The Lieslands

The kids had their first day of school today. Andrew, 3rd grade, and Mari, 1st grade, continue their homeschool work. Elliot and Andy are in the Playgarden class this year. They were all excited to get going and had good days.

We finally got a good rain, and the kids jumped at the chance to go play in it.

Most of the baby preparation is complete and everyone is excited! Susan is almost 8 months pregnant and the baby is getting big!

Soccer practice starts this week. All three kids are playing this year. Last night Elliot had his first practice. There are only 6 kids on the team, but John let siblings join in and it turned out to be a rather large crew.

We hit the Iowa State Fair last night and had a great time. The kids always enjoy the eclectic mix the fair has to offer. This year we stumbled across a hypnotist’s show, which amazed and amused us all.

After flirting with it for years, we finally got a piano. Andrew has been interested for a while and has been playing around a lot on his keyboard. His third grade curriculum calls for a musical instrument so we think that now is the time. Hopefully his lessons will start soon!

We hit up Stam tonight for some gelato. I have always felt that Des Moines’ ice cream screen is rather lacking, but Stam makes a good attempt at keeping it real.

Yesterday we had our annual trip to Adventureland. The Reagens scored some free tickets earlier in the year and this year we were lucky enough to be accompanied by Bianca. I took the kids most of the day and Susan joined us in the evening. The weather was great and the crowd died down by mid-afternoon so we had almost instant access to most rides.

This past weekend we took our (hopefully) annual trip to Whiterock Conservancy with the Reagens. We stayed at the 805 River Cabin, which has no running water or electricity and is right along the Raccoon River. A good time was had by all.

The kids headed cousin camp this past weekend in Kansas City. As usual, a great program was put on by the Connors. The kids had a great time and came back exhausted. All 6 cousins headed down to Kansas City this year, marking that first time that all of the cousins have been old enough to attend.

Last night we hit Andy’s third birthday party. We all had a great time.

Susan has been in full-swing getting things ready for the baby. We have a whole list of house projects we want to get done this summer and we would like to have everything ready for the baby before school starts.