I just love camera dumps...

These first two pictures are from the kids' Open House way back in March, but somehow they didn't make it on the last camera dump.

Mrs. Prescott and Hannah have had a great year together. They are both crazy about each other!

Joey and Mrs. Watters have also had a wonderful year together! We couldn't have picked better teachers for our kids! Joey wanted to dress up for Open House and look "handsome." He was a big hit with all the teachers that night!

These girls LOVE playing with water in the backyard. Good thing we live in a place where they can do it 12 months a year.

We "dogsat" for my parent's dog for a long weekend. Ellie loved having Morgan with us, and loved when he was not in his kennel so that she could have a turn being a dog.

This is part of our on-going tradition of having special dates with our kids. Sometimes we do "Date Night" where Andy takes the girls out and I take Joey out, and sometimes we do "Girl's Night/Boy's Night" where the boys go with boys and girls go with girls. For our last Girl's Night, Hannah wanted to go to Panda Express. Lucky for us, there was a Cold Stone Creamery right next door! The boys ended up going to two (TWO!) GameStops and then picked up some Domino's Pizza and went home to watch The Three Stooges.

Joey and Hannah were both invited to a rock climbing birthday party for a boy in Hannah's class that Joey is also friends with.

Hannah tried it out, but never wanted to go too far up.

Joey, on the other hand, kept wanting to go as high as he possibly could. I got to belay (be the person at the bottom anchoring the rope!)

Joey's teacher sent me this picture of Joey presenting his Benjamin Franklin project to the class. She said, "I think he really enjoyed taking over the class and teaching!" Getting to take over the class and loving it? Yeah, that's our Joey!

Right after Joey's "Night at the Museum," we hit the road for a four day weekend in Phoenix. The kids and I haven't been to Phoenix since January, and we could NOT wait to get there. The first day was Friday, so we just hung around the house while Andy worked "from home." My goal was to not get out of my pajamas for the whole day, and I'm proud to report that I nailed it! All the blog posts I've posted recently have been courtesy of that day.

  Every once in a while, Andy would take a break from work to chase the girls. They love running away from the tickle/kissy monster, yet somehow he always manages to catch them!

 Saturday we all went to the Pioneer Living History Museum a little north of Phoenix. The "museum" is 90 acres of an old 1800's town. It has authentic buildings and historically accurate reproductions. 

 This was the blacksmith's shop.

We did a lot of walking that day. Thankfully the weather wasn't too hot!

 This was by an old mining cabin.

 When we first got there, we watched a gun fighting competition using targets and timers to see who had the quickest draw. One of the guys gave Joey that wooden gun. He was pretty excited about it!

  Our favorite place was probably the carpenter shop because they had a volunteer dressed up in 1800's clothing and demonstrating how to use some of the tools. Then he let us try out some of the tools for ourselves.

 After we got back from the Pioneer Living History Museum, Andy glued a clothes pin on Joey's wooden gun so that it would shoot rubber bands. Then, Grandma made him a holster and two little drawstring pouches, one for his rubber bands and one for his gold. (He said that as a cowboy he plans on "hunting for gold.")

 A new gun and holster got Joey all in the cowboy mood. This is what he looked like for the rest of the weekend.

 Then Andy hijacked my hair dryer and got in on the fun.

On Monday, we went to the park, played on the swings, and had an epic game of kick the can, boys vs. girls.

 Honestly, this is the cutest cowgirl I've ever seen!

Soaking up every last minute of fun before we had to leave!

 Joey has had such a great year in 2nd grade. He was a little bummed at the beginning of the year because all of his friends were placed in other classes, but his teacher has more than made up for it. Mrs. Watters has been wonderful and has been the perfect teacher for him. She's challenged and encouraged him so much!

Mrs. Watters and I were emailing back and forth about something when she wrote:

 I also wanted to add that Joey did a wonderful job sharing about his visit to his dad's work. It was SO interesting and I have never seen the kids so riveted. Joey seemed to learn a lot from his visit! I'm sorry to only have 6 weeks left with him in my class! I will miss him! He is beyond ready for third grade, though. He has a young heart, a happy, silly sense of humor, is interested in everything, and is in no rush to grow up. I hope my little boys are the same when they are his age. You are very blessed! :)

 Goodness gracious! It made me teary when I read that.

