Breckenridge Family Reunion

The highlight of our summer was our family vacation to Breckenridge, CO.  Drew's Grandma Borton rented an AMAZING cabin in the mountains for a Borton family reunion.  Everyone was able to attend except for Drew's cousin, Sarah, and Drew's brother and wife, Brian and Natalie.  We missed them and wished they could have been there too!

We flew in on a Wednesday and stayed through Monday evening.  It was such a great time with family, very relaxing, and the first time some of Drew's relatives have even met the kids.

First a funny story though...so apparently Drew and I booked our flights a week EARLY.  Thankfully our mistake was discovered the day before our scheduled flight.  Let me just say it was a mad rush to cancel the flights and rental car and try to decide how to proceed.  Do we still go out to CO to see some family, but miss out on the actual reunion (and amazing cabin)?  Do we cancel our plans and not go at all?  Or do we rebook our flights for the correct week and just pay the cancellation fees as well as last minute ticket prices?  Boy was that a tough decision that had to be made QUICKLY!  So we decided the family reunion was the main reason we were going out to CO in the first place and we didn't want to miss out on seeing family that we don't have the opportunity to see often.  We "bit the bullet" and decided to pay the extra fees.  It's amazing to see God's hands in the "little things" in how He takes care of us and provides for us.  Over the  next few hours, we definitely saw God's hand in all the mess.  We cancelled our rental car without any fees (thank goodness!) and Drew's aunt and uncle who live in CO offered to let us use one of their vehicles, so that saved us some money.  Then as Drew's on the phone with the airlines we discover that we are able to rebook our flight for the correct week, have it still be a direct flight, AND without any additional fees whatsoever!  The reason for it was that since the airlines had changed our flight times a few weeks back by just a few minutes, so we were able to rebook without incurring any fees.  On top of that, we didn't know that was their policy - the agent offered that to us without our even prompting him.  Just amazing!  So, all-in-all everything worked out and we were still able to go out to CO and enjoy time with family.

Now on to the pictures!

Jenna and Grant outside the Dayton airport ready for their flight

Waiting in line at the ticket counter

This girl was all smiles to be on the plane!

As was this little fellow

Both the kids watching a movie.  Grant didn't watch for very long, but it kept Jenna busy.

Grandma, Aunt Jean, Uncle Stan, and Cathy all did a great job assigning families to rooms in the cabin.  They graciously gave us a room with a queen bed, plus a trundle bed for the kids, and an attached bathroom.  It was so nice and very convenient for us!!  We really appreciated how hard they all worked to make everyone's stay enjoyable!

Don't you just love the clawfoot bathtub??  The kids sure did!

I tried to capture the amazing view from the bathtub, but the picture just doesn't so it justice!  It was breathtaking!

Another view from the bathtub

We had a bathtub and a shower.  So nice!  Plus a HUGE walk-in closet next to the bathtub.

The view of our beautiful room from the door

The kid's sleeping arrangements.  It worked perfectly!

One day a group of us rented bikes and went on a beautiful bike ride.  The kids loved the ride and did great in the Burley.

All geared up and ready to go!

Just look at that view!

Nap #1 - although I don't think Jenna was really napping here.  Maybe just resting her eyes.

We stopped in Vale to catch up with part of our group.  There was a small splash area that just beckoned to the kids.  :)  How can you resist getting in??

After making it to Vale, we stopped and ate lunch.  A river was close by, so some of us wandered down there to play around for a few minutes.  Grant's playing with Uncle Stan and Jenna's with Drew's cousin Adam (in the blue shirt) and his good friend that joined us, Jack.  Jenna loved "the boys."

Nap #2 on our bike ride - I just love how Grant's head is resting in Jenna's lap.  So sweet!

Near the end of our bike ride, we stopped at a gas station and picked up some refreshing drinks.  The kids are finishing off some blue slushies, which is why Grant's lips look so dark.  :)  They love their Slushies!

Drew had us stop at one point so he could "explore" an area.  You can barely see him up on top of the big rock pile (mine tailings).

While we were there, everyone celebrated Grant's birthday.  It was so sweet of them to think of him.  Aunt Jean, Uncle Stan, and Adam even got him some water guns, which instantly became a favorite game of theirs!  :)  That was their first experience with water guns.

Jenna getting some quality time with B. 

