Professional Pics of Cousin Katie and School Starts

 We got the professional photos of Katie plus her best buddy Juliet!

I was not planning on being involved in photos so I'm really glad I had taken a shower prior to this.

After the outfit change. Girls need frilly dresses!

Standard Katie behavior, come on over and sit on little Juliet in order to show her love and affection. 

Cousin buddies.

Cute baby girl!

She got a big owie earlier in the day so she kept showing off her bandaid. 

Girl cousin picture!

Eleanor was beyond delighted to get in on cute girl photos. It was suggested that the boys could join in but they weren't dressed for it and quite frankly I wasn't prepared for the additional effort boy pictures require. 

Aunt Stephanie with the cousin buddies!

Katie said "aww!" and cuddled in on Juliet. 

One last cute Juliet pic. 

It was a little ridiculous how much Juliet adored Katie, the next time we went over to my folks' house she went looking for her and was sad she was gone.

Bradley got in some good playdates at the end of summer vacation. 

Juliet liked these playdates because she often gets new members in her fan club. She and Luca are quite the buddies now. 

We really enjoy Bradley's friend Colin. He learned the rules to Dragonwood super fast and apparently also makes his own Pokemon cards at home. Apparently he plays Dungeons and Dragons - Bradley is intrigued. 

Uncle Thomas stayed for an additional day after Daniel and Stephanie left and we had a great time playing games with him the night before he left. 

Uncle Thomas was the winner!

Juliet helped out with games.

Exploding Kittens time.

Juliet moved on to fun dominoes with Grandma.

And a complete game of Mousetrap! Patrick was so pleased. 

Uncle Thomas showed Juliet some funny buttons on her toy phone.

Group picture! Thanks Patrick ...

Bradley often reads to Patrick at bedtime and it's about the sweetest thing ever.

A cat threw up on Bradley's bed and we discovered it at bedtime, which meant he couldn't sleep in his bed because we had to wash all the sheets. Sweet Patrick invited Bradley into the lower bunk for a sleepover and even arranged the stuffed toys around the edge of the bed, just how Bradley likes it. Dogman was waiting on his pillow. Such a sweet boy. 

Juliet occasionally will sit for part of a show now, and we all enjoy it tremendously whenever she does. We watched a Pokemon movie together one Friday night when Nathan took the two middle kids down to the lake. I took Bradley and Juliet down the next day. 

But then shows with Juliet turns into this. Flips over the side of the couch. Yep, this is one of my children. 

Meanwhile, lake time! It was very hot, perfect for an evening swim. 

Followed by a big thunderstorm all the next morning. These kids barely ever sat down and did puzzles until we started going to the lake, it's been really fun.  

I spent the morning over at my parents' house. Grandpa was victorious playing Dragonrealm against Bradley!

We were getting ready to leave for the lake and it seemed that Juliet had done some bonding with Bradley, definitely preferred him to Mommy.

Nathan and Patrick decided to do some fishing after the morning rain while Eleanor camped out in the playhouse with a comic book. 

Fishing success! There are a lot of Patrick fishing photos in this blog post. 

The crew reunited and eating some s'mores! Juliet is no dummy and gets super excited whenever she sees us light a fire in the fire pit. 

Joyfully reunited with my little boy. 

Bradley and Patrick were perhaps even more joyfully reunited. 

Another fish!

I took Juliet and Eleanor back early so that Eleanor could go to a girl scout event. Here she is with her friend Cate.

Daddy got back and he was lucky enough to get help pulling the car into the garage. 

Strong Patrick pushing Juliet on the swing.

The neighbors across the street had a little electric car that all of our children fought over. Juliet won. 

It turns out she's a pretty good driver.

Girl reading time.

