Audrey and Kate go to a charter school, so they get to wear these cute uniforms.

Simon didn’t want to be left out of the photo ops and really how could I refuse him when he looked so awesome in his high water Lightning McQueen jammies.

This is Audrey and Kate’s first year of going to the same school and it has been so fun listening to them make plans of meeting each other “on the bridge” at recess.

We had so much fun with our own little Amazing Race and Minute to Win it games.

The women-folk got some much needed R&R with some delicious breakfast, pedicures, and shopping.

A few weeks later, we headed to Stanley, Idaho for the Baldwin family reunion.  Each family stayed in our own little cabins.  We spent most of our time outdoors which was kind of tricky with temps in the 30′s at night and 80′s during the day.

This picture was taken right behind our cabin.  We had the most beautiful view.

We spent one day at Red Fish lake and had so much fun playing in the water and canoeing around.

Somehow we talked Audrey into doing a dive off the dock and swimming back to shore.  We told her we would canoe right along beside her in case she was tired. She got her goggles on and got all ready to go.  She dove in and then came up screaming because of the freezing water and jumped right back into the canoe.

She inspire Mason and Uncle Stephen to dive in too.

On June 4, 2011, our Audrey girl got baptized!  I can’t believe she’s old enough for this.

Before we left for her baptism, we presented her with a few gifts.  We gave her, her own set of scriptures.  I made her a quilt with some words embroidered on it that were in a song she and Kate sang at her baptism.  And Scott gave her this sweet little corsage.

She played the song, “When I am Baptized,” on the piano and she and Kate sang it together.  Here’s a video of them singing it at home.

After the baptism, we headed to the park for a picnic with family and then finished off the day having birthday cake for Grandma Jean’s birthday.

In swim team, Audrey and her cohorts were practicing relays. They were taught that if they enter the water before their teammate touches the wall of the pool, then they are disqualified. Audrey stood in the set position waiting for her teammate. Then, at the right moment, she dove in. Straight down. No, really, straight down. It was hilarious.

Here is Simon diving/reaching for “sticks.” He wasn’t down with the other little boy playing with the boat and insisted that the boat be removed from the water prior to his diving for “sticks.”

In this next clip, Simon amazed me when he slipped off the wall diving for a “stick” (that’s what the teachers called the circular ring toys). Naturally, he “pancaked” (another teacher term which means to flip from stomach to back and vice versa) onto his back. Phew. Satisfaction that the swimming lessons taught him to save himself.

Audrey got a new camera for her birthday so she brought that along. Kate didn’t want to be left out so she brought our old camera and they turned into quite the photographers.

Simon spent the first half of the hike in the lead. His little legs were taking three or four steps to one of ours, but he did awesome. Scott ended up carrying him on his shoulders most of the way back down.

Later on we went out to dinner at Olive Garden and when the server offered to bring Audrey some birthday cake, she declined, telling them we had cheesecake at home. I guess we need to teach her the concept of doggie bags.

Happy Birthday Audrey!

Audrey and Kate started a month ago and Audrey caught onto everything really fast.  She’s on the swim team now (not a competitive swim team) and doing awesome. She’s even learned how to do the butterfly stroke.  Something about Audrey is she inherited her dad’s confidence and she believes she can do things which I really think helps.

Kate made some awesome progress right from the start and then when they started focussing more on technique with her, she started getting feisty and wanting to stick to what made her feel secure (flipping onto her back).  So, sometimes we’ll go to a lesson and the teachers will be like, “She’s totally ready for swim team.”  And then three minutes later, they’ll say, “Maybe we should do another week of lessons with her.”  Something about Kate is, she didn’t inherit her dad’s confidence. She’s more like me and second guesses herself a lot.  She’s told me that she doesn’t really want to do swim team, but she does want to continue with lessons.  She really is doing awesome though.

Simon started lessons this week.  On day one, he floated on his back on his own for an entire minute.  His teacher put her hands up to show me she wasn’t helping him and then started counting out loud.  When she got to 30, she looked up at me with big eyes.  Then at 60, she finally grabbed him to move onto something else.  Afterwards, she said, that just doesn’t happen in a first lesson.  He’s made a lot of progress in just a few days.  This video is of day three.  He knows how to make his way to the surface and flip onto his back.  He’s still working on making his way to the side on his own, but when he gets to the side, he knows he’s supposed to flip over and grab on and pull himself out.

