Joy School!

Right before we left for Utah AGAIN, Dane had his first-ever day of Joy School. Last year, while he was three, I did "preschool time" with him most days during Graham's morning nap. We did worksheets and art projects and I really enjoyed doing that stuff with him. But it was definitely time for him to have something a little more organized this year. We are doing Joy School with three of his other little friends from our ward, and he is totally thrilled about it. It's two mornings a week for 2.5 hours. I really am excited for him and for all the wonderful things about Joy School. I remember a lot of the songs from when I did Joy School (especially, "Oh, Boy, I've Got Joy") and I remember some of the art projects too! I love that this program doesn't stress academics but is more about experiences and learning about life, and giving these kids the social experiences and fun that they need. All the kids look forward to "Free Play Time" the most, and are so cute playing together. 

This was his first day of Joy School. He insisted on wearing his (empty) backpack to go to school.

They were so cute all sitting on their mats with their names on them. They sat and listened so well on their first day.

I got to teach Joy School this last week (especially since it was Dane's birthday this week and I wanted it to count for his "birthday party"). I loved seeing him and his friends playing together. Dane was definitely the craziest and most out of control of the kids... Just way too excited about having all his friends at our house. I hope he's slightly better at his friends' houses.

We had a fun unit this week about the five senses. They got to fingerpaint with chocolate pudding, make a "scent collage" with different spices, listen to lots of different sounds and talk about them, and we did some dancing and singing too. They all totally understood the five senses and could repeat them back to me on the second day. So cute!

Regular life in August

Dane was so funny one day. He came out of his room during naptime chock full of ideas for what he was planning to do for the rest of the day. "We need to go to the soccer stadium and then all the girls will play soccer and all the boys will play football! And I need to bring my nighttime friends, and they need to be stacked together..." He had everything planned out. It happened to be my first night of teaching for the semester, so Daddy came home and made all of Dane's plans come true while I went to work. They went and got Chick-fil-A for dinner, then headed to the park and played soccer, football, frisbee--and they even brought Dane's nighttime friends, which Dane put in individual tupperwares to keep them safe. 

These two boys are just too cute.

Graham has started to make funny faces whenever he sees himself in the camera.

Both boys got suckers for being nice at the dr. Graham is SO OBSESSED with suckers.

Help! I'm stuck and I can't get out!

Graham = selfie king.

Graham has started to walk around giving everyone hugs. Dane was laying on the floor and asked for a hug and Graham obliged.

I was laying on the couch trying not to throw up, and Tommy came home, grabbed the crying toddler, and heated up dinner. My hero!

These guys are buddies. Watching a show together.

Dane likes to find Daddy's glasses and pretend to be Daddy.

I got these little shelves to go inside our cabinets and turns out they're pretty much useless except for as a seat for Graham. He pulls them out whenever he can and carries them around for whenever he wants to sit down.

This face just killed me.

Grandma Leininger got Graham a new towel while she was here. I think the moment when they get out of the bath, all wrapped up in their towels, is my favorite moment of the day. They are so cute and clean-smelling and happy, every time.

Dane doing his chore, and Graham insisting on doing something too.

Graham LOVED Bubba. She's the only person other than Mama and Dada whose name he can say. He would look around for her and say, "Buh-buh!" So cute.

Dane and his buddy Ben played for about five hours one afternoon building the most epic train track at his house. His mom sent me this pic as proof of their exciting play date.

Chalk bum, don't care.

We have a little bunny that comes and hangs out under our trampoline every day. We've named him Bam-bam and Dane looks for Bam-bam every day. He has told me, "Mom, Bam-bam really loves me. And I love him." He is convinced that Bam-bam is his pet, even though we've never gotten within 15 feet of him. It's a little bit pathetic, but this is as close as we're getting to a real pet for a while.

Dane and Ben being buddies. Doing "cheers" with their milk.

After my first OB appointment, Graham and I went for some celebratory kolaches before picking Dane up at Joy School.

Sometimes we have great FHEs without doing any planning at all. We did one talking about missionaries, and all I did was print out these little nametags. Dane wanted to save his nametag for the rest of the week.

