Life As We Know It - Dance Pictures 2013

We got the girls dance pictures back and they are cuter than ever! 

We have a couple more weeks to go before the big Recital but the excitement is growing! 

Ally's tap dance is 

"After School Shake Shop"

Evelyn's tap dance is 

"Disneyland Vacation"

Ally's Jazz dance is

"Spice Up Your Life"

Evelyn's pre-ballet dance is 

"Tooth Fairy Dreamin"

Ally's ballet dance is 

"The Climb"

Super excited to watch these cute girls dance soon!!

Venture Track Meet at Ben Lomond High School

This is my second year volunteer coaching for the Venture Academy Track team. It has been super fun and super hectic! The fun part about this year is that both Ethan and Ally are running on the team. Last year Ally wasn't old enough and Ethan had pneumonia, so he missed out on the entire season. Since our season is so short we have four weeks to hit the ground running. We are a very small school, therefore our team is usually very small as well. Can cause some challenges that is for sure.

 Our first meet is always a little crazy, especially for me. Most of the kids have never set foot on a running track before and I have very little time to bring them up to speed on what the rules are and what all of the markings on the track mean. So the minutes before the meet start I am a bit like a chicken with its head cut off!

Ally, Ashtyn and Ethan doing some warm up laps.

Ally came to see me to calm some of her nerves before her 100m dash while I was at the finish line instructing our team photographer, Nate.

My three 6th grade girls, Ally, Gracee and Ashtyn, running the 100 meter dash. They did great! They ran with kids all the way up to 9th grade!

 Ethan running his 100 meter dash

Partial team picture. Ally, Dani, Katelynn, Jayden, Brittaney, Ethan, Gracee, and Chris 

These two were goofing off a bit in between races. I am super glad that they are close friends though.

Last minute instructions from Coach Mills to my boys 4x100 relay team. Parker, Ethan, Chris and Jayden. They ended up coming in 2nd place overall.

Great handoff between Parker and Ethan at the first exchange

Their last race of the meet, the 200 meter dash. They did great and I was especially pleased to see their strong finishes.

Til next week!

Tetherball

I surprised the family with a Tetherball pole this week. Everyone is super stoked to have it and to finally have it set up. Nate as you can see has already been relegated to playing one handed, and left handed mind you, when playing. I see many Tetherball tournaments in our future. 

Wordless Wednesday: Hanging Out With My Bookends

South Again

The work on Grandma Lundberg's family history continues. This was my third of four weekends this last month, down here in St. George. Nate and Ethan were gone to Section Conclave for the Order of the Arrow in Delta, Utah, so it was just me and the 3 younger kids. It wasn't all family history work, we played around a bit too.  

 After arriving fairly late Friday night, we woke up fairly early and headed to the park before it got too hot. The kids absolutely love this park. We have to come here at least once a trip.

 After lunch on Saturday, we weeded and put new Petunias in Grandma's flower bed and then headed to the pool.

The kids enjoyed some time with their cousin Elaina, while sitting on the back wall enjoying the sunset over the desert. It is so peaceful there, it truly is difficult to leave.

Earlier in the day we had stopped at Costco and Evie had talked me into this cute outfit for her. Of course she begged to put it on after swimming. She ran around the house saying, "Cha-cha-chachacha!" She told me that when she is older she is going to wear this outfit when she is on Dancing with the Stars. Love her!

Sunday afternoon, just a few minutes out of the Washington area, I just had to snap a photo of this. I just thought the desert looked so pretty. I really enjoy running the desert trails back behind Grandma's house.

During our dinner stop at Costa Vida in Fillmore I was lucky to snap a photo of this moment. Can you say Group Hug? I love that for the most part our kids are friends and have close relationships with each other.

And of course, there was a little bit of this happening along the way. Sometimes boys are just easier.

St. George Siesta

Because I didn't get everything done with Grandma Lundberg's family history stuff that I wanted to I decided to head back down this last weekend. So I didn't have to go alone I invited Heidi along. When my Mom caught wind of our little trip she made arrangements for her Temple job and joined us. We had a GREAT time! Super relaxing and super fun. We visited, shopped, sat in the hot tub, went for walks/runs and I got a ton more done. I ended up bringing home a lot of stuff to work on. It is so fun to learn more about your family (or your husbands family) history.

We ended up getting matching sandals while we were at the outlets. So cute! Cannot wait til we can do this again!

In Memoriam: Dash Kitty

Today is a very sad day here at the Little Mills Kingdom. We have discovered that we have indeed lost our poor kitty Dash.

We got Dash the day before Halloween of 2010. In the summer of 2010, we had gotten two orange and white kittens from the same litter, and we named them Tom and Jerry. We loved Tom and Jerry. The week leading up to Halloween poor Jerry got hit by a car. We were so sad. Poor Tommy boy was just a lonely little wreck. So we went back to the family we got them from hoping to still get a kitten from the same litter, hoping that the kittens would remember each other. We liked them having each other to snuggle with when it is cold out and to have each other's backs when they feel threatened, etc. 

The first day we brought Dash home he was very, very skittish. We almost named him Skitty. I had to hang out in the back yard keeping an eye on him to make sure he didn't take off. Tom was super excited to have him around and would not take no for an answer when it came to playing together. It took a bit of convincing. The night of Halloween he disappeared. We searched for him and luckily we found him being taken care of at a home just up the street from us. We figure he got spooked with all of the trick or treaters and then couldn't find his way home.

After that he and Tom were inseparable. We often found them in our garage lounging  on the jogging stroller.

 Unfortunately, the following April (2011) Tommy boy disappeared. It was very unlike him to wander off and the first morning he missed breakfast we knew something wasn't right. We never saw him again.

Dash on the other hand was a little bit of a wanderer. Nothing major for the most part. Last summer he got mad at me for taking in a rescue kitten, Roxie, and took off for a week but he eventually found his way home.

 So when I noticed I hadn't seen him for a day or so about three weeks ago I wasn't too concerned, but I didn't like it either. We asked the neighbors to keep an eye out for him and to let us know if he was seen.

Well, this morning we got a call from our good neighbors across the street, the Nutleys. They were wondering if they had found our boy Dash. Nate went over to confirm and unfortunately it was him. He hadn't been gone long. Looks like he had drowned in our irrigation ditch after this weekends rain storms. Poor Dashie boy. We will sure miss him. The hard part comes tonight when we have to break the news to the kids. They have missed him so much and been so worried about him.  

 Our other kitty, Pepper, has just been lost without him these last three weeks. She is so social and is getting increasingly attention starved without having her buddy around.

I will miss you greeting me every morning when I return from my run and having you demand attention and a good rub down while I try to catch my breath and stretch a bit.

I will miss you attacking the plants I am trying to work with in the garden.

I will miss hearing your bell tinkling while you run around the yard.

We love you Dash! Thank you so much for all of the love and fun you have brought to our family these last 2 and half years. You will surely be missed.

 

Dash

June 2010 - April 2013