Fun story - I realized when I woke up in the middle of the night one night that I hadn't seen Sookie for ages and I was afraid she was shut in a child's room or something. So I looked all over for her and couldn't find her anywhere. Not in the basement, not in the garage, not under any beds, not in my closet. Finally I happened upon the laundry basket where I put Nathan's clean clothes until he decides to put them away ... we have been doing this for years and it seems she finally discovered the delightful clean clothes pile. Oh Sookie.

I'm taking Juliet with me to grocery stores again. It's not worth wasting her nap time on going without her, she only touches the cart anyway and isn't running around the store so I feel fine doing this during a pandemic. She loves it so much, it had been at least 5 months since she last was in a grocery store. And it's especially fun at Costco, where it is Christmas even on August 31st!

Eleanor and Patrick have been having a blast with all the extra at home time because of the pandemic. They delayed school start by a couple weeks and so when we found friends playing in an overflowing creek they were able to join them and spend a couple of hours searching for worms. 

Evening basketball with the whole family. 

Juliet was so excited to get to shoot some baskets like the big kids. 

I think she learned this independently because I don't allow the big kids to climb the outside of the stairs. Why baby, why?

This is where you do the climbing! Not sure I feel better about it. She's so little! 

Another day, another worm adventure. I walk them to the creek over by the Odegaard's house and leave them with a walkie talkie. Apparently that's the coolest thing one can do. 

They were quite successful. Blech. These worms didn't actually make it to the lake for fishing, Nathan put them in a mini fridge but after they had sat out for a day or two and apparently worms don't do well in less than ideal worm conditions. 

I'm glad we have such a snuggly crew. The cuddles around here can be a bit ridiculous. Juliet will sometimes agree to watch a show now but she yells at me until I come sit and then she sits on my lap.

More park adventures before school started! Four kids on a teeter totter at Gezer Park!

Juliet later grabbed Bradley by the hand and pulled him over to the swings. I melted a little. 

All three of her siblings are so pleased whenever she selects them to do something. Swing time was adorable. 

And here she is selecting Eleanor's cereal for her breakfast. Also adorable. 

Four kids on the swings at Ironwoods Park!

Someone paid attention to what Patrick was doing and wanted to copy it. 

If there is a tree the Scott children will climb it. 

Bradley shouted out to Eleanor, "OMG you're gonna die!" She did climb rather high. 

Juliet was displeased later in the day when she got to share a motorcycle ride with Patrick. 

Juliet seeks out the big kids she knows are her buddies and she was really excited to see Olivia Rutherford on a park outing. 

Standard afternoon at the Scott house. 

Standard evening. Bradley getting bossed to dance by the naked baby who is insisting on walking around with her Tigger towel on her head. 

Bradley reading to Juliet at bedtime was just beyond sweet.

Reading a book together.

Reading separately. I'm a sucker for any of my kids singing Baby Beluga. 

I decided to clean up a bit one morning and realized why I don't ever get to do this while Juliet is awake when I came back and found her sitting at the table with a can of black olives. 

This is how she got it. No, we don't leave the step stool by the pantry, she brought it over from the bathroom in order to be naughty. 

More naughty. I left her by the car with the passenger door open while I was loading things. I walked inside to grab more gear and when I walked back out I found this. 

Nathan had taken Patrick and Eleanor down to the lake a night ahead of us again, this time so Patrick could participate in the Labor Day weekend fishing derby which took place early on Saturday morning. 

Apparently it was a bit of a bust and he didn't catch a single fish (5 acre lake doesn't have as good of fish as 10 acre lake) but he won a raffle at the end and was ecstatic to get a new fishing pole. 

In the afternoon the friend crew arrived. Labor Day weekend at the lake is a popular thing to do. We had the Krenns, Rutherfords, and Monahans join us. 

Bradley had a great time with Kyle. 

Pretty Eleanor with the sunset behind her. 

Juliet decided it was time to love up on Bradley while he was trying to play video games.

The dudes hanging out at night.

