We celebrated twelve years as a family by attending an immersive display of Van Gogh's work. It was a bit too intense for Joyce's nerves, but the rest of us loved it.
Since our family birthday landed exactly on Thanksgiving we celebrated a day early. Last year was a Robinson Family celebration, and with COVID finally on its way out the door, we eagerly invited as many as we could.
Following our family's birthday, we got to celebrate Bret's birthday.
The kids treated him with breakfast in bed. They've really gotten into the fun of food preparation this last year. John is our main muffin baker and pancake flipper. Joyce's experiences in the kitchen are much more free spirited. She doesn't want supervision or to follow recipes. She especially enjoys surprising people.
December was full of the usual festive fun.
For Christmas Eve we had a special meal by the Christmas tree.
After Christmas, but before New Years, Sarah's family gathered for their annual Christmas party and Nativity reenactment. With all the grandchildren getting older we considered not doing it, but Joyce and John were pretty insistent and excited for it.
While cousins were here we went ice skating (Joyce cut her thumb) and sledding.
New Year's Eve is celebrated by eating 12 different items and then doing 12 different activities each minute up until our big celebration, which, this year, was at 8 pm. We banged our pots and danced to some party lights!
During the holidays, John got it in his head to make himself some moccasins. Our friend Duane has made some in the past and was happy to help. He wound up basically making them for John, but we kindly did so while visiting with us on Sunday afternoons, allowing us to watch and learn.
As we do each year, the kids and Sarah took a turn cleaning the kids' school. It's fun to see their rooms and they have fun exploring after hours.
In February we became chicken owners. They started out as chicks living in our basement, but soon moved to their fancy coops in the back yard.
As you may be able to tell, Joyce's hair got shorter. She cut it herself during a stressful day of math homework. It seems no matter what she does it looks great. Joyce, ever creative, planned a few "parties" for us in the afternoon. She would choose some music, make some games, and set out her leftover candy as "refreshments."
Sarah did her own "playing" by exploring the Jordan River trail with her friend. Between many walks they managed to explore the valley from West Jordan up to North Salt Lake.
The kids had so much fun sledding with cousins at Christmas they continued to play with their sleds in our yard, even though it's as flat as ever.
In March, our boy, John, turned 8! He chose to be baptized on his birthday and we celebrated with a party at the house afterward. He was excited to invite all his friends from church and school.
For Easter, the kids made pretty sugar eggs with their friends from church.
For Spring Break we took a mini vacation to Ogden, just an hour north of home. We enjoyed eating out, swimming in the hotel pool, playing miniature golf, and visiting a Mountain Man Rendezvous where our friend Duane taught us how to make a fire using flint and steel.
When the weather warmed up we got out our bikes and took a few rides to the library. The park, just a few houses down, had a neighborhood party and the kids helped paint a sidewalk mural in preparation for it.
As the school year wound down, the kids had a performance of Frozen Jr. that they'd been working on. Joyce played a young Elsa and John was the reindeer, Sven.
The kids also had a piano recital. We finished working with this piano teacher and transitioned to doing lessons with Mom. It was a funny story because Sarah tried to dress up as a new teacher who came to the house, Miss Ruby. When she rang the doorbell, Joyce was freaked out, thinking she was a scary homeless person. Lessons went over much better once the wig was ditched and Miss Ruby forgotten.
As school came to a close, John got to do a book report on Teddy Roosevelt by dressing up as him. He proudly made the glasses by himself. Joyce was excited to be invited to join a ukulele ensemble at their school's graduation performance.
Each of the kids participated in their graduation performance by joining their classes in reciting parts of MLK's "I Have a Dream" speech and the Gettysburg address, respectively. Each week one of their assignments is to memorize a poem or part of a speech.
Summer time was filled with the usual library visits and play dates. The kids and Sarah went to the Living Traditions Festival to kick things off.
The kids took several classes throughout the summer. One "class" they took was sewing from a friend's mom. We would go over once a week and work on different projects together.
They also learned a bit of fencing, did some acting classes, rock climbing, sports camps, and ninja training.
Our chickens finally began to give us eggs near the end of summer. The kids continued to enjoy preparing special meals for things like Father's Day.
Cousins came to Utah for a niece's wedding. While here, we all went to Lagoon.
Throughout the summer, the kids got to play a lot with their Cousin Thomas as he was living at Grandma's house. He invented a game with them called Dagoon, Dangerous Lagoon. They couldn't get enough of it.
Come June, Joyce celebrated her ninth birthday. We got to attend the local fair in Orem with Bret's parents. It's becoming a favorite tradition. On her actual birthday we were in quarantine since we'd been exposed to COVID, so we just played at home with doughnuts from the drive-through.
