Willa has a piano recital and earns a trophy

We got news that Willa had passed the LVMTA musicianship exam a week before her piano recital. Normally, The teacher would have passed out the trophies at the recital, but this year there wasn't enough time between the two events. I tried to warn Willa that the trophy might not be there yet. The trophy was the sine qua non of the musicianship exam. She has been dreaming and talking and salivating about having her own trophy since she saw other kids get them at the piano recital last year. The idea of earning her very own was extremely motivating.

For this year's recital she played Pumpkin Boogie and was very sweet. Here is the video.

After the recital the teacher had her own awards to give out to students who had volunteered with their talent and played in church or somewhere else like that. But she called Willa up very first and had ordered this large trophy with a pink base just for her. She gave Willa an award for practicing so well. Willa does practice really well and has progressed a lot because of it, but I'm not sure if it was trophy material. Still, it was really sweet of her teacher to do it and Willa was over the moon. Her trophy was bigger than the others and pink and she whispered to me that she had been looking at it the whole recital (all the awards were set up on a little table on the side) and hoping it was for her.

Getting the award.

Sister Thornton has been an amazing teacher. I've learned so much from her just sitting in on lessons. Here's a fun fact, her husband (who passed away) did all the murals for the Salt Lake temple during the last remodel in the 60's or 70's. The Church brought her up a few months ago with his journals to meet with a church historian.

Rebecca got her a Jasmine lego set as a gift for the recital. Legos are almost as exciting as trophies, Willa loved it and has repeatedly put it together all by herself and keeps saying how much she loves it and that she is so glad Aunt Rebecca got it for her.

A few weeks later, the LVTMA trophies were ready. They also had her written exams, so I could look at how she did. She made a bunch of mistakes during the listening portion, which were really easy, so her teacher thinks she just didn't understand the questions and what to do at that point. My favorite is that she phonetically spelled her last name on the paper. It just illustrates where we are in life right now.

The real trophy.

California Friends Visit

I have no pictures to document it, but the Fjeldsteds, our best friends from USC, came about two months ago. Actually, just Courtney and their two cute kids but I was lucky enough to see them twice! On their drive through up to Idaho, their car broke down and we rescued them from the slums of Las Vegas for a few hours while it was being fixed. Then, a few weeks later on their return trip we met them at the children's museum and spent a few hours to break up their long drive. It was so nice to see them and my eyes got a little misty wishing they would just buy a house on the same street as us instead of living far away in San Diego. The best was that the kids got along so well together. Willa and Parker hit it off right away, despite it being nearly two years since they had last seen each other. When they left she asked if Parker was her best friend :).

Then last month, the Rudds came to visit. He was the bishop at USC and Ryan was his counselor and I was the Relief Society president. We have such good memories of that ward. It was kind of like playing at being a grown-up ward because we had young marrieds, little kids, and then brand new college freshman all together. He's stake president now and still up to his old shenanigans of setting the clocks in the chapel back so that any visiting authorities might not realize how late the meeting was actually starting.

They were coming to Vegas for a few days, so on a Monday I brought the girls to their hotel and we swam. Tuesday, we spent the morning at the children's museum, did the High Roller, and then they came over to our house that night for dinner. I thought about cooking, but since we were gone all day the better alternative seemed to be ordering take out from Grimaldi's, and that pizza is an experience in and of itself. It was great to see them. We miss them and all our friends a lot and we love living in Las Vegas where everyone is bound to visit once and a while.

Kate is just four or five months older than Willa. It's always fun when you and your friends have kids who can be friends.

Not a great picture, but it had Evan and Jen in it.

June gets invited to a tea party

Wouldn't you know, June is getting all grow'd up and has started having her own little social calendar. This girl is SOCIAL and when she got a real, live, paper invitation in an ENVELOPE she was beside herself with excitement and couldn't stop talking about it.

Annie, a little friend from church was turning three and having a tea party at this cute place called Rock the Tea. A princess dress, tiara, necklace, bracelet, purse, and fancy shoes were provided!

June chose to be Snow White. She was the perfect Snow White (and it's not just me - the Bishop said it too - it was his daughter's party).

They got their hair done.

They had manicures and June will tell you that she got purple nail polish with sparkles, squeal!

And they got REAL make-up.

All dolled up, look at her little hand.

BFF Lyla

Could this girl's dream party get any better? Wait for it.... Cinderella came!!! June was the only girl who had a sister just older so she knew who Cinderella was and everything about princesses. Lots of the other girls were the only girls in their family or there was a large age gap between the older sister so they hadn't been as indoctrinated as June had. June gave Cinderella the sweetest hug ever and she was beaming the entire time just looking at Cinderella and smiling.

Sweetest hug.

Cinderella didn't stop there, she painted a butterfly on June's cheek.

She helped each girl do a little fashion show with a curtsy, twirl, and blowing a kiss at the end.

Isn't this the most precious picture? Look at June's face!

Finally, there was a fancy tea party lunch of pink lemonade, pizza, and cupcakes. June's been smiling so much that it's starting to look Iike a grimace - but she was soooo happy.

They got to pick a little purse with real lip gloss and a bubble necklace for a party favor. She passed out fairly quickly. Best. Day. Ever.

Willa Graduates Preschool

Back in May, we had preschool graduation. The preschool did a lot of prep, which I'm torn about. I just want things to be simple, on the other hand, what's wrong with having fun and getting fancy?

The kids had learned songs for a little program that were cute, and they also had full a full graduation equipage of gown, cap, and tassel. There is a photo of my preschool graduation and I was wearing a cute little paper handmade cap. These days and times are no place for such simplicity and the full get-up it was.

Wills looked cute, but was not happy to be wearing any of it. It was one of the first hot days of the season, which was a bummer since was outside, but we stood in the shade and survived.

With her best little preschool friend, Rheyanna.

Timidly (and seriously) doing actions to the songs.

Graduate!

Her teacher Mrs. Scott

Family Photo! Rebecca came along and snapped a pic for us.

It was a good year of preschool and Willa enjoyed it a lot. People raved about this community center and for me it was just meh. The price was the absolute best thing about it. It was also very organized and Willa did love it. But for me, it was kind of a drive and I missed the personable aspect of a preschool run out of a home. I'm not sure I would do it again unless I lived REALLY close. But it was fun and almost every day after school we would stay after and play at the playground with other kids from her class, so I was sad to say good-bye to those moms. I hope we can get together a couple of times this summer.