A partial view of the cabin.  I wish we had gotten more pictures of the inside because it was beautiful!  We did take videos of the inside, but for some reason, Blogger still won't let us post videos.

A close up of some of the family

B with her grandkids

The cabin was in a perfect location.  We could walk to the gondolas and ride up to some fun theme-park type activities or ride down to the town of Breckenridge.  A few of the days we went down to the town and played in the creek down there.  Here's Jenna enjoying her lunch, while taking in the view.

Drew took the kids across the creek as it started raining.  Then we ran for cover and ended up getting stranded down in the town since they closed the gondolas.  Thankfully Ed saved the day and picked us up!

After a few days there, the kids discovered a secret hideout in our room. 

How cool is that?!  They definitely enjoyed that!

The cabin had 2 hot tubs.  Jenna was in heaven!!  She loves her hot tubs.  :)

Grant enjoyed it too!

My two favorite boys!

Posing on the rocks outside the cabin

The family with Grandma and Ed.  Thank you for an AMAZING trip!!  We loved everything about it - the location, the fellowship with family, the adventures - it was all perfect!

I added some pictures that Mom Borton and James took...

Hanging out in the kitchen around the food.  Actually I think we were fixing lunches for one of our excursions.

Cheesy grin

Jenna and Grant out with B, Grandma Borton, and Aunt Jean while Drew was mountain biking and I was napping.  :)  It was a really nice relaxing break for me and I know the kids enjoyed it as well.

So thoughtful of him to share his food.  ;)

Drew with his boy

The boys are ready for some mountain biking!

Another great picture of us on our bike ride.  I just love the view in the background paired with the bright blue sky.  So beautiful!

Week 3 - Letter E

We've just finished our third week of preschool and learned the letter E.  It's been so fun to see Jenna recognize and point out the letters A and E in regular text she sees around the house, in her books, on the cereal boxes.  It definitely makes the letters more "real" to her and she can see the application of them in the world around her.  In fact, just before she went down for her nap, she looked up at her name on the wall and pointed out the letter e.

I've been amazed over these past few weeks seeing how quickly Jenna learns.  It's so true what they say about this age - young kids are definitely sponges, soaking it all in!  She very quickly learned the days of the week and the months of the year, although she has yet to understand their application and what they really mean.  She can just recite them in order right now, but has no concept of what July means, or that today is Monday, but that will come.  It was funny, yesterday in the car she was telling Drew that "Christmas is at the bottom, January is when it snows, and June is the beach" because I have the months of the year lined up vertically on our wall and each month has pictures associated with that month.  Funny what she remembers!

Also, I forgot to mention that Jenna's memorizing a Bible verse each week that goes along with the alphabetical theme.  The 1st week was Romans 3:23 - "For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God."  The 2nd week was Proverbs 15:1 - "A soft answer turns away wrath." And this week was Proverbs 20:11 - "Even a child is known by his doings."  There's a book we read that gives the verse, an explanation of what the verse means, and then a story that exemplifies the verse.  Jenna LOVES (loves, loves, loves) reading books right now, so she always looks forward to reading the story each week from this book.  And I'm really enjoying learning verses with her because it causes me to memorize verses (even though they're short, they're still important and effective for me in training the kids), and I'm able to apply them to situations with Jenna.  When Jenna and Grant are getting into a "fight", I remind her of Proverbs 15:1 - that giving a kind answer to Grant can help dissolve an argument.  So we're able to apply the scripture we're learning, which is the whole point of memorizing scripture - to hide God's Word in our hearts so that we won't sin against God.  I have to say, this part of our morning is my favorite time with her!  :)


Now on to activities from the letter E:

Her letter E coloring page was a "color by number."  That was her first time doing a color by number, so it was a bit confusing to her, but she did fine with my help.  Plus it was good practice with numbers 1-10.

Categorizing capital and lowercase E's.  This was easy peesy for Jenna.

Find the matching letter disks for the word "ELEPHANT" and "elephant."  This one was a little more challenging for her than last week probably because it involved more letters than the word "apple."  ;)

She made the letter E with her body...and a little help and explanation from Mommy.

Her letter E wikki stix. 

Writing the letters Ee.  Not too bad.  This girl has me stumped though.  She keeps switching from her left- to right-hand, so I honestly have no idea which "hand" she is at the moment.  :)

Cutting practice - one of her favorites.  I still need to get her left-handed scissors!

