School and Baby Brother!

I have learned that this is part of parenthood. Sometimes, no matter how much I try to stick to my guns and teach them obedience....my plans don't work. Like making Sarah stay in her high chair till she eats her food, and an hour later she falls asleep in her chair. Lose, lose and try again next time.

Fun concert in the park. The girls were the bands' biggest groupies.

When we announced to facebook world that we would be having another Thatcher child.

My dream hair style someday.

Date night at a Thai restaurant. The food just looked so pretty..

Canning and jamming our plenteous plum crop.

Family night ice cream at a new favorite fast food joint, Culvers.

There is always a football practice going on while Anne is at soccer practice. Rachel was just enthralled with their practice and had several discussions with me on girls playing football.

Last time at the pool soaking up the sun.

Last time at the lake with our Evans buddies.

Anne's first day of school at Manila Elementary.

Rachel's first day of homeschool preschool.

And of course, Sarah wanted me to take a picture of her too. :)

Anne with her class waiting to go in. Tall girl.

Her teacher Miss Myntti.

Rachel was so excited to start her new workbook. She just keeps plugging along and still loves to do her schoolwork. That girl's brain is like a sponge, she just soaks everything in.

At the end of the first long day in 1st grade.  Anne did well but was sad to not be at home and missed us.

One of Anne's favorite games these days, playing crossing guard. She loves the crossing guards at school and mimics them all the time. She stands out on the end of the driveway and pretends to direct traffic. She was estatic one day when Daddy pulled in while she was playing this and she got to tell him to stop till she moved the cones then told him to proceed.

The girls' chore chart. If they do their four chores: clean room, either unload dishwasher or set the table, practice piano (or Anne do her eye therapy), and do schoolwork (or homework), then they get a nickel (we upped it from a penny recently) to put in their mason jar bank. The girls are saving up for various different things such as pretty dresses, horseback riding lessons, and a trip to Disneyland. They're gonna need to do a LOT of chores. If they do extra chores they get extra money. And once a week they help with the vacuuming, bathrooms, or other bigger chores. It's nice to have more helpers and they are learning the value of work.

They were just looking awfully cute one morning on our way to school.

Every Friday we try to do "field trip friday" and go somewhere fun or informative. This day we went to the Thanksgiving Point gardens and learned the names of some of the flowers. Rachel loved drawing in her field journal.

Little ham.

This homemade pizza actually turned out and looked so pretty I had to take a picture.

Soccer Dad.

The girls loved playing soccer this year. Anne had fun running around following the group around the ball.

We hosted a fun mini Palmdale reunion with some of Zac's friends from high school that have ended up in Utah as well. Zac had fun giving the kids rides and giving away some of our geodes that we inherited.

Fun visit with Grandma and Grandpa Russell when they brought Uncle Gordon out to school at BYU.

Visit with Great Grandma Hebbert.

Someday we are going to grow a pumpkin like this.

Helping.

Helping Gordon get settled in his dorm. Oh the memories.

Cabellas' fish.

Helping Grandma pick potatoes from the garden for dinner.

Playing music for great-grandma.

Some of our harvest: zucchini, cucumbers, tomatoes, green beans, potatoes, plums, and pears.

I think Grandpa's favorite aspect of our house was our hammock out back.

Another of Anne's favorite games, playing teacher to her sisters.

Big sister Rachel decided to give Sarah her very first haircut (unauthorized). So sad. But after Aunt Jennifer evened it out, it does look cute.

Another Friday field trip to the BYU dinosaur museum.

She is such a fan.

On a Saturday that BYU was playing I told them to go put on byu football shirts. They got it half right.

Me and junior.

Fun family dinner at a local restaurant.

The day of our ultrasound we posted this pic on facebook.

And this was the next one!! We are having a boy! We were rather surprised during the ultrasound, though Zac and I both had an inkling that it was. I got teary :) He is healthy and on track and we are so excited to meet our Thatcher boy!

One of Rachel's favorite past-times, catching grasshoppers. I have never seen so many grasshoppers in all my life and they like our plants so I am happy with her hobby.

Having fun at Costco.

Movie day. Once a week we snuggle up on our hide-a-bed and watch a movie and eat popcorn and treats.

A fundraising race at Anne's school.

Everyone did great! Zac and the older girls ran the entire 2.5 miles and Sarah and I walked the shortcut of 1 mile with Sarah and met them at the end.

Sarah selfies.

Anne's owl of the week autobiography.

Rachel wrote down people in our family.

