Kylee Turns THIRTEEN!!

I'm just not sure how it's possible that we already have a TEENAGER in our house. I feel like it wasn't that long ago that she was a tiny little girl. Now she's all grown up! She's been wanting a Kindle for a LOOOOONG time, and I finally decided to get one for her birthday.

For her cake she wanted a Mockingjay from the hunger games. She found a photo online and asked me to copy it.

Here are some facts about Kylee right now:

She is in 8th Grade at Camino Real Middle School -- though in New Mexico school is still 100% online so she doesn't actually get to GO to the Middle School. She is just about to start Level 3 in piano (she's behind because we slacked with lessons for a while), and she also plays the Flute really well. She is the President of her school's FCCLA club, and she is super excited that our area has recently started doing in-person YW activities again. She loves to ride her bike around the neighborhood with her friends, and she is a great babysitter. She also makes the world's best macarons, and has recently been teaching several of her friends (and their moms) how to make them as well. She's excited for her upcoming NYC/Washington D.C. 8th grade trip that happens at the end of the school year.

One day while grandma was still here we went out to find the slot canyon we'd heard about near our house. The kids thought it was AMAZING. It's fun that there are so many different types of things to explore in our area. Who would've thunk (yep, that's a real word!) there would be a slot canyon here? It's pretty short, but it's cool how you can see all the layers that the water cut through over time.

At the end of the slot canyon there were a TON of cairns. Apparently everyone who comes up there builds more just for fun. Some are huge, some are tiny, and they are all over the place. The kids call it "Karen [cairn] City".

One night I was taking a bubble bath and Andy put Colby to bed. He snuck out of his room and came into the bathroom "cuz I want to be by you, mom." I told him, "Okay, you can be in here for a few minutes, but you have to lay down and by quiet." Within about 2 minutes he was sound asleep on the little rug.

January!!

One day Andy and I left to go get Taco Bell for the kids for lunch. It's about 3 minutes away from our house. While we were in the drive-up there, Kylee called and was freaking out because Colby had hit his head and was bleeding all over the place. When we got home there was blood EVERYWHERE. Like drops the size of quarters from one end of the house to the other. Apparently he ran around frantically looking for his blankie. It was so sad. He had blood in his eyes, up his nose, in his mouth...literally EVERYWHERE. Andy got him all cleaned up and I took him to get stiches.

When he was laying on the bed waiting for them to do the stitches, he kept wanting me to hold my phone up on reverse camera mode so he could see what it looked like. Then a girl came in to wash it all off again (it had been dripping blood all down his face and into his ear and hair while we were waiting), and he made me hold the camera up so he could watch. Then he said "She's not even wiping the right spot!" She thought it was hilarious that he was critiquing her cleaning skills.

When they finally came in to start stitching, they moved a bright light over and he didn't like it. They told him to just close his eyes and he was like "I can't. Mama, you put your hand up on my eyes." So I had to sit there with my hand shading his eyes while they stitched so that he could keep his eyes open. He wanted me to hold the phone up still so he could watch, but I told him I couldn't. He kept saying things like "I don't know what they're doing to my head!" Eventually he got all fixed up with 6 stitches and we headed to Sonic to get a milkshake because that's what I promised him if he was brave.

We headed home to finally eat our Taco Bell and have our shakes. Judging by the mess on his face, I think he enjoyed his!

A couple days later Grandma Karen came to visit. We took the kids on a hike up to an old mine in the mountains.

On the way up we passed a few cows. We wondered what they could possibly drink because it's dry as a bone up there!

We also passed this old house. We assume maybe the miners used to live here? But then later we researched the mine and found that it was only used for one year...so who knows?

Ally wasn't so sure that these sketchy wood beams were going to keep the mountain from collapsing on us.

They apparently mined Flourine here. It's this sparkly rock that looks like crystals. Most of it is white, but some parts were purple and green.

We also got a shed for our backyard so we could keep the lawnmower, bikes, and tools in there. It's so nice to have them all out of the garage!

One morning I convinced Andy and Karen to go on a 5.5 mile hike that I'd been wanting to do. It got pretty steep in some places, but the views were beautiful.

If you look closely at this photo (below) you'll see a whole family of deer that wandered across the trail in front of us. There were 8-9 of them.

Another day we took the kids to the cave I'd been to a few weeks before. At first they weren't so sure about crossing the freezing water, and Andy had to carry Colby and then Skyler, but Ally and Kylee survived, so on the way back Skyler decided that he could be brave, too.

They all loved exploring the cave, and decided that the hike was worth it to get there.

I'm sad that this one is blurry, but I used it anyway because it shows how skinny one of the spots was. Colby got his shoe stuck for a minute and had to have someone help him push it through. It's total darkness in there, so it's hard to get good photos!

This is what Colby like to do while I work. He sits under the desk and plays with his toys.