Hazel with a captured kitten

We are now living in Houston, Texas.  Danny came down here right after finals to start his new job, and the girls and I were able to follow about three weeks later when Veta and Hazel were finished with their school.  The drive down here wasn’t terrible – my girls are so great at keeping each other entertained and happy while on the road; we were able to make it in just two days instead of the three I had planned for originally.  I thought it was interesting that the temperature was 42 degrees when we left Idaho, in the 50s when we left Denver, and 101 when we got into Texas…and it was only May!  I expect it will be even hotter the further we get into the summer.  The apartments we are staying in are pretty nice – I particularly enjoy the high ceilings and open floor plan.  The girls love the pool, and thus far we have gone to the pool (which is right outside our backdoor) just about every day since getting here.  There have been no sunburns yet, but we are going through the sunblock at a pretty ridiculous rate!  Veta and Hazel also discovered a stray mother cat with three kittens that hang around our apartment building, and much of our sandwich meat has gone to bribing them into being petted. 

Danny is officially a student of civil engineering now.  He starts his sophomore year this fall.  He has been getting such good grades; I am so proud of him!  He loves school and was a little sad for the year to be over, and is eager for the fall to begin so he can get back to it.  We are thinking about applying to BYU to finish up his degree next year – they have an excellent engineering program there and he thinks it would be so awesome to take a class from Spencer.  I think it would be a nice change of scenery, too.  I’ve missed those Utah mountains!

Veta and Hazel enjoyed climbing Rachael's trees during our day in
Colorado on our way to Texas - and yes, that is Yoda holding her up!

Veta graduated from the fourth grade with perfect grades.  Her ISAT scores were all in the highest rankings again.  She was also a Star Tutor this year.  Star Tutors are students who volunteer to help younger children who are behind in their grade level catch up to where they need to be.  They give about 20 minutes every morning to do this.  Veta’s main pupil didn’t know her alphabet when Veta first met her, but at the end of the school year, she was reading!  It was neat to see how proud Veta was of this little girl’s accomplishments.  We haven’t pursued Veta’s career in acting/modeling very well since March, when she was an extra in her first movie.  We have just been so busy with other things!  However, we did meet Lacey (through Dale’s friend Braden) who will be coaching Veta when we get back from Texas.  Lacey has been doing acting, modeling, and singing for years and seems very enthusiastic about working with Veta.   All three of my girls love her; I’m glad we met her!  Also, as you can see, Veta has gotten glasses.  She kept complaining that she couldn't see the board at school even though the yearly eye exam people (from Walmart that check visions at the school) reported her as having perfect vision.  I took her to a real optometrist and was informed she definitely needed glasses.  She's happy with clear vision again, but we are now looking into getting contacts for her.  Veta has also lost several more of her baby teeth; she pulls them out when they get loose enough instead of waiting for them to just fall out.  For a while, it seemed she was losing a tooth every week!  It's slowed down considerably now; she can't have too many more left!

Veta took a field trip to Texas Roadhouse with her
school.  They got a tour of the restaurant and then
they got to make shapes with bread dough.  Veta
made this cute flower for me!

My three girls at Kristy's wedding in mid-May

Hazel loved to swing in the trees, too!

Hazel went skating for the first time at a birthday
party for one of her friends.  She said she had so
much fun and was eager to go again!

Hazel also graduated from Kindergarten with perfect grades.  She loved school so much!  She made so many new friends and had several little boys quite enamored with her.  Hazel thinks that she would like to modeling and maybe acting with Veta if she can get over her shyness.  Meanwhile, she loves to play Barbies with Veta (especially her mermaid ones now that we have a pool), draw and color, and practice reading and writing.  I am very impressed with the progress she made in school!  Hazel received an eye check up around the same time that Veta did.  It was discovered that while she has a very slight astigmatism, her vision is still perfect.  The doctor gave us a prescription for her eyes anyway, just in case it started to bother her, and Hazel begged for me to get her some glasses!  We got some for her, but of course, she never wore them and we donated them when we moved to Texas.  Either way, I was very glad I remembered Zenni Optical to order cheap glasses from!

Hazel in her graduation cap headed home from school after
the graduation ceremony

This is the way Gemma eats cookies when left to her own devices.

Gemma loves to do whatever her big sisters are doing.  She prefers a real cup over her sippy cup and has a mouth full of teeth – she’s only missing a couple of her molars now.  Gemma tries to be independent.  She won’t ride in the cart at the store any more, but when I put her on the ground, she doesn’t like to stay with me.  I’m seriously contemplating a leash for that baby!  She insists on climbing into her car seat by herself and even tries to do the buckles.  She loves to go up and down stairs, too.  Her vocabulary is growing, although mostly I hear, “No!  Mine!” and “Veta!  Stop!”  (Veta doesn't even have to be teasing Gemma for me to hear this - Gemma just blames everything on Veta!)  Gemma also loves to talk on the phone.  She doesn’t care who is on the other end, just as long as she can hear someone.  I often catch her talking to my voicemail, although sometimes she calls random numbers from my phone book and actually gets a real person on the line.  Whenever my phone rings or beeps to alert of a text message, Gemma gets so excited!  If I don’t have my phone near me, she will run to grab it and bring it to me.  Sometimes I don’t even hear it make noise and she will bring it to me to let me know that someone has texted or called.  Gemma always asks me, “Daddy?” every time I get a text.  It’s been hard on her to have her daddy be away for so long!

Gemma climbed whatever she could get her foot
up onto - I had to watch her carefully to rescue
her from the many precarious situations she
got in!

Despite the cooler afternoon temperatures in Colorado, Gemma
and Lila couldn't resist the water features at the park we went
to.  They were soaked in a very short amount of time.

Gemma was right at home on the bouncy horse while she chatted
on the play cellphone she found.