End of Summer

Hooray for Emma, who found my camara in the stroller compartment from when I took pictures on the first day of school... it has been missing for 2 and a half weeks!! Now I can post pictures...

My sweet baby below who is sleeping AND actually in a basinet and not my arms! She sleeps pretty well at night too, but ofcourse that is if she's in bed with me in my arms... I am loved!

Look at the tender moment below...

...so I walk in the family room to the above scene, Logan just laying on the couch staring at his new baby sister when she was like a week old... After laying there a while he says to me:

Logan: "Mom, do you think Sophie is cutest when she is asleep or awake"

Cherryl: "I think she is cute when she is asleep and awake"

Logan: "I think she is cutest when she is sleeping"

Then he just kept on laying there staring at her. It was such a sweet moment. It has been so tender to see how much all the kids love their new baby sister!

And below is my youngest and oldest daughters... Ashlin is trying to calm a crying Sophie. Ashlin's getting pretty good at the bouncing and "sh"-ing to get the baby happy... I might even say sometimes better then the dad has it down...

must be a gender thing!

I think this picture captures pretty much how I feel...
happy, but don't I look really tired too?

And I think this picture pretty much sums up how Sophie feels:

tired, but happy because she's asleep with me.

So when Sophie was just 2 and a half weeks old Bruce's family had a family reunion in Utah. I thought it was a little much for a new baby, so he took the older 4 kids and left Lily, Sophie and I home for 4 days...

Here are some photos Bruce took of their stay at the cabin with the Vernons:
The boy cousins all slept outside in a tent
You notice the pink shirt Dallin is wearing above. Him and Ashlin ran in the 5k in Monticello and the free t-shirts they got said, "tough enough to wear pink". Dallin called me after the race to tell me he got first place for his age group... I was like, WOW, good job!! Then he told me he was the only one in his age group... ha ha, but he still got a prize!

Ashlin is WAY excited about the family games above!

So below is Lily and I back at home. While the older kids were gone I was looking forward to some much needed rest. Big problem... Lily doesn't nap anymore. But one afternoon I was nursing Sophie and Lily was playing alone in the playroom. I had planned on laying Sophie down then going to snuggle and read with Lily for some one on one time. But when I layed Sophie down someone called, and shame on me for answering the phone, but I did, and talked too long, and when I came out to the playroom this is what I found:

Poor Lily had gotten a pillow and blanket and her backpack of toys and quietly put herself to sleep. It actually broke my heart, she was so sweet laying there alone in the play room. I felt so bad I answered that phone!! She was so patient and sweet waiting for me... :( But since both my girls were sleeping, I went and had myself a nap too!

So one family tradition we have is "THE LIST". Every summer, the monday night before summer starts, we make a to-do list of all the fun things we want to do that summer. Then we mark it off as we go. It was especially challenging this summer, since we had our 6th baby in the middle of it... but don't you worry, my kids still did plenty of fun things!

The week before school started, we had a few things left on our list, one of which was a BAKING PARTY, and we had new neighbors move in with kids my kids ages.... so my kids made invitations and we went next door and invited them over for a pie baking party!

Here are the boys making their pies:
And here are the girls:
They got to choose any kind of pie they wanted for their mini-take home pies:
chocolate cream, cherry, blueberry, banana cream, or apple

Everyone and their finished pies:

And then a few days later, since we had leftover pie stuff... and since it was sunday, and I love a little dessert on a sunday, but I was busy nursing... I informed Ashlin she was going to have her own pie party.... and Ashlin made us a chocolate cream pie
ALL BY HERSELF!

She was very proud of herself and actually asked me to put her on my blog! She made the pie crust, rolled it out, formed the pie, made the filling and made the chocolate shaving curls for the top all herself! And it was YUMMY! (and actually, she sewed the apron herself too)
Go Ashlin!