K'nex Creations!

A boy with a builder and engineer brain!

Matthias received K'nex for his fifth birthday.  He absolutely loves them because he can build so many different things.  He spent a lot of his time this Summer building things from instructions or creating his own ideas.  It is really impressive how well he can follow the instructions and figure out how to make each of his creations.  He even corrects mom and dad sometimes when we do something wrong.

Lizzy's Last Day at Suttle's Preschool

Lizzy's best friend Cordelia and good friend Christian

Lizzy loved being at the Lanette L. Suttle's Child Development Center at Georgia State University.  It was so nice to have her so close to where I (Cheryl) was during the day and great that she could be there for long days for my busiest year in school so far.

She spent one year at the 2 year old class with Ms. Gennie and Ms. Michelle and a couple of months in the 3 year old preschool class with Ms. Iris and Ms. Melissa.  She grew to love her friends there.  On her last day, she was sad to leave her friends, but also excited about the prospect of spending time at home with mom and starting at a regular preschool in Decatur.

Ms. Gennie

Ms. Iris

Ms. Melissa

Summer Vacation

We had such a fun summer trip this year.  We drove from Atlanta to Cokeville, WY and spent time with the Teicherts.  Matthias got to feed a bottle to a calf, which was awesome.  Sadly I missed that picture.  It is always so peaceful and wonderful.

Picturesque Cokeville

We then traveled onto Burley to spend time with the Garn side of the family.  We had fun boating, getting our teeth worked on, recelebrating birthdays, and spending time with family.

Josh is the best!

I dropped a ski!

Family tubing time

Getting adventurous

Grandpa cleaning Lizzy's teeth

After spending time in Burley, we traveled down to the Salt Lake/Provo area and Matthias was able to spend time with Kirsti.  She took him to the Museum of Creativity

So happy together

From there Matthias and Lizzy went with Grandma Garn back to Idaho while Josh and I flew to Beijing to spend time with the Lewis family and celebrate Paul's graduation from high school.  We were able to tour around, eat awesome food, and spend time with family.

All about this guy.

Yup, that's him

It's always surprising what you can find in Beijing

Took a bike tour through central Beijing.  Tian An Men Square is behind us.

Waiting for the acrobat show to start

From there the Lewis clan took a trip down to Hong Kong.  It was so fun to spend time in the Hong Kong temple with Josh, two of my sisters, and two brothers-in-law.  And it was fun to show Josh around where I spent four years of my life.  

At the Hong Kong Temple

The lights of Central are behind us

Matrix moves on the peak tram

View of Central from the Peak.

Sister love at the Tiantan buddha

Sadly, the trip had to come to an end.  While we were in Asia, Josh's mom  drove with Richelle and the kids down to California to take them to Disneyland and Lego Land.  So, Josh and I met everyone in California.  We were so happy to see our cute kids again.

And we were able to spend one full day together at Disneyland.

The day after Disneyland was a Sunday and we were happy to be able to see Grandma Janice and Poppa Paul.  The kids had a great time getting to know Grandma and Poppa and we had a lot of fun chatting.

After being in California, Josh flew back with his parents to spend time in the western United States, while I drove back with the kids.  We were luck to have Richelle with us on the first leg off the drive from California to New Mexico.  We were able to stop and climb trees with Aunt Richelle along the way.  We were also able to go to a splash pad and fishing with Aunt Richelle and Uncle Jared.

Chipmunk Cheeks!

Fishing!

Fishing with Uncle Jared is awesome!

The kids and I then took two more days to drive from New Mexico all the way back to Atlanta.  We stopped in a nice hotel half way and the kids enjoyed swimming in the pool the morning before our last day of driving.

Such a fun trip.  We were so sad when it was over, but also happy to be home.

Last day of Pre-K

Matthias had a great year at Pre-K with Ms. Gabriel.  She was a great teacher and really helped him improve.  At the end of the school year, Ms. Gabriel said that he thought Matthias would grow up to be a reporter because he is so good about sharing lots of stories (we have no idea what he was sharing at school!).  Matthias told his class that he wanted to be a builder when he grows up.  A fun last day for Matthias.

Matthias with Ms. Gabriel

Matthias at his Pre-K, College Heights

Joint Birthday Party

Matthias celebrated his fifth birthday and Lizzy celebrated her third birthday this year.  We decided to hold a joint birthday before school let out and everyone disappears at various points in the summer.  Lizzy was insistent that she wanted a Frozen theme for her party, but Matthias wasn't totally into that and wanted super heros.  So we compromised by having a mishmash themed birthday party.  So many fun friends joined us to celebrate!  It was a great day at the park.

Lizzy is three!

Matthias is five!

Lunch with friends at the park

Blowing out candles on Frozen/Ironman cupcakes.

Some of the fun friends that came to celebrate with us.

Pin the carrot on Olaf.

More Presents

Easter 2014

Happy Easter from the Garn Family.  We had a lot of fun doing our Easter traditions (egg hunts and bunny cake).

Cool kids with their Easter baskets

I looked away for a second and the kids decorated like crazy!  Such a fun cake!

Easter egg hunt in our community

More importantly, we focused on Jesus' life, crucifixion, and resurrection.  Both kids loved watching the Easter videos on LDS.org and asked to watch them repeatedly.  The message of our Savior seemed to really sink in with Matthias.  I was able to sit with his class on Easter Sunday.  He had finished up what the teacher had asked him to do, so I encouraged him to draw an Easter picture for me.  I thought he would draw something about the Easter bunny or egg hunts, but instead he drew a very thoughtful picture.  He first drew Jesus on the cross and told me about how Jesus died.  Then he drew the empty tomb next to Jesus and said that Jesus was buried and then came to life again.  I'm so grateful for his testimony and the knowledge that we have that Jesus lives.

He Lives!