A surprise fireworks show two lots over from us that took place at 8:30 at night, while we were trying to get Juliet to sleep. She was so tuckered out she fell asleep during the 20 minutes of fireworks. It was very loud, I couldn't believe she fell asleep. All the other kids went nuts for the fireworks, it was so fun.

Happy girl in the morning with one of her top fans, Mike Monahan. 

Patrick had an amazing day, a lot of fishing was involved. 

Bradley got in on the action too.

Yet more Juliet and Mike time. So sweet. 

Legend of the Wendigo time!

Yet more fishing. 

Juliet has figured out the best part about a graham cracker sandwich and I'm proud to say she managed to eat all of the frosting without eating a smidge of graham cracker in the process. 

Even more fish. 

One of the fish caught was big enough to eat. And so we did! There was great fascination at the fileting of the fish. I bribed children with shiny pennies to eat a bite after it was cooked. Universally it was considered rather gross, but we just had butter and some salt on hand to season it. We need to get more serious fish seasoning if this becomes a regular meal at the lake. 

So many kids, so many s'mores. 

Juliet with her fan club.

The captain of the Juliet fan club. She loved Mike so much. 

Bradley being cute for Juliet while we hung out on the lily pad. 

Bradley got some diving lessons.

And loads of rough housing lessons. He was so happy.

Patrick's reaction upon being handed a frog.

Coming home, doing some laundry, dancing to sweet tunes. 

Juliet has a thing for big kid underwear and she is fortunate that her siblings think this is hilarious and are happy to put extra pairs of underwear on the baby. She ended up with four pairs of underwear this evening. 

Big sister reading time. 

How cute is this little girl? I've been getting more bows out for her lately. 

Good news, we think she likes brownie batter. If you look closely it's even on the top of her head. 

And the kids made it back to school! Finally! Patrick and Mabel are behind the welcome back sign, wearing masks. 

It was a very weird start to school, they started out in hybrid mode which means they go to school two days per week and the other three days are virtual. Our first official day of school was virtual so we took a picture this day, which was their first in-person day and their second official day of school for the year. Also, it was surprisingly cold. 

A picture I got from Bradley's 3rd grade teacher, Mrs. Brewer (our former neighbor).

From Eleanor's teacher, Mrs. McAtee.

I found this while cleaning up at home. It took me a second but I realized Eleanor wrote her note to Baby Menace. Maybe I need to stop calling her that ... but she truly is a menace. Too funny. 

I mean, this is what happened as I watched. If this isn't a menace I don't know what is. 

SO proud to be naughty and into the pantry again. 

I might have gone a bit over the top and purchased a ring light for Eleanor to use in her room on the virtual school days. Her room can be a bit dark, one needs good lighting for Zoom calls!

This goofball. She's so fun. 

Juliet talked Grandpa into reading her a book when he came over to drop something off. Actually, what happened is she brought him a book and yelled at him until he laid down on the pile of blankets her siblings had placed on the ground. Grandpa is a good sport. 

More boy reading time. Bradley is such a good brother. 

I don't get to read to the big kids much anymore, typically I'm with Juliet at bedtime. It's a treat whenever I get to read to them!

Nathan took the girls on a bike ride to the school playground while I took the boys to Saturday tennis lessons. 

Juliet watches everything and already sort of knows how the basics of swinging works.

Juliet works so hard to keep up. 

Eleanor may have gotten a bit tuckered out between school excitement and all our other activities. We were reading by each other in the afternoon and then she cuddled up and fell asleep on me. I was so so happy. 

After our much needed cuddle time, I cleaned myself up a bit and put on a dress so Nathan and I could go on a fun date night to a church event. No big deal, but I won the basketball shooting event. Sure, because I got one ball in a bucket and my single raffle ticket was the one selected, but I'm still very proud. 

I did not win this event. 

Mini golf at the lake the next day was even more exciting because we discovered they had only halfway redone the course and there were no walls on the sides of any of the holes and most importantly, there were no holes cut in the turf for the ball to go into. 

