August Adventures

Our summer is quickly coming to an end, so we are trying our best to get the rest of our summer activities in before school starts. Last week we had some fun doing things here at home and had some fun outings around town. The Olympics have been on every minute we are home. Adam doesn't want to miss a minute of them.  He gets up in the morning and watches the highlights from the previous day on the Today Show and stays up until 11pm when we finally force him to go to bed. It has been fun to see how excited he is about all the sports and the athletes. Tessa has loved watching the "gymtastics" and the swimming. I love listening to her high voice screaming, "Go Missy Franklin!! Go Missy Franklin!!"

Last week we had fun with a couple of science experiments. The kids made homemade popsicles and said they were the best popsicles they had ever tasted!

 We made elephant toothpaste!

 Both kids got to blow a balloon up without any air. It was pretty cool!

 Adam made a race track out of tape for his cars so he could race them while watching the Olympics and Tessa invited her character friends to come watch the Olympics with her from their house.

We finished our last Mrs. Piggle Wiggle book. It has been so fun to read chapter books together all summer!

 Gwen moves everywhere! The other night she was trying to climb up the ottoman.

 Adam asked me to move his basketball hoop downstairs so he "didn't miss a minute of the Olympics". Heaven forbid he go a day without playing. 

 We went to see Sleeping Beauty at the Hale. The kids loved it and Gwen didn't make a peep through the entire play. We had a fun time!

 On Thursday, Tessa got to spend the afternoon with Mamma and cousin Ellie and Zeke came and spent the afternoon with Adam. They had a blast playing cars and trains while they cheered on the Olympians!

 Friday we had a fun day at the zoo with the Riley's! The kids all were so good and had so much fun hanging out together. 

 Everyone loved seeing the baby elephant. 

 Watching the seals swimming. 

 The polar bear put on a pretty good show for everyone.

 Gwen was wonderful the whole day. She is such a happy and easy going baby! 

We ended our week with a big birthday bash for our princess. Her birthday isn't until Thursday, so more to come on this soon!

Nielson Family Home Evening Olympics!

Last  night for Family Home Evening we had our own Olympic games. We started with our opening ceremonies. Daddy taught the kids about King Benjamin (nothing related to the Olympics-just the scripture story we are on) and we worked on learning the 5th Article of Faith. 

 Let the games begin!!

 The weather did not cooperate with our plans, so all of our events were moved in doors.

We had hopping races. Adam had a slight advantage there.

 The Straw throw. Tessa concentrated so hard on her throwing.

 Cotton ball pick up. It took Tessa a minute or two to figure out how to scoop up the cotton balls and then how to keep them on the spoon, but she got it.

 An egg race. They were both so worried about dropping their eggs. I was mean and didn't tell them that they were hard boiled:)

We had lots of fun with balloon races.

 We ended our games with some serious gymnastics competitions! I have some good little gymnasts.

 Everyone is a winner at our house. The kids have been proudly sporting their medals since they received them!

 The girls whipped up some homemade ice cream for a treat for our tired athletes and we ended the evening watching the Olympics on TV. We were sad for our men's gymnastics team, but were glad they were good sports and did their best! 

 Adam turned our ottomans into a pommel horse.