Tonight, as the kids got ready for bed, Simon slipped on a recently unearthed pair of his brothers "gorilla slippers". He then chose a tiny camping coffee mug to get water to wash down his vitamin. Each of us who caught a glimpse of him had to snicker. Then, big brother, Keith, thought he looked like a Dad and needed a robe. This, as you can tell, required a photo! He even posed taking a sip in the side of his mouth so he could still see the camera! I love heading to bed with a good laugh :)! It is such fun to watch my kids' humor develop!

Kara and Simon, realizing their days together, just the two of them, are drawing to a close, played and played today! One adventure involved playing football. We tried to encourage Simon to make the "tough guy" face, but it looks like his favorite cheerleader understood better how to intimidate the opponent. Kara even enlisted his "muscles" to help her move her mat like she saw the cheerleaders do in FL at cousin Derek's game. We plan on attending the local high school football game tomorrow night! It was 95 degrees today, here, and is suppose to be 66 tomorrow (cool football weather, sounds like :)!

Wednesday was the first day of school for Keith and Jacob. They were all set and have enjoyed getting into the groove of their new teachers. Kara had an open house to meet her teachers and will go Friday for her first full day (they alternate half the class every other day until September 3rd). Kim started school today and loved filling her binder with all her supplies and filling in her planner. The high school is just a block from Keith, Jacob, and Kara's, so she'll walk to the playground to meet them after school.
And girl prep for first day of school - TONS different than boy prep. Kim and Kara picked "pretty" outfits (Kara even wanted her Easter dress :), requested multiple french braids, organized all their things . . . Keith and Jacob threw on clothes, partly combed their new haircuts, ate breakfast (which spilled on one pair of shorts Mom had put out to wear which were then replaced by the athletic fare preferred by 9 yr old boys :) and headed out the door.
Oh, what fun!

On Tuesday night, we took a little field trip to the school playground after a busy day of cleaning the garage, shed, and breezeway. We had fun "practicing" playing at the little ones' school. I caught Jacob in a rare moment of stillness to capture a picture for Kim. Most of the time, he and Jeff played some elaborate dodgeball game! Kara posed for a picture. You can see her classroom windows behind her (first group beside the blue doors). Her teacher and her family even visited the playground toward the end of our play time. They just live a couple of blocks away.

The Super Sunday track . . . We're getting back into the routine of relaxin' on Sunday afternoon :)! Daddy and Simon (and a few other random helpers) had fun putting all this together. He enjoyed a new lumber station, especially (thanks Garrett)! It's always much more fun when Dad can help build . . . all the tracks actually connect!

Last night the long awaited backyard campout occurred at the Ort house! We made our dinner and smores on the fire pit. Asa, our neighbor, came over to enjoy dessert with us. The kids (minus Simon who came inside for his "campout") slept super in the tent in the backyard. This morning they had breakfast outside and are planning on playing all day in the tent. We'll take a little break to go hike a nearby mountain, but they want to come home and change back into pjs and play more in the tent :). They are all going by their middle names today as part of their fun.. Christina, Lin, Lawrence, Corbitt, and Jeffrey are having loads of fun :)!

We've now moved back home from camp and are enjoying getting back into the swing of home routines. Hopefully, I'll be back into "blogging" as I set up my fall schedule :)!
Simon had a sport themed birthday party the week after his birthday (July 28th :). Jacob went to bed the night before the party saying it felt like Christmas he was so excited! They woke up and helped set up game stations in the yard - basketball, soccer, football, baseball - all kinds of fun. Each of the big kids led one of these stations. Simon had been asking for weeks for a "rainbow" cake like Boden's, so Mrs. Jesica slaved over the mixing bowls and delivered 2 cakes with colorful layers iced white. We had fun turning them into balls - it turned out cool that the baseball had red, orange, and yellow layers and the blue soccer ball had blue, green, and gray layers . . . They matched without us even knowing what colors were hiding inside! He's had fun playing with all his birthday gifts - lots of sports gear, instruments, Woody/Buzz notebook, sprinkler, flashlight, craft sets, learning robot, . . .!