Crazy Colorado Weather

It's the middle of August and we got a huge hail/rain storm in the evening Tuesday.   For the past month we've been getting a daily rain storm in the late afternoon.  Now I'm not complaining because these storms have saved our new grass in the backyard and eased our water bill.  :)  

At least it rains for 30 minutes -1 hour and then it's sunshine before and after.   I like that a lot better than grey all day.  It was fun to watch this storm....the kids, when they were watching it on the porch, kept saying 'Holy cow!'   The hail was everywhere.  And the road was a river!

Ice/Hail coming down the slide.

 Our neighbors backyard was white.  

 The full rainbow after the storm.

Gotta love Colorado!!

Happy Birthday Connor!

Happy Birthday 

Connor Benjamin Booth!

Connor turned 5 years old today!!!  Connor is a lot of fun and is a GREAT big brother.   He loves his sisters, Briella and Regan.  I think he loves that Briella is getting older and plays with him a lot more than she used to so he has a playmate now.  He loves making Regan smile and coo!  He can ALWAYS get her to smile, it's really cute.  :)  

Connor is in kindergarten and loves school!  If you read my previous post you would understand.  :)  Right now he loves Star Wars legos, anything superhero related (Spiderman, Captain America) and helping/playing outside.  I asked him 23 questions about himself the other day, check out his answers.  :)  (It's the same questions I'm doing every year.  I ask them the same questions starting when they are 3 yrs old.  It's fun to see how their answers change.)

(I think if you click on it you can zoom in better to see the questions and answers)

The last question.......I'm not sure where that answer came from.  I even tried to clarify, "Did you mean Air Force like daddy?"  He said "Nope.  The army."  :)

For his birthday we let him choose what he wanted to do.  In the morning we made cupcakes to share with his class in the afternoon at school.  We went out to lunch at Wendy's.  Then for dinner he wanted to have pizza and watch a movie.  We watched 'The Great Mouse Detective" while picnicking in the family room.  :)  Afterwards presents and cake and ice cream!    His birthday cake was simple again but it looked cool.  :)

Our Birthday Boy!!!  

He got a birthday crown at school.

 Our dinner and leftover cupcakes from his class.

 Connor and Briella while they watch the movie.

 Present time!

 I think this was when he opened the card from Matt's parents and it had money in it.  He wanted some money for his birthday so he could pick out the Star Wars Legos he wanted. :)

 Cool card from Gma Crosland.

 Briella really liked one of the presents my parents sent.  They light up!  It's cool!

 Spiderman Cake!   

Apparently I used a little too much blue food color in the icing!  :)

Happy Birthday Connor!!

We love you lots!!

Connor's first day of school!!

Connor's in Kindergarten!!!   He's been so excited to get back into school.  He LOVED his preschool in Ohio (and we LOVED it too, we miss it lots!!  Especially his teacher.) so he's been itching to get back into a routine and back to learning.   Let me tell you a little bit about him......Connor LOVES to read.  He picked up on his letters, sight words, sounds, etc so quickly in preschool and before we moved he was reading all different kinds of books.   He especially loves science books and learning about Astronomy and the human body - it's cool!  He shares with me all kinds of random facts that sometimes I know and many times I don't know.  He's been telling us lately, 'My mind is a very powerful thing!"  - Yes it is!  

A couple weeks ago we were playing in the basement and he was looking through the books and came upon the Magic Tree House series.  It's a beginner chapter book series where 2 kids have lots of adventures via their magic tree house.   He picked up one of the books and sat down and began to read it out loud.   He kept on reading until dinner and was on chapter 5!  Whoa!   Needless to say, I was surprised.  He doesn't know every word but most of them and he understands what is going on in the book.  He finished that one 2 days later.  He loves the books!

For school this year we decided to put him in a Charter School, Pikes Peak School of Expeditionary Learning (PPSEL).  It's not to far from our house and based on our research and talking with lots of other parents, we hope he will be challenged and they will adapt to his needs and where he is scholastically.   He only does half days (PM) which he wanted to go full day and is ready, but we think this school will be a good fit and in the long run we're glad he's home a little bit longer.  (He's a big help to me!)

