1st Tooth

Spencer lost his first tooth after we got home from camping last night.  It got really wiggly after dinner and he pushed it out with his tongue while he was in the bath.  I think I was as excited about it as he was.  The hole is on the bottom and I couldn't get a good picture of it because those teeth just don't show much even when he smiles.  It's still pretty cute though.

The Tooth Fairy left a quarter under his pillow and Spencer was thrilled with it when he woke up this morning.  He's growing up so fast!

Family Camping Trip

We went on our 2nd annual family camping trip this weekend.  Because of some procrastination in making a reservation, we wound up going to Kilchis River Park just outside of Tillamook.  Alan and Spencer had a good time camping there in June, so we decided to go back.  The camp ground was WAY more crowded this weekend than it had been in June though.  Our tent was really close to other tents on both sides and there were no trees for privacy.  Despite that, however, we had a really good time together.

We decided that Alan really needs an ax for Christmas.  His dinky, little hatchet just wasn't doing the job.

I had aspirations to do some awesome dutch-oven cooking, but wound up taking the easy road and just roasting hot dogs for dinner.  Not my favorite, but at least I didn't have to listen to any complaining about it from Spencer. :)

The playground had these steep slides that Spencer loved.

After a fairly decent nights' sleep in a tent, we woke up to misty rain on Saturday morning.  At least it wasn't too cold.  We experimented with cinnamon twirlers (crescent rolls roasted on 1/4 dowl rods) for breakfast.  They took way too long to cook, but were pretty good.  Then we spent the rest of the morning throwing rocks in the river.  Spencer and Alan could do that for hours.  I got bored and took a lot of practice shots with my camera.  It was too bad that it was cool because the river was shallow and would have been a lot of fun to wade in.

No trip to that part of the coast would be complete without a stop at the Tillamook Cheese Factory for cheese samples and ice cream cones.

Spencer said his favorite part of the camp out was roasting hot dogs.  Alan liked the s'mores best.  I loved being away from all of the house work, computers and cell phones so we could just focus on having fun together.  I decided that camping is too much work for such a short trip though.  It would have been nice to have the whole day and another night to spend together.  Maybe next year.  I'll take what I can get for now.

Kindergarten Readiness

 Our school district has a Kindergarten Readiness program every year where the incoming kindergarteners can practice going to school for a few days during the summer.  Spencer went last week and loooved it!  He went to school for two hours each day Monday-Thursday.  He told me that he was a little nervous the first day but had no reservations at all after that.  It was definitely harder on me to leave him there than it was for him to be left.  There were only 15 kids in the class and Spencer knew one of them from primary.

Hanging out before school in the morning.  It was nice that it didn't start until 10:30 so we didn't have to rush out the door first thing.

The parents dropped the kids off in front of the school office.   When everyone arrived, the class lined up and walked to their classroom.  All of the kids did such a good job lining up and listening and I was impressed with the way Mrs. Thomas handled the class (at least from the 5 minutes I got to observe each day!).

I usually have a hard time getting information out of Spencer, but he was surprisingly willing to talk to me about Kindergarten Readiness.  The class was divided into three groups and he was happy to be in the turtle group ("because turtles are quiet").  The groups rotated between reading with Mrs. Thomas, working on a writing/coloring booklet, and "reading" stories on their own.  They also had a short recess each day and got to take a tour of the whole school.  Spencer loved doing the rotations and his teacher said that he was a "shining star" at following directions.

Spencer really is ready for kindergarten and is going to do great.  He's been rather bored at home lately so it's probably a good thing that real kindergarten starts in about 3 weeks.  (sigh from me)

More Long, Lost Friends

The only bright spot when Spencer's best buddy, Andrew, moved last fall was that he has family in Oregon and we knew they'd be back to visit.  I helped organize a picnic for the Rudin's and their Sherwood friends while they were here a few weeks ago.  We just ate, played and talked at our neighborhood park for a couple of hours on a Saturday.  It was great to catch up with Annie and Dan and the kids had a blast running around in the forest.

Look at all of those little boys!  Out of the 14 kids that came, only two were girls.

We miss you Rudin's, but thanks for making time for us on your trip!

Swimming Lessons

July was swimming lesson month for Spencer this year.  He finally passed Pike level and is now an Eel!  His last teacher was really good and he made a lot of progress with both confidence and skills.  We've done 2 two-week sessions so far and are starting another one tomorrow.  Spencer loves going and it's fun for me to watch him and to having some good reading time every day. :)

Spencer got a special treat on the last day of class when his Grandma Rasmussen came to watch his lesson and then took him on a lunch date to McDonald's.  You can't get much better than that for this little boy!

Kiwanis Kids Fun Run

I found out about this awesome event a few weeks ago.  The Kiwanis club in Wilsonville puts on a FREE kids fun run every summer.  They encourage you to donate to support the Kiwanis club, but you really don't have to.  It being our first time, I didn't know what to expect, but it turned out really cool.  They hold the races at a local high school and the kids run in heats according to their grade or age.  There were tons of booths with fun activities for the kids to do before and after their race.  Most of them were encouraging healthy lifestyles so I was happy about that. 

Modeling his race shirt, also free.  Every kid also got a real race bib number and a medal.

Warming up at the start line.  Spencer was happy to see a couple of the kids from his preschool class there.

On your marks...

Spencer was disappointed that the Kindergarten race was only a 1/2 lap long.  That's a way shorter distance than he's used to racing.  I told him that in short races, you just focus on running as fast as you can.  It was a little tricky for me to get from the start line on one side of the track to the finish line before Spencer did though.  I had to run too!

Squinty face.  It was hot and sunny.

Albertsons provided free sack lunches for everyone.  With white bread, a bag of chips and cookie, they weren't the healthiest lunches though.  That is my only complaint about the event.

Spencer thought the dunk tank was hilarious.  They let the little kids get really close and Spencer actually hit the target!

We came home hot and tired, but it was such a fun event to promote healthy lifestyles.  We'll definitely be attending next year!