After we watched a bunch of Olympics, Dane wanted to do some races of his own. He and Tommy made medals and then we went on a bike race around our neighborhood. Dane won, but he insisted on getting the bronze medal.

The official medal ceremony after the race.

While Jackie was here, we got to go to the temple together! This was literally the first time we'd gone to the Dallas temple together since we moved here. We've been going separately the whole time we've lived here because getting a babysitter with the time required for the temple/dinner, etc. is just too hard. We did sealings and it was really nice.

Then a week later we went on another date to celebrate our seventh anniversary!! We went and got pedicures--Tommy totally enjoyed it.

Getting into the spirit of the pedicure, reading the gossip mags like you're supposed to.

And then we went and saw the new Star Trek movie with some free movie vouchers. Awesome date night.

On our actual anniversary, we all went out to lunch at La Madeleine. It was really good. Lunch with the kids is not quite the same as a lunch date, but still fun to do something out of the ordinary routine to celebrate. (Also a bummer that I went home and threw it all up again. Wah wahh.) 

So glad to be past the heat of August!

Leiningers in Texas!

Right after we got back to Texas, we had most of the party follow us from Utah to here. It actually ended up being a huge blessing because my backpack was left behind at the Leininger household--with my wallet, phone, diapers, everything I needed to get on and survive the plane flight. Luckily x a billion, the airport has a secret security policy that if it's your return flight and you don't have your ID, they can still let you on the plane after they grill you with lots of questions to establish your identity. And then the Leiningers just brought my backpack with them a few hours later when they flew out here! It was the BEST time to leave your backpack at home if you're going to do that... which I never will again because I think I lost five years off my life just when I realized it wasn't there.

The reason why everyone came out to Texas was because Kurt is starting medical school here, in Dallas! He was moving out here, so Troy, Sarah, and Kristen road-tripped down with him, and Greg, Jackie and Kenzie flew out as well. They wanted to help him with the move, see his place, and hang out with us too a little bit as well. Troy also wanted to re-visit his mission in McAllen, Texas, with the whole gang (except us. We weren't going to drive eight hours with our kids in the car.). So they spent a few days doing that, and then a few days with us doing whatever we could when we didn't melt in the Texas summer heat.

Five Leiningers together.

Graham was getting into giving hugs to people.

We went to Top Golf and Dane showed off his excellent form.

Most everyone went to a FC Dallas soccer game together. Dane was super thrilled to be there. (I didn't even try to bring Graham.)

Both boys were thrilled to have uncles willing to jump on the trampoline with them.

Giving Grandpa hugs.

We brought them swimming at our Fun Club pool and they were all duly impressed.

Family Pizza Movie Night with everyone, before turning on the Olympics Opening Ceremonies.

Everyone spent a lot of time reading together. (No kidding--Dane and Graham were so excited to see their books, and to have some extra readers around the house, that they were asking people to read to them every five seconds.)

A look into Sarah and Troy's future...

We went to the George W. Bush Library one morning. Dane and Graham were super patriotic.

I'd vote for him.

They had a microphone and a place you could give a speech, and both boys were completely obsessed with talking into the microphone. Graham, who doesn't normally babble at all (he just screeches when he wants something), kept putting his mouth right up to/onto the mic and talking like he was just having a normal conversation. It was very funny. Even funnier when the soft part of the mic came away in his mouth. That is so sanitary.

He would make a great president.

Building forts with Auntie Kenzie.

After everyone else had to go home, we got to have Kenzie and Grandma stay for a few more days. It was so helpful because I was in the worst throes of morning sickness and Jackie did all the dishes and laundry and cleaning so I didn't have to do anything. They are the best types of visitors to have.

The last day they were here we went down into Dallas and went to the top of the Reunion Tower in downtown. We also went to the JFK memorial and the famous cattle drive statue in downtown, but those pictures are still on the camera and it's too much work to go find them. It was a fun morning and it was good for us to do because we'd never done any of those very quintessential Dallas things.

Awesome classy picture at the Reunion Tower.