Swimteam and Change

 

Mischievous Nicole captured on film by the swimteam photographer. They took a bunch of pics of the swimmers throughout the season so here's a bunch.

 

Nicole just finished her second year of swim team. She enjoys swimming and the other kids on the team; we enjoy the many swim practices where the kids can swim (instead of practices for soccer, etc where the siblings have to sit on the sidelines)

 

Her diving form is just as memorable as last year! We hope to get her doing the correct form by summers end, but when that buzzer went off she was in full attack mode every time. It was awesome!

 

Cheering for the team

 

The kids encourage each other a lot

 

It's fun to meet the neighborhood families

 

Ready for the first stroke already!

Having a blast at a meet

 

Our ward just split and we are the Apex Ward- a very small geographic area but still already in the overflow! This area is really growing fast! Marian and Brandon bought a house in our ward and the next day we found out the wards we splitting and we'd be in a different ward. Crazy! We're just glad they live so close and it's fun to know the people in their ward they'll be in.

 

At the meeting where they announced the split, we had already been a 3 hours of church from 1-4 and had the mtg at 6pm. Jacob snuck his blanket in the building somehow and about 15 min into the meeting was completely asleep.

Nicole wanted me to take her picture! It has been wonderful to have a full summer with her to really spend a lot of time together having fun, being bored, playing, working and just hanging out. She loves to make people laugh and has quite an imagination.

 

Michael is growing up so fast. After the bishop of our new ward came to visit, Michael said 'I don't want to go to a new world.' He thought we were leaving this planet apparently and was totally willing, just was really going to miss earth. It was pretty cute.

 

Jim and I spent time planning what fun stuff we want to do in the backyard and I can't wait to get it all set up over the years! For now we need to fix this soil drainage issue now that we don't have a forest of weeds and vines holding it all back.

 

On our way to church! Jim was set apart as the Elders Quorum President and it was a very special blessing when the stake president set him apart. Our family was constantly blessed when Jim was a seminary teacher and I can already see how this calling will give more to us than any sacrifice we give. I also feel so blessed to be married to Jim, next summer will be our 10 year anniversary. These 5 kids are everything to us, each one is such a ray of sunshine and brings so much life and character to our family. Sometimes it's a zoo, but it's a wild adventure I wouldn't trade for anything. Little Katy is three months old now! She smiles, makes little sounds, and today burped loudly in Sunday School while I was making a comment. Nice.