Anne wanted to have a party for her birthday this year! So we invited the girls from her class at school and had a princess dress-up party. It was a blast! So girly and so cute. Anne still talks about how much fun she had and can't wait for her next birthday. I can't believe she is already 7!!

Anne needed a new dress for Sunday because all her dresses are too short. This dress just screamed Anne.

Anne loves her stylish new boots from Grandma and Grandpa Russell.

Pretty Anne.

Rachel's artistic creations.

We are so glad we can go ride the horses at Thanksgiving Point whenever we want. It helps Rachel's cravings to have her own horse be satisfied.

Feet painting with Aunt Jennifer.

Happy Birthday cards for Grandpa Russell.

Fun Pinewood Derby night with my cubscouts.

For Zac and my 10th Anniversary we went away for the weekend. The first night we stayed in a cabin on the Jordanelle reservoir. It was beautiful.

We caught probably 15 fish between the two of us, but most of them were this size. It was still fun though.

We forgot our pillows so needless to say I was up at the crack of dawn...and pretty much all night so we went out fishing at sunrise.

They got bigger, but still not worth throwing in the cooler.

We listened to the very sad BYU football game on the radio through our phones then packed up and went to Hooters to watch the rest of the game. After, we had some time to kill before we could check into the hotel so we went toy shopping for the kids for some games that were recommended by Anne's vision therapist. We thought this guy was pretty cool. After this we went and saw a matinee of the Maze Runner 2 which was pretty awful (it was a zombie movie, not a zombie movie fan) then we checked into the hotel and got ready for a romantic night out in the city (Salt Lake City).

We went out to eat at the Cheesecake Factory which was DELICIOUS. I loved the hibiscus lemonade....and everything else.

The company was....pretty much the best. We had so much fun just talking and being together, just the two of us.  What a huge blessing that Heavenly Father lead me to this guy. It is a perk that he is so darn handsome :)

My cool salad.

Zac's was not as impressive looking but he said it tasted good.

Thanks to my two awesome siblings (Loren and Jen) for watching the kids all weekend while we were gone. The girls had a blast and loved telling me all about their fun adventures. When we got back we celebrated my little brothers' 18th birthday. Happy Birthday Gordon! We played games with the kids, ate cheesecake, then played Settlers of Catan. Good times :)

So we had been checking in with Anne's school and teachers every week and sometimes more to ask how things were going and they kept saying "Great, she's doing fine. She cries a little, but she's doing good." And one day her teacher said "Well, we don't actually see her that much, she's in resource most of the time. But when she is here on Mondays, she cries all day." That came as a big shock because we  thought she was only in resource for half the day. And when she would come home she would say that she had a great day and she didn't cry at all. So I decided to go and observe and help out for a day to see what was going on. And sure enough she was in resource for all but about a half hour. In the mornings there were two resource teachers so they could be in smaller groups but in the second half there were no aids, so one teacher. One teacher with a group of 16 resource students varying from 1st to 3rd grade. After talking with the resource teacher for a while she told me she had Anne doing preschool work because she didn't think she could handle the kindgerarten workbook. So Anne was learning to write her letters. I talked with her regular ed. teacher and asked her to give me her honest opinion of Anne and she said she couldn't teach her and didn't know what to do with her. She recommended putting her in the special ed first grade class at a different school. During Anne's math assignment that day, the teacher was timing the kids to finish an adding worksheet. Anne was just copying the problems instead of finding the answer so I told her to ask her teacher if she could use the counting cubes because I know she can add with them. Her teacher told her no and to keep doing what she was doing. Needless to say I came home in tears and furious with what was happening. Zac and I talked for hours and I couldn't sleep that night. The next morning we had decided that I would go check out the charter schools nearby and the special ed first grade class at Mt. Mahogony. I was very impressed with both charter schools, Lincoln and Canyon Grove. They both had small class sizes, huge special ed staff (5 to 6 teachers with the groups being no larger than 6), actually taught science and social studies, more specialties, energetic teachers and administration, and an overall more positive attitude. Plus, they wanted Anne there. I took Anne with me so she could meet everyone and get a feel for the schools. Mt. Mahogony and the special ed. first grade was worse than where Anne was now. That night I talked to everyone in my ward that was at the Pinewood Derby and turns out a ton of people in my ward had kids that went to Lincoln Academy and no one had kids at the other. There were even quite a few people that had transferred their kids from the other charter school to Lincoln. We also heard that the other charter school wasn't very stable (had lost accredidation, new owners, new staff...things like that). So after talking to Zac that night and praying most fervently, we decided Anne would go to Lincoln Academy. The next day we turned in all the paperwork (another blessing: Lincoln is knows to be impossible to get into the first time you try, you usually have to get on a waiting list and it takes a year to get in, there "just happened" to be one slot open in not only the first grade, but the entire elementary school. AND someone called an hour after I did and wanted the slot but I had called first, so it was Anne's.) After turning in the paperwork there they said there was a bag of donated uniforms that we could have anything we wanted which was a huge blessing because we were kind of stressing about buying all her new clothes. After that we went and withdrew her from Manila and let her say bye to her teachers and classmates. I was so angry, but I held my tongue as I told them why she was leaving. Her resource teacher understood and genuinely expressed sadness that Anne would be leaving. Poor lady just didn't have the resources that she needed, more importantly poor kids that weren't getting the help they needed. Our education system has issues. Big ones. Her classmates were sweet and gave her big hugs. It's a good thing her reg. ed teacher happened to be sick that day cause I don't know if I could've held my tongue with her. We don't want to burn any bridges cause you never know what could happen in the future. But I have never seen a school and teachers so unwilling to teach a child in my life. Anyways. Anne's first day at Lincoln was actually a field trip to the zoo!