It is a good feeling knowing that all of my kids would know what to do if they fell into the water.

Audrey and Kate started up piano lessons again today and Scott came up with this great incentive to get them to practice in preparation for these lessons.  We now have a practice jar.

Every time either one of them practice piano, or when Audrey practices violin,  they get to put in a spoonful of M&M’s.  So, after the first full jar, we made cookies.

Yes.  Simon is in great need of a more manly apron.

After the second full jar (of marshmallows instead of M&M’s) we made rice crispy treats.  And now we’re ready for M&M cookies again.  I don’t know what we’ll make next yet.  Audrey has requested  something healthy.  She and Scott are on a no sugar kick after they both had several cavities filled at the dentist this week.

A little while later, this is how I found her.

She’s told me since then that she doesn’t want to listen to the audio books of Fablehaven because the voices might be too scary.  Audrey set it aside a few times, but finished it up by the beginning of February.  She was so excited about the book and the characters, that I decided to get her the second book and finish the first one myself.  I got really into them and ended up getting the whole set for Valentines day, but Audrey is really hard on books, so I was a little selfish with my books.  She finished the second one and I bought her the third one as a St. Patrick’s day gift (No… we don’t normally give St. Patrick’s day gifts, but it was a good excuse to buy it).

On Saturday, we got to go meet Brandon Mull and get our books signed!

I think meeting him lit a fire under her because she had read two chapters before Saturday and had finished book three by Tuesday.  I know I’ve been bragging about Audrey all through this post, but it’s about to get much, much worse.  So, if you can’t stomach the bragging, you might want to stop reading now.

So, while we were in line to meet the author, Audrey was reading book three and I was reading book five.  The lady in front of us came back to Audrey and said, “How old are you?”

Audrey answered, “Seven,”

The lady said, “And you’re reading that yourself?!”

Audrey smiled and nodded.

Then later, after waiting in line for probably a half hour or so, the lady looked at me and said, “It’s just so cute watching her read.  She’s so into it.”

Wait!  There’s more.  Then, when we met Brandon Mull, he asked Audrey how old she was and she answered, “seven,” again.  He said he had a seven year old daughter too.  Then a little while later, he said, “Wait! And you’re reading these yourself?”  I was so proud of my girl and I could tell she was so flattered.  It was so fun.  We ended up buying the rest of the books for her while we were there.

On the drive to our destination, they kept asking where we were going, but my lips were sealed.  When we got to the doors of the Energy Solutions Arena, the ticket man asked if they were there to see the monster truck rally – trying to throw them off a little.  They finally figured it out when we walked in and saw Disney paraphernalia everywhere.

I got the cheapest tickets possible which equals super high seats… I’m talking so high I felt dizzy for the first 15 minutes up there.  The arena wasn’t very full, so once it started the usher told us to move closer.  We ended up being able to see everything great!

While we were visiting with him, Kate whispered to me, “I’ve never met the REAL Santa before.”

We visited Temple Square with Grandma Jean and Grandpa Gramps.

It was pretty cold, but so beautiful.

Kate was determined not to let go of Grandma and Grandpa’s hands – even when people got in the way.

We had our annual Christmas program

complete with Joseph, Mary, the donkey,

the angel,

and Baby Jesus.  Mary was nice enough to give up her spot on the donkey when Joseph got tired.

Christmas morning led to some fun surprises!

Simon spent all morning playing at that kitchen while the rest of us opened presents.

He broke away long enough to line up some new cars.

Scott and I (mostly Scott) made this awesome car town.  Scott added some Texas flare by putting a Rudy’s and an HEB on it.

After Christmas, we headed up to Brad and Chanda’s to have some fun on the wii, eat tons of good food (Brad is the best cook ever!), and get super addicted to American Ninja Warrior.  So awesome!

Then, we headed to Jodi’s to celebrate Grandma Baldwin’s birthday.

Everyone had fun with the cousins.

Audrey and Lily had some fun getting pulled on a sled behind the snowmobile.

Okay, by “nutshell”  I meant lots of things combined in one really long post.

The end.