McKay's Graduation

This smarty pants just graduated from high school!
 

 

He had full honors cords and graduated in the top 30 in his class.  You'll have to notice his tie.  He wanted to wear a funny tie so he borrowed his dad's gambling tie.  You couldn't see much of it under his graduation robes.

It's official.

Because he was one of the top 30 graduates, McKay got to sit on the stand at graduation.  On the left you can see the graduates filing in up onto the stand.  McKay is right in front of the podium with the gold around his neck.  The middle picture is of him just after they called his name and he walked across the stage.  The picture to the right shows him back up on the stand returning to his seat.  They had assigned seating on the stand.

Post graduation photos:

 McKay with his best friend Parker.

Above McKay is on the far left with some of his high school buddies.  Below he is with his proud family.

Last Day of School 2018

The school year has come and gone.  McKay and Jaxon had their last day of school on yesterday and Josh and Kayden had their last day today.  This was McKay's last last day of school.  He is all grown up and big now.  The days are long but the years are short.  Welcome summer!

Read Across Utah Award

Kayden worked hard and received the 4th grade Read Across Utah Award.  He had to read 29 books all with a different genre representing the 29 counties in Utah.

Receiving his award from the 4th grade teachers.

Super proud of my 4th grade boy!

Goodbye Jiffy Lube

It is the end of an era for McKay.  He quit his job.  He has a lot going on the next few weeks.  He has his high school graduation, a family vacation and needs to prepare to go on his mission.  I think he was excited to quit, but when it came down to it, he was a little sad too.  Thank you Jiffy Lube!

Baseball Season Wrap

It was another great baseball season this year.  It had it's ups and it had it's downs.  Kayden played on a new team with a different coach.  He had some kids on his team that were.....interesting to say the least and some poor sports.  But we learned to take our personal victories.

 Kayden developed his batting stance.  It would hold up his had to let the pitcher know he wasn't ready.  Then he would measure out with his bit how far to stand from the plate.  It made me smile every time he got up to bat.

 He had a very patient coach that even let Kayden try out pitching in one game.  Kayden also got to play third base a few times as well as second base.  He learned a lot and hopefully developed some  perseverance.

Josh changed leagues this year because of his age.  His coach from last year changed leagues as well since his kids had gotten older.  He mentioned trying to get as many kids back on his team from last year as possible.  Josh was lucky enough to be a Cub again.  His team experienced more losses this year than last year and that was a growing experience for Josh and his team.  But when it came down to it, they had a great unity and had fun together.

 

They took their unity and won the league championship!  Above, Josh is receiving his trophy from his coach.

 Go Cubs!

Champions!

After the game and trophies, the team went and celebrated at Pizza Pie Cafe.  Here Josh is with his coach.  While eating pizza they signed baseballs for each other and reminisced about their baseball season.

Dance Festival

Kayden is my last child in elementary school.  So when it came time for the dance festival this year, I only had to stay for one dance.  I loved watching him get his groove on, even though he doesn't love the dance festival as much as I do.

They danced to a song called Champion.  He was a little sad that the 4th grade didn't to do square dancing this year.

I think he enjoyed watching everyone else dance more than dancing himself.  Funny boy.

4th Grade Utah Program

I love the 4th grade Utah program.  It teaches us all about Utah's history and heritage.  It also makes me proud to live in the state that I do.  Utah!....this is the place!!

He makes one cute pioneer/cowboy.  I tried pulling faces at him during the program, but he kept shaking his head at me.  He was all business.

 I love all the songs that they sing about Utah and it's history!  This is the Utah Counties song.

This is my favorite Utah song.

Seminary Graduation

McKay graduated from seminary tonight.  I think he was a little disappointed when he opened his diploma to find it empty.  I guess he better keep going to seminary.  After all, school isn't over yet!!

All of McKay's supporters from left: Grandma Haacke, Natalie, Jaxon, Kayden, Rebecca, Me, Jeremy, Josh, McKay, Grandpa White, Grandma White and Grandpa Haacke.

Can I just add a note about the scab on McKay's forehead?  He got silly after family prayer the other night.  He was pushing his body across the wood floor while dragging his forehead.  He gave himself a floor burn!  When he got up from the floor he mentioned that his forehead stung and then the next day a nice scab had developed.  Funny boy!

Entrepreneurs

These three kiddos decided it was a good day for a lemonade stand.  I decided to broaden their inventory by baking giant chocolate chip cookies for them to sell.  These boys walked away from their lemonade stand at the end of the day with $15 each.  They were feeling pretty rich!

Lego Derby

We have done the Pinewood Derby or some kind of derby for the last nine years straight with all of our boys and this was our last one!  This year for the Pinewood Derby, they switched things up. The scouts built their cars out of Legos!  Kayden had a great time building and creating his car.  He went with a Star Wars themed car and it did really well.

Here he is all set to see how his car is going to do.

Above his car is in first place.  In fact, there weren't many races that his car wasn't in first.  It was quite competitive.

He took third place overall and won a Lego trophy as well as a stand to display his car on.  It was a memorable night!