First Day of School 2009

We've survived another first day of school! Katie is entering 7th Grade this year and Emily is the big fish in the little pond in 5th Grade! It's hard to believe that when this year is done we will have been at our Elementary School for 8 years. It will be hard to move on as we love and adore everyone there!

Katie has to get up early this year at 6:00 am. She has to be at the bus stop at 6:55 am!! She is looking so grown up in her favorite color of blue!

Here is Miss Emily ~ Pretty in Pink as usual!

I wish that I had her nice skinny legs!!

This is Emily's teacher this year ~ Mrs. Cornelsen.
And last but not least (thanks to Cheryl's picture taking expertise!), here is Gord on his way to school! Cheryl drove Gord to go get his rental car so that he could make his way to his first day of school at the Academy!
Here's to a great time at school for all of the Clarkenhoven's and I'm not the least bit jealous (is that bad?).

August.....phew!

I apologize! It's been over a month since I've Blogged but due to the events of this month I'm hoping that you'll forgive me! I'm actually going to start out in late July so bear with me.

It is with mixed emotions that I say goodbye to a good friend. We traded in my Car for a new to us Van. My feelings are mixed because I really did like driving my car but I really like the flexibility of the Van. My kids are actually able to each have a friend in the car now!!! The van is a year older than my car but only had 40,000 miles on it which is much less than my car.As many of you know my Dad had been pretty sick over the last year and a half or so. He had been in and out of the hospital many times over this period. This last time he entered the hospital on May 4 and the kids and I were able to get up to visit him about once a week. This picture was taken on July 11th and I like it because my Dad was having a good day and everyone is happy.

Less than a month later, on August 5th, my Dad lost his battle to Diabetes. This is the picture that I used in his Obituary and it was taken on February 15 of this year while my brother was here from Iraq visiting. He was very happy to have been able to see my brother.

Although I am sad that he is gone, I am comforted in the fact that he is at peace and no longer in pain. He had had a few amputations just before he died and battled many infections.

RIP Dad

Now for happier times. The day after my Dad's service we headed up North to Kamloops. A celebration for my Mother and Father-in-law's 50th Wedding Anniversary had been planned long before.

My sister-in-law, Pat, made a trail of rose petals down her stairs leading to.......

The honeymoon suite!!! (or better known as the love shack!!)

Pat and the kids also made some signs for them!Here's the happy couple!!! Gord's Mom and Dad.
We ate so much food that day!! Here's just a sampling of the appetizers!
And the day was not without excitement! Emily had been sitting on my lap and I had shooed her along when her hand hit Auntie Pat's red wine and sent it flying all over this gal's WHITE pants. She was a really great sport and Pat had another pair of white pants for her to wear and she had this pair washed and dried with no stains before she left!!The next week was Fair week! My kids love riding the rides! This was the first year that we actually let them wander a little bit on their own (with mom and dad checking in frequently!)
I think that my kids' favorite ride is the glider! It was getting dark so it was hard to get non-blurry pictures!
I like this one because the lights are starting to sparkle in the dark!I love this one because it shows the motion!!!
Next up was the Typhoon! Here's the kids standing in line waiting.
The Typhoon goes all the way around but both kids braved it and ended up having a good time!Next was the Tornado!I got a couple of cool pics of the Ferris Wheel.
On August 19th, Emily and her friends decided to have a Lemonade stand. I was really impressed when they decided to donate their earnings to the St. Jude's Children's Hospital. Janet's sister works for a bank so she took the proceeds in and had a check made out to the charity and sent it off!!

My Aunt Deb and Uncle Rick (my Dad's brother and sister) helped me out tremendously in the days following my Dad's death and we had a family get together a couple of weekends ago. I like this picture of my Aunt because you can see all of the happenings in her glasses!

My Uncle Rick has a very nice home and has entertained us a couple of times this summer. He has an in ground pool and the kids love coming for a swim!

Finally, this past weekend, my friend Monica invited us to see a movie in an outdoor theatre in White Rock. There were tons of people there and many more behind us in this picture. People just bring their lawn chairs and they block of a city street and play movies during the summer. We saw Mama Mia this time and we had fun singing to the music.

Here's to September!! The kids start school tomorrow and I'm sure that I'll be back soon with some first day of school pictures!

Am I caught up yet?

I know, I know, it's been a bit since I've posted. I'm not 100% sure why but I guess it doesn't matter since I'm getting around to it now!! :o) That's my theory anyways!

I know that most of you know the story that's about to follow but I think that there are still a couple of people out there that don't know so here it goes....

This goes all the way back to State Competition for Destination Imagination on March 28. Both Katie and Emily's team qualified to compete there.

We headed off on Friday morning and made our usual lunch stop in Leavenworth, WA. It's very pretty and fun place to stop. It's a German themed town and there are tons of stores to explore. The weather was totally different this year. Last year the snow was coming down and this year it was just beautiful!

We got up bright and early on Saturday to catch all of our town's teams compete. Here's Katie's team. They did very well but unfortunately Katie is not Tennessee bound this year. Her team placed fifth. She took it very well and I was proud of her.
Here's Emily's team waiting anxiously for the results.This is Emily and her friend Callie just as they heard their team being announced as.....
FIRST Place!! Here they are getting their Blue Ribbons!And here are the Washington State Champs picture after the Ceremonies! So it's Emily who is bound for Global Finals this year! I am very excited for Emily to have the Tennessee experience too!Now, on to things that have been happening since State. Emily's school puts on a Music Concert every year and we got to go and watch Emily sing some songs and play the Recorder. She looked very pretty in her dress. I ♥LOVE♥ the picture of her in the middle!

Last weekend, like every weekend, we watched some soccer. It was very cold and windy at the fields that day. It was the end of Spring Break and hardly any of Emily's team showed up so they recruited Katie to play too.

She was just the right size for these kids that were 2 years younger!! She played Goalie for a bit and the middle picture shows both Katie and Emily playing together in the same game ~ that never happens!!

Over Spring Break, Gord's sister Cathy was kind enough to offer to watch the girls. I think that she enjoys hanging with them and they certainly enjoy getting spoiled by her! There was only a little drama on the second night, Emily had to end up waking Auntie Cathy up because she (Emily) was throwing up all over the place. I bet Auntie Cathy was really glad that she offered to watch them at that point!!! LOL

Here is a picture that was sent to me after they asked if Uncle Malcolm could show them how to chop wood. Emily kept saying that she really didn't think it was a good idea!
No Katie's were harmed in the taking of this picture!!

We had Easter dinner at my Uncle Wally's and Auntie Adele's. I was playing around with my camera and Katie was having a good time posing for me! Here are the many faces of Katie!!

I tried to take some pictures of their cousin Robbie too but he wouldn't smile nicely for me so Gord decided to get in on the action and make him smile! I'm not quite sure it worked!


I bought some bubbles and Katie was having fun playing with them!
It was so nice on the fields today. It was a bit chilly when the wind came out but most of the time the sun was nice and warm! Almost all of Emily's team showed up today so Emily had to manage without her sister. LOLKatie played really well again. She almost scored a couple of times. Here is one of them where she just missed the corner.Look how red her face got! She was playing hard!I like this one because it shows how her tongue helps her during the game!
The next two are taken one right after the other. She starts to kick it here... and finishes up really high here!She got on her tippy toes for this throw in!I forgot to mention that I totally let a Blogoversary slip by me a few days ago. It's been two years since I've been Blogging!! Hard to believe!