She cut this page completely on her own.  I had gone into the other room to help Grant and came back to find her page done.  

Completing the pattern went better this week.  I repeated the pattern 4-5 times before we got to the blank spots, so the repetition seemed to help her. 

Making the letters Ee on her geoboard with rubberbands.  I helped her with the capital E, but she did the lowercase all on her own. I was really impressed with her lowercase e!

She put together her E puzzle.  I would have thought this would be super simple for her, but she seemed to have a little difficulty with it.  I tried to point out the border along the edge, but it didn't "click".  Practice makes perfect.  ;)

She hunted for all the letter e's in the story about Elsa the elephant.  She did really well, but got a little carried away with the title at the top.  I think she just likes using the Do-a-Dot markers.

Of course Grant wanted to play with the markers too, so here's his work.  He was very proud of it!

Last week we didn't get to our letter A craft, so we squeezed it in this week.  We made an alligator out of the letter A.

Do-a-Dot marker with the letters Ee.

For our ABC book, we glued elbow macaroni on the letter E.  Grant wanted to do it too, so he got the lowercase e.

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Jenna put together her color puzzles.  They are a little TOO easy for her.  I thought it was funny that the toy elephant happened to be placed next to the puzzles...and I don't think Jenna was the one playing with it.

This activity was tough for her.  She had to count the elephants and then put that number of Cheerios in the spaces below.  She would count them, but then just start filling up all the spaces instead of counting the correct number of Cheerios.  I wonder if next time I should have her count out the Cheerios first and then put them in the spaces.  Hmm...

A cut and paste project.  She had to cut out the parts of the elephant and then glue them on the paper.  This is another one I didn't help her with because I was busy with Grant and I was really surprised with the outcome.  I thought she did a great job cutting close to the elephant. I think I did show her how to assemble the elephant, but then took them off the paper and she glued and assembled it on her own with my directing her. 

Number clip cards - She had to put the correct number of clips on the cards.  This activity worked on her number recognition (she's getting tripped up on the higher numbers still - 6, sometimes 7, 8, 9, and sometimes 10), counting, and fine motor skills with using the clips. 

I wanted to see how she'd do tracing letters with a pencil....and quickly realized it's too soon to expect her to be able to write them.  My thought was she could have practice tracing them first and then try to write some on her own.  Of course the practice is good, but it definitely altered my expectations and helped me realize she'll need lots of practice to be able to write on her own.  So we'll stick to the tracing for now.  Notice she did write the letter H (I think she was trying to write a capital A, and the box under the capital E's was her wanting to "draw a house."  ;)

She did a much better job sorting the elephants by size than she did with the apples.  She only mixed up two of them (which we corrected before the picture was taken.)

Once the decorative stones were out, Grant was over to "help."  Jenna had to place them over the blank spots on the page and then Grant tried it too.  And then Jenna wanted to make a snowman out of the stones...

While Jenna was working on another activity I pulled out the lowercase a from last week.  I tried to explain to him that he's to put the stickers just on the "a", but it obviously didn't register, so he just put them where he wanted on the page.  Then afterward, he stood up, held his paper in front of him and said, "cheese."  Cracked me up!  He's obviously seen his sister do that a time or two.  :)

Lacing her elephant card.  Again, this was more tricky with the elephant than with the apple, since the apple's basically the shape of a circle. 

Finished product!

At the end of the week we read the book, Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, which is about the alphabet letters climbing up a coconut tree until it gets too crowded and they all fall down (chicka chicka BOOM BOOM).  It's a fun story and goes through each letter a few times.  So we have a coconut tree on the wall and after we finish a letter, we'll read the story and then put the letter on the tree.  I wasn't quite ready to start this last week, so she put up both A and E this week.

On the last day of the week, we had a family night to "celebrate" the letter E!  Jenna was pretty excited about it!

For dinner we had Eggs, an Elephant pancake (that Drew made), and bacon shaped like an E.  Yum!

Then we played the game Elefun.  Butterflies shoot out the top of the elephant's trunk and you're supposed to catch them in the net.  Don't laugh...it's MUCH harder than you'd think!  :)

Then we watched the movie Enchanted - it's a newer fairytale with both animation and live acting.  She LOVES it probably because there's a princess.  It's a really cute movie, even for adults.