The Reader and the Sleeper

I haven't posted in a while. A lot has been going on, some good and some bad... but it has kept me busy. I wanted to post about a couple of things that have happened in our house lately.
First, Ciera received an award at school today for the first grading period. She got an award for Language Arts. Her teacher has said that she is a great student and has shown great enthusiasm for Language Arts. She is a great reader, and shares her love of books with her class. We are very proud of her!
Second, Brooke and Chloe were both invited to participate in the science club at their school. Each teacher gets to choose two students to participate, and they were both chosen. The club is called the "nerds" (which stands for something... I am not sure what...) and they meet once a month to do science experiments and such. We are very proud of them both! (And I don't have pictures yet!)
Last, I wanted to post something funny. Dave and I went out to the gym the other night while the little girls were asleep and the big girls were reading in bed. When we got home, we found Brooke asleep on the toilet. We asked Ciera if she knew Brooke was there, and she said she had heard her get up to use the bathroom, but thought she went back to bed. Brooke had used the bathroom, gotten put back together, then closed the lid, climbed on, and fallen asleep. It was cute. She was SOUND asleep sitting up there.
Autumn and I have been keeping busy at home, she is a cute little helper and makes me laugh a lot! Time sure is flying by... I can hardly believe that it is almost Halloween. Before we know it Thanksgiving and Christmas will be here!

Proud Mama Moment

Each school year, Ciera's school has a "No Bullying" campaign, where they try to get the children to see that being a bully is never a good thing. Anyway, they have a poster contest. The children that want to participate create a poster to be judged and then displayed around the school during the year. Ciera participated last year, and made a cute poster with her friend. It didn't win any awards, but was displayed in the halls.
This year, she made a poster by herself. It was really cute... It says, "Bullies always lose!" with a scoreboard showing the "bullies" with no points. She won second place out of the whole school! I am so proud of her! Way to go Ciera!

Labor Day service project

At the last General Conference, the church was celebrating 75 years of its welfare program. A challenge was presented to all of the wards around the world to participate in a "Day of Service". We were to plan and carry out a service project in our community. The point was to allow us to show loving charity to others, benefit our community or those we served, and to build unity among those in our ward as we worked side by side.
Our ward participated in a cemetery clean-up at the Wylie Cemetery on Labor Day. We cleared away weeds and growth around the perimeter fence, cut down shrubs and trees, cleaned weeds and overgrown plants from around the graves, picked up trash, raked, cleaned and painted the gazebo, fixed the metal fence, and did some refurbishing of table skirts in the funeral home. The project started at 8:00 am, and went until noon. It was a lot of work, and we had about 200 people there helping. Our whole family helped, and I was so very proud of our girls. I heard little complaining, and they were great workers!The project was a great way to help our community, and we were able to feel good about our part in it. Dave got poison ivy, which has been really difficult for him, but otherwise it was a really positive experience for our family!

Where does she get this stuff?!?!

My conversation in the car with Autumn this morning:

Autumn: I think that was Devin's mom in that white car.
Me: Oh?
Autumn: Devin likes to kiss me. He always kisses me.
Me: Really? Well, maybe he thinks you are so cute.
Autumn: You mean, he thinks I'm so hot.
Me: (laughing) Yes, you are cute.
Autumn: I am cute to you, but I am hot to him.
Me: ...
Autumn: Hot means they like to kiss you.
Me: ...

Really? Where did she come up with this??? And she is only 4. Yikes!

Mommy's helper

Since the three big girls have all started back to school, Autumn has been my little helper around the house. She loves to do stuff with me. We like to do preschool activities, go shopping, play together, do stretches and exercise together, but most of all we like to cook (mostly bake!) things. This week, we tried a new recipe for chocolate cookies made with Nutella. They are DELICIOUS! Autumn licked every utensil I used (including the measuring cups for the flour, sugar, etc.)! She is so much fun to have around... I enjoy having her keep me company during the daytime. What am I going to do next year when she starts school?!?