Ashton's Birthday

 Better late than never, right?  My little guy turned SIX on the 7th!  I can hardly believe it, it still seems like only yesterday I was in the hospital with him missing out on Lexie's first day of kindergarten.  But now it is him that is off to school.  He has waited so long to be able to go to school.  

This was our first birthday celebration in Minnesota and it was a little different not having tons of family around.  But still, Ashton had a great day.  We didn't do too much, he was off school because it was kindergarten transition days, but Lexie was at school and Jake had to work so the day was pretty quiet.  I made him wait until everyone was home to open his presents and he thought that was pretty mean of me.  His new thing has been legos since our trip to the lego store. So getting some new sets for his birthday was a high priority.   

And he opened them with much fanfare, in true Ashton fashion.

Jake found this cute baseball theme cake in a super small size which worked out great considering there were only five of us to eat it.

Ashton go to pick what was for dinner and he picked his favorite.  "Shrimp on a bob"  which translates to BBQ'ed shrimp kabobs.  We also had inside out cheeseburgers, which he really likes also.

I think he had a fun day, don't you.

Behind, I am so behind

So many things have happened in the last few weeks, and I haven't made the time to blog about them.  First, the first day of school was last Tuesday.  Lexie started her first day of 6th grade, she is an official middle schooler.  I'm still not sure how I feel about that, back in Utah she would have still been in elementary school for this last year and that seems easier, less scary, safer.  

And because we live too close to the school she has to ride her bike until it gets too cold for that and then, lucky me I will be driving her.  We must live right on the edge of the boundary because it is 1 1/2 miles to the school, too far to walk.  She was excited for school to start, but nervous because she doesn't know anybody.  I was hoping that she could find friends at church, but all the kids that are her age in church are home schooled or live in Wisconsin. I never thought any of my kids would ever have to be "the only member of the church in my grade"  but Lexie is.  I know that she will be fine, but this first little while is going to be hard.

Ashton's school starts later so after Lexie left it was time to get Ashton ready and off on the bus.  I was a little nervous for the little guy, but he seemed to do fine.  He looks nervous in this picture, but he never seemed nervous.  This was my first experience getting a kindergartener off on the bus for their first day of school.  I was in the hospital after just having this little guy on Lexie's first day of kindergarten.  

He climbed right on the bus without looking back and was off for his first day. 

 Abbie wanted her picture taken too, she was pretty sad that she didn't get to go to school.  We had already talked earlier this year that she would be doing a preschool co-op in Herriman with other kids her age so now that we can't do that she is feeling pretty picked on in the school department.  We bought her a lunch box "just like the big kids for school" and she insisted that she needed a lunch also for the first day.  She had so much fun eating her lunch out of her lunch box, that it was totally worth it.

First day's of school are pretty hard on kids and you expect them to come home tired, right?  How 'bout the little sister left behind?  Think she had a rough "first day of school"?

(She rarely takes naps anymore, especially not in the middle of the afternoon)

Next up, Ashton's birthday...

Mall of America

Last Saturday we drove to the Twin Cities and went to the Mall of America.  That place is HUGE!  We explored some and had lunch, at Bubba Gump's Shrimp Company.  It was Ashton's choice he loves shrimp.  The restaurant is all from the movie Forrest Gump, it is kinda cheesy but the food was really good.  

 Waiting for food....

 Jake's food, we got stuff that we could share pretty easy and mostly shrimp.  All of it was really good.

 My food, it was really a appetizer platter, but we got to try more kinds of shrimp that way.

After lunch we went to the Lego store.  Ashton couldn't decide what set he wanted most. 

This set was on display in the window, all the Harry Potter stuff was really cool.

The kids found Woody and wanted a picture (well, maybe it was Mom that wanted the picture.)  Ashton was upset because he lost his boat from Bubba Gumps.  It was what his food had come in.  See Lexie's in her hand in the picture, that one didn't make it out of the mall either.

They had all of these statues made from Lego's on the top of the store, that was amazing.  

Also in the Mall of America is this amusement park.  We didn't go on any rides that day because I was thinking there were only a couple of rides and we could do them in a few minutes and be done, but when we got there it was a big park and you could spend most of day there and have a blast, so we decided to wait and plan a day when we could spend more time.

I am still shocked at how big the mall was, we didn't see even half of the mall and we were there for the better part of a day.  They also have a theater and an aquarium that we want to go back for.  Good thing it's not that far away from where we live.