Zac took off work so we all tagged along.

Her second day she was scared and sad but the staff helped her and she called me and we had a good talk. They calmed her down and she went back to class and didn't cry again the rest of the day. The rest of the week she just cried for a minute when I dropped her off and NOT AT ALL the rest of the day, which is huge. Not only that, she loves it! The Friday before she started, I sat down with her teacher, the special ed teacher, and the head of the special ed and went over her IEP and changed the amount of time she was in resource. We also had a good long talk about all she was capable of and all the problems we faced at her old school. I showed them proof of what she could do in the workbook we did over the summer. So now her teacher says she does great in Math, she keeps up with her class and finishes her assignments. Her teacher assessed her reading and she is just slightly below a 1st grade level and is catching up quickly. Anne gushes about her PE and music classes and LOVES learning about animals in science. This is the first time she has ever learned science or social studies at any of the school she has attended (this is the fourth school). So after a week we all are very excited about where she is. This is where she needs to be. We are so grateful to our Heavenly Father for directing her path. At first, I was frustrated and wondered why He had given us the direction to have her stay at Manila and not go to Mt. Mahogony at the end of last year. But then I realized that there wouldn't have been a spot open at Lincoln then. And we didn't even know anything about Lincoln, we were so new here. Plus, I think we needed to see another regular public school and how it was not working there to know that was NOT the right path for her. We are so grateful to her kind teachers and staff now that are working so well with her. We already see huge improvements in her work and desires to not only do her work but to be at school. She actually wants to go! She still has a lot of work to do, but now she has the right tools to help her achieve where we know she can be. We are so proud of our adaptable, strong, brave, cheerful, sweetheart, hard-working kid. Plus, she looks so cute in her uniform clothes!! :)

We had another burn in the backyard. We are clearing out an old, dead fenceline of trees to open up the back field. It was quite a site and attracted all the neighborhood kids to watch.

Anne had to make a poster about herself for school. She chose and cut out the pictures, glued them on, and painted the poster board all by herself. It's kind of hard to see but things she cut out were the beach, flowers, ice cream, chocolate, dogs, cats, shoes, makeup, blankets, and sausages. 

Rachel catching another friend.

Our greenhouse is finally taking off. We have (from left to right) mint, tomatoes, bell peppers, basil, cantelope, and cucumbers.

Jen brought home a ton of pumpkins from her work so I made pumpkin bread! A slice of this with a cup of hot cider and I was ready to ring in my favorite season.

Zac's Camera

A view from a hike he did with his scouts and Sarah up a canyon near us.

A cool creature they met along the way.

I don't know if you can see it but we've had a ton of hummingbirds frequenting our feeder out our back window. So exciting for the girls while they are eating their breakfast.

Zac hiked Mt. Timpanogos with his scouts late at night so they could sit and watch the sunrise in the morning. Seems a little crazy, but the views were pretty spectacular.

Cool fossils along the way.

The little shack at the summit.

Playing music for Great Grandma Hebbert.

A bird Daddy rescued from Shizzie's water bucket.

Feeding the ducks for family night.

Fishing trip to Strawberry Reservoir.

The girls loved playing with the worms.

Rachel's big catch!

A stop on the way home at one of their favorite places to eat, Dairy Keen! It's the cool fast food place in Heber that has trains everywhere.

Before our burn.

After Anne's party she asked to go to her favorite place to eat, Pizza Pie Cafe!

A guy at Zac's work puts up funny quotes on his door. This one was my favorite, soooo true.

From our Anniversary weekend.