Juliet might have cheated a little but she got in on the action. 

And we used her as a fun obstacle while kids tried to shoot the ball between my legs. The baby would go up and down like a bridge obstacle! Juliet figured out I was pulling some nonsense and refused to cooperate. 

Tire swing at one of the playgrounds. 

Cool girl on the stand up paddleboard. The water was quite chilly so she didn't get in, surprisingly Bradley was the only kid who ended up swimming this weekend. He did it because I dared him/bribed him with Swedish fish to jump in. He traded in the Swedish fish for screen time. He was very happy. 

He also fished a little. Our lake is the best for fishing.

Even Eleanor got into the fishing by the end of the day. She and Patrick were down by the water on their own and walked this gigantor fish up to the RV to show off their catch. Eleanor was wearing the green glove because by this point she was the one pulling the fish off the hooks and tossing them back in. 

How cute is Juliet in her little denim dress? It was Eleanor's.

How helpful is Patrick with little Juliet? Lucky girl!

I could frame this one. 

Or maybe this one ...

She loves this tricycle and screams at any of her siblings who ride it because it is obviously only hers.

Patrick giving a delighted Juliet his stick he uses for hitting leaves off of tree branches. 

Oh my goodness this naughty cute baby. 

Eleanor had her girl scout bridging ceremony where she crossed over from Daisies to Brownies.

It was super delightful to sit there and keep Juliet quiet and out of trouble while Eleanor decided it was hair braiding time for Mommy. 

The girl scout troop. Eleanor has a pretty fantastic group, we really like it. 

Mentoring her little sister in the art of climbing. 

Juliet thought it was hilarious to wear big kid hats when we got home. 

Cruising with Addison.

Kindergarten Zoom calls are hysterical. This day Patrick was really proud of the ghost he had painted and also wanted to show off a light-up pumpkin toy and it quickly turned into a show and tell Zoom call for all of his classmates as well. 

Fun Patrick story: I had been laughing with other kindergarten moms about all the chaos of the zoom calls - kids ask to go get a drink of water, to go to the bathroom, and one little girl constantly asks if the call is over yet. No one fully understands mute. One day the teacher had to continuously ask for a child to stop drawing on the screen and told the class it made her heart sad. So the next day when Ms. Scarborough told a child to erase what they had drawn on the screen, I walked over to see what the naughty child had done. Patrick then asked me, "how do I erase this?" Sighhhhh. 

Meanwhile, Juliet hid under a chair so I couldn't get her. I wonder why? Such a mystery. 

Could it be a poop? Mystery of mysteries!

Juliet and I have been getting in some solo park time with just the two of us and I don't even know what to do at the park with one toddler, it's weirdly easy and quiet. 

I mean, she's still one of my children so she's a maniac and tries to climb on everything. But it's just one child doing it, so I can actually fully supervise what is going on. 

We had the best night at the Louisburg Cider Mill with Eleanor's girl scout troop. 

It was the first night it was open and it was perfect weather yet not busy at all. 

Juliet was excited about the air pillow.

And Eleanor was very excited about friends. I saw her a little bit at the beginning and then she ditched out and ran around with girl scout buddies. 

But we managed to feed her some donuts and give her some apple cider before she left us for friends. 

This is actually a thumb of approval, not a thumbs down. 

Juliet was pretty pleased about donut dinner. I fed them grapes before we got there so it could sort of count as a balanced meal. 

Patrick! When the boys aren't driving me crazy they are just beyond adorable. 

Corn hole. This was all so fun, we're used to everything being cancelled because of the pandemic, we did not expect to get to go to fall festivals this year. 

Eleanor's friend's mom sent me this picture. Big points for cool pose. 

It was very interesting to see the various states of the masks in Eleanor's pictures with friends. 

Meanwhile, the rest of us went on a tractor ride. 

Juliet yelled "on" at this truck a bunch but alas, it did not turn on. 

