Last Week of June 2017

It was our first BUSY week of summer.  Ben had his first Cub Scout Day Camp.  He LOVES scouts.  It cracks me up how much.  He worries about if we will be late or he will miss it, and this boy doesn't normally get excited about much more than video games, so I can't help but think he's leaders (a husband/wife team, the Sanders) must be doing a great job.  He did great at being away all day and having the time of his life, didn't get much sunburn at all, and, as you can see, thought mom trying to document the momentous occasion with glaring morning sunlight seering his baby blues was not cool.

 I keep telling him he is the middle child like his Aunt Ja and he will be able to handle anything; perfectly balanced, able to fit in with all sorts of situations and people, an accomplish anything he'll set his mind to human being, and so far it's true.

This here's, um well, I don't know that Lucas names his cars, but Lucas has had this car since we were pregnant with Matt, so over 11 years.

 I remember test driving it (note the 2 doors) with Lily riding in a carseat in the back with her pregnant mom (me) and Lucas and the car salesman in the front.  Lucas got it detailed this week in order to sell it (he bought a new car at the end of April) and it was gone in 2 days.  Bam!  Good car but the V6 did make me a little overexcited in my accelerating maneuvers, I'll admit.  Her sunroof will be missed, but 4 doors, newer and better gas mileage just made sense.

Below we have Matt, my victim (or helper) for a Family Home Evening lesson.  One of my biggest desires is for my children to always be strong in the knowledge that God loves them, the Savior died for them and now lives (meaning his Gospel is true), and that we have modern-day guidance from a living prophet, not to mention the ability to pray and receive answers any time we are willing to put forth the effort.  I see some friends of ours losing their faith and some of them appearing quite lost and unhappy.  I don't want that for my children.  I want them to always feel loved, always have the ability to access power from heaven and to know what they need to be doing personally whenever they desire to.  I want to be contributing members in families, communities, society, church, etc., and to never get so self-centered that all they care about and all they see is the person in the mirror...So for our lesson we talked about how to stay spiritually strong, and every time someone gave a way, like serving others, saying we're sorry, etc., I gave Matt some more muscles.  It was pretty giggle inducing but hopefully got the point across.

Daphne started swim lessons this week.  The last time I will have a child take their first swim lesson.  Sniff, sniff.  Here are Daphne and Shawn being silly in the back of the van afterwards.

 And here is Daphne enjoying her Starburst from her swim teacher for trying everything.  She LOVES her teacher, LOVES going to lessons but thinks her head under water is totally bogus.  Hopefully she loves it more this 2nd and final week.

She is so squishably, perfectly wonderfully adorable.  I get the squeeze the cute kitten tight feeling when I look at her way too often (if you think this sounds weird just look it up, scientifically proven, psychologically studied fact).

And speaking of squishable adorableness, a short clip to remember her loveliness forever.