Christmas Day

Halloween!!

This year for Halloween, we had two little kitties running around trick-or-treating.

Sophie is like Dave, in that she is not motivated very much by sugar. Sabrina, on the other hand, takes after me. She couldn't stop herself from devouring everything in her candy bucket!

Luckily, the Halloween Witch visits our house. We leave our candy out on the doorstep and the witch takes it and leaves something else in it's place.

Sabrina, though, has not stopped talking about candy. Or ghosts. I think she loves to "see" ghosts. There are some in our garage, and sometimes in her bedroom. That's what she tells us anyway.

By the way, please check out my new website Lindsey Joslin Photography if you haven't already!

100 Books

Sophie has read 100 books since the beginning of the school year! She is now reading words like "shore" and "sail" (she read a book about the beach recently, you can tell by the words)!

Way to go, Sophie! You have come a long way in the past 3 months!

Fun at Schnepf Farms!

This year, we went to Schnepf Farms for some festive pumpkin patch fun! This place was really great. It had everything.

 Here is Dave off-roading through the corn maze and Sophie leading the way!

Some of the paths were definitely NOT stroller friendly.

 Sabrina LOVED the jumping pillow.

 This is the girls' first experience with cotton candy. It had to be documented.

Sabrina's 2 year old pictures

So, I had a 2 year old portrait session with Sabrina around her birthday, but I never posted them because it took me a while to start editing them. And I didn't really like them anyway.

So here are a few from that session and a few others to document her transition to 2.

Also, I find it very ironic that though these photos are from four different days, Sabrina is wearing the SAME shirt in most of these photos. We really like that shirt.

Facts of a 2 year old

Sabrina, you are a very fun girl. Here are a few facts about yourself to prove it.

Anytime I sit to play at the piano, you touch my hands and say "peeze!" (please) and I know that to mean "Please play 'Phantom of the Opera' so I can dance around!" That is pretty much the only piano song I am aloud to play when you are in the house.

One of the first words out of your mouth was singing "Let it go!" over and over, especially right when you would wake up. Actually, you still do that every morning. Even now, when you hear Frozen's "Let It Go" on our Grooveshark playlist you have me put on Daddy's old superhero cape around your shoulders and run around singing "Let it go! Let it go!"--but only during the chorus. For the rest of the song, you just stand around waiting until the "good part" starts again. But my favorite part to hear you sing is the last big note Elsa holds out in "Let the storm rage ONNNNNN!!!" You love to sing that big note and it is always adorably off-key.

While we're talking about music, I need to mention a few more of your favorite children's songs. You love "The Wheels on the Bus" and "Hot Potato" from The Wiggles. Those always put you in a good mood.

Sabrina, you only have to wake up each morning, and your hair is perfectly styled and volumized. See?

You are not very good at swallowing your food. There have been several instances where I have laid you down in your crib shortly after lunch only to find your cheeks stuffed with half-chewed leftovers.

Some children explore objects by sticking them in their mouths (such as Sophie did), however you explore objects by throwing them. Specifically, at Mommy's head. In fact, you ALWAYS throw it right above my left eyebrow. You have really good aim, and it hurts. A lot.

If I happen to tell you "I'm going potty," you take that as an invitation for a bathroom party. I said those every words a few days ago and you responded with "Otay!! Potty!!!!" and ran down the hallway to the bathroom where you sat on the toilet fully dressed, threw TP in the bowl, then flushed it down saying "Bye, bye!"

First Day of Kindergarten

Here is Sophie on her very first day of Kindergarten. As a mom, I didn't get too upset dropping off my very first kindergartner at school, but Sabrina was soooo sad when Sophie got out of the car and didn't come back!

We chose to put Sophie in Pomeroy's Montessori program. It is a traditional public school, but also has a separate Montessori program. It attracts families all over the valley. Luckily, it isn't too far for us. I agonized for months what kind of school to send her too, but now that we've been in school for a few weeks I couldn't be happier with our decision to send her there. I'm not going to lie, those first couple of days were really hard on Sophie emotionally but she has embraced her school and loves it.