She also had to yell at some goats. 

She did ultimately make friends with the brown goat. 

It kills me that she didn't get to go to Deanna Rose this year, they never opened. This is some prime petting zoo age. 

Then Nathan took the girls down to the lake for the night because Louisburg is only 20 minutes away, might as well go down if you're so close already. The boys needed to go home with me because they had tennis lessons in the morning. So we had some extra time at the Cider Mill and decided to take on the corn maze!

We struggled a bit. It was actually really tricky, I had a map and we did okay for the first half but then we got a bit turned around on the second half and kept running into loops and dead ends. 

Did the boys panic? Yes. 

But good news, we eventually made it out! There was great joy and discussion of what an accomplishment it was to finish because corn mazes can be really tricky (especially when you're the only people in one, it wasn't like we had anyone else showing us the way to go). I asked Bradley when he would want to do one again and told him it had been 18 years since I had last done a corn maze. So he said he would do one again in 20 years. 

Nathan sent back pictures from the lake in the morning. They had a good night and wonderful handy Eleanor was helping him set up extra mats and the new picnic table I had gotten from the church garage sale. 

Then the boys and I went down and were joined by friends, the Odegaards, who came down for the afternoon. 

Most of the kids got in the water, which I couldn't believe they did as it was 73 degrees out. Eleanor's friend Naomi wisely opted for a kayak trip around the lake with her mom Mary and Eleanor. 

We also brought our neighbor girls down to spend the night with us. Juliet was delighted by this. 

They got to experience playing cards with Juliet, and what an experience it is!

Juliet was delighted to be given Addison's phone as a toy. Addison may be too nice to this baby. 

Getting ready for s'mores. I love Bradley's face. 

Once again, so many kids, so many s'mores.

Bradley was incredibly proud of his ability to burn marshmallows to a crisp.

What the morning looked like. It was very chilly out so we just snuggled under blankets and watched a show of Juliet's choice on the tablet. 

Insane 12 year old girls who decided 55 degree weather was swimming weather. They also got bossed by a delighted Juliet all weekend. 

They opted for the stand up paddleboard and apparently then decided to jump in on repeat. Crazy business. They had a blast. 

Patrick is starting to get pretty good at casting and is catching some pretty big fish these days. 

The kids have been ready for Halloween since August (Eleanor has planned out matching costumes with Juliet because I told her she already had plenty of costumes and the only way I'd want to buy a new one is if it was a fun matching one with Juliet.) So there was great joy when some leaves finally started falling. It's fall!

This leaf collection is currently a centerpiece on my kitchen table. Pretty cute, we're all enjoying it. 

Bradley and Eleanor have been doing great at keeping up with their piano lessons, even when an overenthusiastic baby sister bustles up and starts banging away at keys while they're practicing. 

Oh my sweet Bradley. Virtual school has been interesting and I'm not sure if it's a good or bad thing that I've been so relaxed about schoolwork when it's on the virtual days. He came down the other day asking me how to spell "you" so I felt very good about whatever industrious project he was working on up in his room. Then he came down with his computer, very excited to show me his assignment he had written in alien ... heaven help his teacher this year. I did try to encourage him to expand on his work so he wrote at the bottom "I was writing in alien." Apparently alien is a very complex language, if you look he's translated up above and it says, "Hello, how are you?"

He also was outside playing basketball with me and Patrick one morning and eventually I asked him, "Don't you think you have a school zoom call by now?" He ran back in and it turns out he had missed about an hour of some class. Oops.

We have a great time outside right now. I could take so many pictures of this cute little dumpling. 

Standard Patrick face. I describe it as joyfully naughty. 

He showed Juliet how to scream with joy on swing rides. 

She is a good student.

Cub scouts started back up.

Patrick was thrilled to finally get to be an official cub scout. This cool kid. Pandemics aren't my favorite but this family is, and we're having a pretty great time together.