Here's his first day of school!

 Briella had to be in the pic too!

Everyday when we drop Connor off for school she asks if she can go to school too.  So cute!!  I think she really just wants to go because they have a big playground (we pass by it each day.).

Connor the Kindergartener!!!!  :)

Pics of our growing cute girl, Regan

Here are some recent pics of Regan.   AKA - Regi baby!   That's what we usually call her.  She's getting so big and so fun!  We can get her to belly laugh often, smile all the time and she's getting a lot stronger.  Maybe she'll be rolling over soon.  We love her!!

We came home from church one Sunday and put her in her bouncer.  By the end of dinner she was asleep like this.  So cute!!   What a reverent child we have!  Haha! :)

3 months old  (July)

 4 months old (August)

Hanging out with her brother and sister!  :)  Silly kids!

End of Summer fun!

This summer we've done a few things, not much though.  Honestly, we're just trying to keep up with the house and having 3 kids - we definitely feel out numbered.  :)

T-Ball - Blue Jays

Connor wanted to try t-ball this summer.  He had practices every Tuesday evening and games on Saturdays.  If you ask Connor, "What was the best part of t-ball?"  He'll say, "That Daddy was my coach!"  Yup, Matt was the coach of Connor's team of 3 & 4 year olds.  He'll tell you he doesn't know much about baseball in general but he learned and did a great job.  One mom told me she was watching the other coaches one game and felt that we have the best coach.  She said she really appreciated Matt coaching, especially all his patience with the kids.   I agree!!!  He did a great job and I think he had fun too.  They also got to choose their team name.  Their team color was blue but they got to pick the mascot.  Matt and Connor really wanted the 'Blue Jayhawks' but they got out voted.  :(

This is one of my favorite pics!  Matt and Connor in action.

 Connor playing first base.

 Connor swinging away!

 End of the game team chant.

Sandberg Family Reunion

At the end of July we ventured to Southern Utah for Matt's mom's family reunion.  It was right by Zion National Park.  We drove halfway to Matt's sister, Kenzi's, house and stayed the night and then we caravan-ed the rest of the way.  It was a lot of fun!   Kenzi and Todd's kids, Kailey and Cope, get a long great with our kids so the trip was a lot better.  On the way, after lunch one day, we put Briella in their car with Cope and Kailey came in our car with Connor.  Connor had a lot more fun and Briella got a nap!!  It was awesome!!  We think Kenzi and Todd have a magic car because she never sleeps in our car for us.  We did the same thing on the way back.  :)  

This was a short intermission in our drive through the mountains of Colorado on our way to Kenzi's house.

We were in 'free range' country and we came upon some cows being herded back to where they were suppose to be.

 I've never seen this before, it was really neat!.......I know I'm totally a city girl!

We kept telling Connor and Briella, "Look those are real cowboys!"  

I think I was the most excited about all this.  :)

 We were probably only stopped for 15 min-ish.  Not too long.  But I was getting a little worried that one of the cows would run into our car as we passed by.  No worries, everything was fine.  :)

 We got to the reunion Thursday afternoon.  Said "hi' to everyone, had dinner and then went to bed.  Friday was a fun filled day with lots of activities and family time.  

 Connor enjoying the giant slip n slide at the reunion.  It was pretty awesome!

 Good form!!  :)

Right before dinner on Friday, they launched rockets.  Each family made a rocket to launch.  Below, is a bunch of the kids climbing over the fence chasing after one of the rockets. 

 Briella watching eagerly.

 There's one of the rockets. They were pretty big.  Connor's ready to run. 

 (Left to right)  Hyrum, Todd, Kenzi, Kasey, Matt's mom - Grandma Booth

 Matt's mom (left) and Grandpa and Grandma Sandberg (her parents) next to her in the back.  

They are so cute!

Matt's cousin Katie took some newer family pics for us.  She did an AWESOME job!

Summer has been fun but as always, it goes by too fast!