One of her favorite gifts was a date with Cousin Thomas and Nylene. They took her for a pedicure and pizza. She also got a revamped bedroom. The handywoman, Zara, that we hired to install it, loves Joyce so much, she gifted the personalized painted board. She was inspired by the Webb telescope photos and wanted Joyce to have something special.
For the Fourth of July this year, we went to Jordan Park where instead of fireworks they had a laser light show. It took a really long time to begin and we almost gave up, but once it began we were all amazed. The kids especially were impressed.
Other fun summer things involved planting a little container garden and getting Slushies on 7-11 day, as well as 7-10, since we accidentally went a day early.
Sarah got to celebrate turning 50 with "breakfast" in "bed." John gave her a rare kiss on the cheek as a present. She later celebrated with around 20 friends, eating sushi and exchanging gifts of their "favorite things."
Joyce cut her own hair a few times over the course of the year, but the final one extra short and she worried about people calling her a boy. The solution she proposed was to wear a wig, so we pulled out the "Miss Ruby" wig for a day or so. Joyce finally decided it was too itchy to be worth it.
Once all the fun summer camps were over, Sarah and the kids went on a few adventures using an activity pass we had bought at Christmas. The favorite of all was getting to feed little parakeets.
The real highlight of the summer was when we traveled to Washington D.C. We toured The Capitol, various Smithsonians, the Library of Congress, paddled across the Tidal Basin, visited various memorials, walked dogs with new friends, had lunch with an old friend, relaxed on Temple Square, and made new friends with people at church. Oh and we walked and walked and walked. It was a huge success.
Joyce was always making friends. At the monuments she approached people, offering to take their photos. In the neighborhood where we stayed, she asked to pet all the dogs and made friends with one woman who we visited each evening to help her with her dog walking. At the airports she met everyone who had a dog. She also talked to the flight attendants and gate agents and got us early seating on one flight. At one point, John asked me how she managed to meet so many people. On more than one leg of our trip she offered her services to help pass out refreshments and gather trash. As seen below, she is sitting with a friend she made at the gate and is wearing a "crown" made out of snacks that the flight attendants gave her for her services as an honorary flight attendant.
School started up soon after our trip. Joyce is in fourth grade and John started third. They still attend Capitol Hill Academy where they are in classes with less than 10 kids each. They happen to share the same teacher for math. They are out at noon, but are enrolled in "homework support" so they stay until 1:30 and get all their homework done under the supervision of a teacher. Once home, they have extra curricular activities like piano, Ninja class, and musical theater. Joyce is also doing a singing class. We regularly sill our free time with trips to the library and play dates with friends.
Joyce got baptized September 17. While visiting the Washington DC Temple Visitor's Center, she decided she was ready to get baptized a member of the Church of Jesus Christ. She had been giving it a lot of thought for several years, had even met with the missionaries, and even picked a date earlier in the year, but had cancelled it. This time we could tell she was serious because she approached the missionaries at church the Sunday we got back and found a time for them to come interview her. She also scheduled it on a day when some of her favorite relatives were unable to attend because she wanted to do it as soon as possible. She didn't necessarily want a lot of people there anyway. She's already a great missionary and one of the best at fellowshipping members and visitors. Every Fast Sunday she looks forward to bearing her testimony. Other adults have told me how much they appreciate her maturity and thoughts when she bares her testimony. Each Sunday afternoon she calls the members of her Primary class and visits with them a bit or asks them if they will come the next week.
We said goodbye to summer with a BBQ with friends. The kids were finally old enough that they were able to run wild with all the other kids and have a great time. This is an annual BBQ that we've missed doing for the last couple of years, so it was wonderful seeing everyone again. Normally we host, but our new home's yard didn't get finished until the end of November.
Both kids enjoyed doing their "part" to help with the landscaping.
We took a quick trip to Idaho to see Sarah's sister perform in a play. A trip to Idaho isn't complete without a visit to the potato cellars. We learned a lot about how McDonald's french fries are grown and proces
Halloween seemed to bring more candy this year than any before! We did a church Halloween party one night and then trick-or-treating the next. We don't have many homes that pass out candy in our neighborhood, and being on a busy street there aren't that many homes that are easy to access anyway, but we did find a few friends home and did enjoy visiting them. Before going trick-or-treating we carved pumpkins. It felt special to Sarah to see Joyce wearing the same witch costume that Sarah wore when she was the same age.
We'll leave you this year with some photos from one of our favorite fall traditions, a picnic up Millcreek Canyon. As usual, Joyce made friends with someone there building a fire for her own family. She was kind enough to take photos of us.