She looks forward to attending her class every day. Her reading skills have blown me away. Within the first week, I noticed a huge change in her willingness and ability to read. And even tonight while reading scriptures she was tackling longer words that would normally intimidate her. She still reads very slowly but I have seen great progress. I have no idea what her teacher is doing, but it is working!

I asked Sophie what her favorite part of school was, and true to an elementary student, she replied, "Lunch and playing at the park [or playground]."

Here is a little comparison of Montessori vs Traditional schools, if interested.

Faces II.

 Sophie: Age 5

Sabrina: Nearly 2

5 kids

Dave and I don't know how many kids we want. The ideal number is changing year after year. A few weeks ago, however, we tried out five kids: Sophie, Sabrina and their three cousins Stephanie, Kate, and Megan. To say Sophie loved having some girl cousins around everyday would be an understatement. Our days are quite less eventful now that they are gone.

I learned a few things myself about having five kids in one house. Namely, these:
1. We would need to make a lot more money to feed 5 hungry kids on a gluten free diet. One loaf of GF bread=1 meal.
2. I would need to make a lot more food. Bleh.
3. Five kids under one roof is actually much easier than two kids. They entertain each other.
4. Clean ups can happen more quickly when their are more kids to do it.... If they do it.

The first day they arrived, all three of the Hancock girls found something in Sophie's closet that fit them and they went around wearing her clothes. Little Megan especially loved wearing dress after dress of Sophie's. 

Our days were spent in lots of water environments, dancing to some awesome musics, and playing at some fantastic parks. 

We had some definite fun.

Music for you.

I have been meaning to put down some of my music in notated form, and I am finally getting around to it.
Here are a couple I wrote several years ago. Feel free to play around with them if you so desire!

This one is nameless. If you have an idea for a title please let me know!
Please enjoy this high definition, high quality recording!

Here is The Memory Reel, a simple lullaby-esque song:





I have more in the works, so check back for more in the future!

Kids being kids.

I was going to title this post as "Nothing Special," but decided that that wouldn't be very accurate. You see, these people are special to me! Maybe nothing significant was happening at this moment but we were having some fun!

Sabrina really likes to play tee-ball all by herself.

As you can see, she was very pleased with herself when she hit the ball!

And everyone loves a ball of soccer, right!?

 Everyone had to get head shots AKA lie down and get "tied up" by the pirates...

 

And this picture pretty much sums up Dave's life right here:

I know. I love this photo too.

That is all.

Thanks to the Dave.

I bought a new camera.

It's pretty awesome.

I am super stoked.

Conference Weekend

For some reason, Sophie really looks forward to General Conference weekend every 6 months. It probably has something to do with eating popcorn and delicious sweet breads. I remember watching conference in the back of the Stake Center that was really far away and we had to sit on hard metal chairs. It wasn't so fun for a kid, and I defently know I didn't look forward to it. But Conference has become a kind of holiday in the Mormon world.

We have developed a few family traditions for each General Conference weekend. They include: baked goods, delicious breakfasts, healthy and not-so-healthy snack foods, and spending lots of family time outdoors in between sessions. Another tradition that has developed is photographing our family day together. So here is our Conference Day in the Life of the Joslins! Photos by Dave, Lindsey, and Sophie.

Sunday began with Sophie hanging out on our bed and Sabrina getting her diaper changed by her dad.

Then Sophie helped me slice some strawberries.

Gluten Free Banana Bread!

Watching Conf.

Checking our muscles.

Got airplane rides. Or something.

Then Sophie took a selfie in her mirror...

 and had me pose for a few shots.

We did some silly ones outside then Sophie said, "Let's do some nice ones inside." She took the following picture and said, "That one is so beautiful. I want to hang it on my wall!"

Yeah. I look a-mazing..... maybe not so much. :) 

But if she wants a photo of her mom on her wall she can have it!

Later, we went to Discovery Park for a picnic.

  

And we had a great view of the Gilbert Temple.