Then, the other day, a neighbor whose son is in Joey's class posted this on my Facebook wall:

 I volunteered in the classroom today and I just wanted to let you know how awesome Joey is! He is such a confident yet incredibly sweet and caring person. I love him and am so happy his presence is an influence on mine.

Meanwhile, Hannah's teacher (who has been teaching for 18 years) sent me this email:

Can I tell you the truth...I am going to have Hannah withdrawals next year. I know I tell you this all the time, but Hannah truly is the most amazing student I have ever taught. She is so excited to learn and so joyful about everything. She truly brightens my day. I love that she is positive and happy about all things school. I am going to miss her more than you know. 

There are certainly times when I want to throw my kids out the window, so it was a nice reminder about what great kids they really are!

This past week I got to go with Joey on his field trip to Jack's Pond and Nature Center.

The Nature Center had several interesting, hands-on exhibits.

Then we got to go on a guided nature walk.

This is half his class.

Later that night, Joey participated in "Night at the Muesum" at school. Every second grader in the school did a research project on a historical figure. Then they dressed up like the person they researched and presented their displays.

 

Joey picked Benjamin Franklin and made a picture frame. You might recognize a couple of those pictures from our trip out to Philadelphia in August.

Dr. Seuss, Benjamin Franklin, Marlin Briscoe

Ben and his proud sisters.

This happened in our backyard the other day:

 Joey set up different centers in our backyard for the neighborhood girls. He took me on a little tour...

 This is the "stick softening" center where you rub sticks on the stucco to make them smooth.

 The football center.

 The mud center.

The jumping center.

 

 The climbing center.

  Ellie and Cameron liked this center a lot!

Well this post is long overdue! My last post was about Lauren's baptism, and now I need to share about the rest of our wonderful week with the Gallos.

When Rachel and Michael planned their trip, we decided to keep it a surprise from my dad and my three kids. I picked the four Gallos up from the airport on a Saturday and drove them straight to my parent's house. My dad thought my family was coming over for my youngest brother's birthday party. He had no idea I was bringing out of town guests. It was so fun to watch my Dad's face light up with surprise and joy when he realized who was walking into the house!

An hour or so later, Andy and the kids showed up. They were also very excited to see "Benny," as they call him and Baby Lauren.

All the kids wanted to take turns holding Lauren.

 She was less enthused about the idea.

And now with Ben!

This is how Ben smiles when you tell him to smile for a picture. I love it! (This is also how Joey smiles when you tell him to smile for a picture.)

This was (almost) the whole crew for Timmy's birthday.

The birthday boy and his nephew!

Later in the week, Ellie and I got to hang out more with Aunt Rachel, Ben and Lauren while Joey and Hannah were in school. Ellie and Ben were so cute together and held hands as they walked around the backyard.

And this one wasn't so sad about the photo shoot this time.

On Thursday, my mom, sister, kids and I drove down to visit my grandma. Here she is with three of her great-grandkids (Joey and Hannah were in school again). Lauren was very sweet and content, so my grandma got to cuddle with her the whole time.

Playing on the courtyard outside my grandma's place.

Thursday was also Andy's birthday. Unfortunately, we didn't get any pictures from that night. We went to my parent's house for dinner and my Uncle Kramer, Aunt Kim and cousin Brian came up to meet Lauren. That night we came home with one less kid because Ellie stayed at Nana and Bubba's house to spend the night!

So she got more snuggling time with little Lauren! Ellie got to spend the whole day with Nana, Aunt Rachel, and her cousins.

They went to the beach to feed the birds!

That evening they came over to our house for another little party because Friday was my sister's birthday. (Yes, we have a LOT of May birthdays around here!)

Cute family of four!

The five Krause grandkids. This is the best picture we could get of all five of them. At least one of them is looking at the right place. ;-)

My Dad and Princess Sweetness

We had a wonderful visit with my sister and her family! A HUGE thank you to my fabulous brother-in-law for thinking up this trip in the first place!