School Starts Tomorrow!!!

Well, Jessy forgot to mention that last Saturday was a very hairy one in our family. Everybody except Kelli got their hair cut—some more than others. Savannah’s is a little shorter than I wanted to cut it, but she’d like it even shorter. She worries every day that it’s growing. Collin got a trim. Hunter got all his goldilocks cut on the top and we took the clippers to his sides to keep him cool (for heaven’s sake, the kid sweats buckets and it’s not even summer yet!). Jessy decided to cut his hair himself, which he has been doing since I was pregnant with Hunter and for some reason couldn’t hold my arms up high enough or long enough to cut his hair. I got a distress call and went in to find him looking like a boot-camp inductee. I guess he’ll be cool, too. And we’re hoping it grows out in time for the wedding.

This week was the last of this school holidays—thank goodness! Savannah was so good the first week, but this week has been grouchy most days, which tends to affect us all. The only thing that saved us was that we managed to stay busy. The kids had swimming every day this week and loved it. Savannah was assessed on Friday and –drum roll, please—passed the Octopus level and is now a Goldfish!! She is quite the little swimmer. Collin loved it, too, and we even signed Hunter up for swimming next term!

Thursday night was one of the longest ever. Jessy and I were up late talking about moving back to the States and had just gone to bed around midnight when we heard Savannah coughing (she has been sleeping on our floor during school holidays). Before we knew it she was throwing up all over Collin, who was next to her (he never woke up). After we cleaned it all up, she said she felt fine and we got settled again, just to have her do a repeat performance. We eventually got a bucket for the rest of the night and the cleanup wasn’t so bad, but then Hunter decided to wake up and join the party in our room. Around 4:00 we were all able to get a few hours of sleep in. Savannah woke up happy and bouncing around, ready for the Primary party that day. She held down breakfast, so I eventually let her go and she did fine.

Jessy had the deacons sleep over at the house on Friday. The kids were so excited—they love to have the Young Men come over to play with them. When the first people knocked on the door, Collin was so excited he ran over to me and said, “Our first customers!!” The boys were good and most got to sleep before too late. They got up early and went on a bike ride (Jessy towed Hunter and Collin in the trailer)—all the way to the zoo in North Adelaide! It was about 35 kms round-trip, and some of the boys were on bikes without gears. They came home exhausted—they literally fell down on the front lawn—and Jessy said they were all too tired to make it to the Priesthood session of General Conference that night.

Savannah had a doubly hard time sleeping Friday night. She was excited to have the boys over to play games with, but she was also very excited to be going horseback riding with Keely on Saturday. It was hard to wait until 11:00, but she made it and was all smiles as she rode the horse all around. After riding, they went to McDonald’s for lunch. I need to get the pictures on a CD from Leanne—all I’ve got are the ones she printed up for me, but it looked like she was in heaven!

Hunter has sworn off his high chair. He wouldn’t eat if we put him in it and would scream, “All done!!” whenever we put him in. So, now he’s on the regular chairs with a hard tile floor below. I guess it can’t be any worse than Collin, who tends to fall off his chair once every month or two. He’s also up to his regular mischief—today I went in to find him and Jessy painting with watercolors. His face was all streaked with blue paint and he would suck the brush every time he dipped it in the water. Then, when Jessy left, Hunter drank the dirty water, and then went over and stole the rest of a bag of Tim Tams from off the counter. He came in to find us with a melty Tim Tam in each hand and his face covered in chocolate. As he went outside a little later, he walked right through the screen door instead of opening it. Apparently on that outing, he buried one of his Tim Tams, which he just now dug up (Savannah confiscated it before he could eat it). I should get mad, but right now I’m pretty amused at the fact that he continues to do these things and doesn’t think anything of it. In fact he is usually humming while he’s committing his crimes…something that sounds a lot like Darth Vader’s theme from Star Wars.

Collin continues to be…Collin. He fell against his chair today at General Conference and got a bloody nose. This afternoon, after The Worst Nap Ever (kids in my face talking to me, kicking balls at me, screaming about who got the most water balloons, basically not sleeping at all), he asked, “Did you have a good nap, Mom?” with the most innocent and sincere face you’ve ever seen. I couldn’t help but do my best psycho laugh in his face, which he thought was hilarious. He loved his swimming so much, but he kept getting in trouble because he got bored when his teacher took “his friend” out to do her things, so he kept himself occupied by diving down in the water for as long as he could or pushing himself off the wall and floundering around to get back to it. He also taught his teacher to “play the guitar” in the water—who knew he had such talents?

We're all doing well and are getting ready for the Halloween party I promised the kids last year (they never forget that type of promise). Should be a crazy, hectic, and hopefully fun week!