the new airport! There was some problem with the landing gear of our plane, so we had to wait for another plane to come over from California. 

We were compensated with free pizza since there were no restaurants open in the airport yet. Some intrepid father got Frozen playing on the TV in the family room and later played "animal freeze dance" on his phone. At first they were saying that nobody would be able to leave the airport since TSA had already gone home for the day, but luckily they got enough of them to come back for a later shift. There was a catch though- we had already returned our rental car and checked our car seats, so we were stuck. 

I sent a text complaining about it to my family text. Max immediately called me. It turns out that Breezy and Blake were at his house only 20 minutes away from us! I should have been able to put this together- I knew they were going to stay with Max after they got out of school- but I didn't realize that I would be so close to them on our vacation! My Utah geography is exceptionally poor. 

They showed up pronto, and we hung out in the empty airport lobby! It was my first time seeing Blake in person since he got home from his mission, and it was great giving him a hug. Annie loved getting some Morgan snuggles, and Max and Blake were very efficient at helping my kids get their wiggles out. They were all laughing up a storm. Annie was admiring Breezy's ring collection and Breezy gave her a rose ring. She has worn it constantly since then, and I catch her singing to it on a regular basis. 

Some sort of escape/battle game going on here

"Oh no, Annie escaped us again!"

We got to hang out for 2 hours with the sibs. It was great! I would have planned a hang out time on purpose if I had realized we would all be in the same area!

Twinsie Friend Reunion

The worst part about living in Sahuarita is that our friends move away over and over again. They keep saying they want to "be closer to family" when really the correct approach is to get your family to join you in Sahuarita.

Two of our very best friends- the Knells and the Allsops- were getting together in Utah, so naturally we decided to join them for a week of boating, late night chats, and rounds of One Night Werewolf. There was an absolutely side-splitting moment when we were playing catch phrase and a very tired Erick got the word "Twinsies." He described it as "When you are feeling goofy and someone wears the same shirt as you!" and then did this finger gun thing. We have all been feeling goofy ever since.  

Our greatest boating accomplishment is that Aaron got up on the wakeboard! There was a general cry of delight from all 16 of us on the boat.

I opted for the kneeboard this year. It was a far less painful experience than last year's wakeboard beating. I figured out how to zig zag over the wake on it! 

The kids greatly enjoyed the tube rides. Isaac was frantic trying to jump on the tube before it was his turn- no fear from that one. Elliot loved the big bumps but was pretty scared about going over the wake. The boat turning accidentally put us over the wake once and he was NOT a fan of that level of excitement. The wake looks like a tiny drop when you are on the boat, but when you are out behind the boat it looks like an absolute wall that will surely flip you if you go over it. 

A happy little boat baby! 

Elliot with a girl who looks just like Annie but is actually Riley. 100% of our 10 combined kids are as blonde as blonde can be. 

On Friday we met up with the Wiscombs, yet another Sahuarita friend who turned traitor and moved to Utah on us. We went and got Quiznos for dinner and then met up at the park and splash pad for an evening. I'm so glad that I thought to recreate the picture of when our 4 families went to Rocky point together!

The Blood-Knell-Wiscomb-Allsop kids in Mexico, October 2019

The same families reunited in July 2022. We have added 5 kids to the mix since then!

Splashpads are always a hit with my kiddos

Isaac and Annie ran right in with their clothes on, but Elliot is the type of kid who needs to be properly dressed for an activity. 

Then there is Annie "I hope I get all wet today" Blood. She's part mermaid. 

Elliot couldn't do this a year ago when we visited this park. Now he's a pro!

Isaac jumped off this platform onto this ring at least 20 times. It looked terribly unpleasant and he fell every single time. Maybe that was the point of it?

Isaac Blood, master of this ring obstacle

Annie Blood, who was actually able to go on all the rings

Elliot and Winston Knell hitting it off on the spinny thing

This trip was just perfect. I am ever so pleased that we have managed to stay in touch with these friends and are already brainstorming future reunions!