Zavoral Villa!

We had a really fun 4th of July, staying home and keeping things simple this year! I love this holiday. After Tanner's birthday and after the grandparents left, Tanner started exploring some of his gifts. This is a cool circuit board builder set. I got a good shot of Jeremy's beard while he helped Tanner with his circuit experiments. He has gone 9 months with it, and I really like it. One of our Air B&B guests had a motorcycle and let Tanner sit on it! This was taken the week of 4th of July, right after eating the free school lunch in town. The boys love climbing on this wall after they eat. We did some decorating and made festive snacks for Independence Day. And read lots of patriotic books. Cutting out watermellow and making kabobs was a highlight. Our small town does two nights of fireworks with our local Concert Band and Symphony. This was our first year going to both shows. For the show on July 3, we rode our bikes there (Tanner on his own bike, Dallin in the trailor),...

On June 28, 2017, Tanner turned 6 years old! Since March, he had been talking about having a Ninja Turtle birthday party with all his friends. We have never done a birthday party with friends, so we were reluctant to let Tanner do it, especially since he doesn't do very well at big parties. We said he could invite 6 friends. Fortunately, the party turned out to be a GREAT time for him, his friends and for us! For Tanner's birthday service, I challenged him to think of things we could collect from his freinds in lieu of birthday presents that would help other children and families. I was so proud of him for making this sign that says "Cansuvfoud" (cans of food) next to the front door as friends arrived. It was a good learning opportunity for him in many ways, one of them being to trust in us. We assured him that he would get plenty of presents from family and wouldn't need anything from friends, which he found to be true.  The night before the party, Tanner got eve...