New Years Eve

Our last moments of 2017 were spent with family at the Terry's house. We gathered for dinner and then a game of mafia/murder in the dark.

We skipped out on dessert to get home to put kids to bed, but paused long enough for a glass of oreos and milk to ring in the New Year together as a family!

All the kids were in bed long before midnight expect for Madi who was working so hard on her new Book of Mormon study guide. I couldn't argue with her desire to stay up to study the scriptures until midnight! 

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!

Christmas Card 2017

Dear friends and family, 

We love you all and feel so blessed to have seen many of you this past year (whether in person, or living vicariously through social media). Either way, are grateful to have you in our lives.  2017 has been a good year, filled with many blessings and memories . . . 

• Spencer got his ASA sailing certifications, joined a sailing club, and now is dreaming about buying a boat and sailing to Hawaii (easy there tiger…maybe some day!). He also became a named partner at his firm - Beach Cowdrey Jenkins, LLP has a nice ring to it! He’s very busy and enjoying (most of the time) all the responsibilities that go with this new gig. 
• Anie loved sledding in the Utah snow (January), the Rudd family reunion in Park City (August) and lots of visits with friends! She looks forward to her morning runs, nap time, Spencer coming home from work, and spending time with her kids, especially when they’re all happy and helpful! She loves getting to work in Calvin’s kindergarten class every week  
• Madi (10) has taken after her mama and started running every morning before school. She also fell in love with tennis this year. She just finished her 1st year on the violin and is coming up on her 4th year playing the piano. Music, art, and reading are her passions. Harry Potter and knitting scarves were her biggest obsessions of 2017. She’s recently started babysitting her brothers and opened up a whole new world of freedom for her parents! A 2017 highlight for Madi was getting braces on in May. 
• Elle (8) fell in love with dance this past year. We always find her making up her own routines, doing leaps, cartwheels, backbends, and jumping into the splits. She’s excited for her first year of basketball starting this month. Elle’s taken off with reading and loves school - having an awesome teacher makes all the difference. She is super responsible, organized, and loves to clean the entire house to surprise her mom. Getting baptized in August was her biggest highlight of 2017.  
• Calvin (5 1/2) is experiencing the magic of kindergarten. He’s constantly reading signs, telling us the speed limit, spelling words, doing math problems, and writing us notes and letters. He loves school and is a top notch student! Cal played on his first organized soccer team this past fall and also started piano lessons! He is very thankful for his pet bird, Bob, that joined our family back in March. Bob is loved by all! 
• James (21 months) is a busy boy and adored by all of us. It’s been such a magical year celebrating James 1st birthday and experiencing all the toddler firsts while having older kids to enjoy them with. James has a big cheering squad every time he learns a new word, or does something cute. And he has lots of babysitters to help alert mom when he’s getting into mischief. 

We are truly grateful for this holiday season to count our many blessings and thank our  Heavenly Father for the true reason for the season, the gift of His son Jesus Christ. We hope you are all doing well. Sending lots of love and Christmas wishes.

The Jenkins Family

Cal at 5 1/2

Just a couple of things I want to make sure I document before I forget Cal at this sweet, perfect, innocent age. . . .
 Every night he prays: "Please bless me to have good dreams and not bad dreams and really good dreams and not really bad dreams, Bless me to have really good dreams and bless me to have really good dreams and not really bad dreams ....." (says this probably 6 or 7 times in every prayer).

He also says, "Bless me not to fight or scream or kick or pinch to have temperaments."

Cal is such a sweet boy with a kind and sensitive heart.

I love how every time Cal is going to tell me something he always starts with, "Can I tell you something . . . " And if he has a lot of things to tell me, he'll continue to ask - "Can I tell you one more thing?"

And when telling me about something that happened: "And can I tell you what?"

Cal is thriving in kindergarten. I love that I get to work in his class every Monday and see how well he gets along with everybody, how obedient he is, and what neat handwriting he has compared to all the other kids in his class. He teacher pulled me aside the other day at drop off to tell me how impressed she is with Calvin's homework. He really is a top notch student and I look forward to seeing these good study habits continue with Cal over the years.

 And how lucky that he gets to have Bailey in his kindergarten class. I hope these 2 always share a sweet friendship. They really are such good little buddies. 

Cal's first soccer team!

Calvin had such a awesome first soccer experience! He got to be on the same team with 2 of his favorite buddies - Drew and Jackson. The other boys were great and the boys all got along perfectly! 

I volunteered to be the team mom so I got to know everyone really well. It was sad when the season came to an end. 

We had practice every Thursday evening and games on Saturday morning. 

Last game of the season we did cupcakes and trophies and a perfect little celebration! And a big shout out to Spencer and Madi for making the team banner for me! They did such a fabulous job! 

Cal is truly an All Star and already looking forward to soccer next year!

Halloween 2017

Halloween 2017 is in the books! We had a chef, superman, Captain American, and Herminome from Harry Potter. 

Our day started early with a school parade at Cape. Sadly Spencer was out of town (depositions in Salt Lake) so I was on my own. We actually had to stop by Boppi and Grandpa Al's early before school so Grandpa Al could do Madi's tie for her. 

The school parade was long but I sure loved every second I got to see my cute kids walk by. I wanted  to follow them around the whole parade, but didn't want to look like a total goof! 

Calvin's class was first to lead the parade and Madi's was last so we stuck around the entire time. 

Calvin just happened to have the same costume idea as his buddy Wells. Too cute not to snap a picture! 

James really mastered the stink face this Halloween! I guess that's life with a  20 month old!

Elle and Ella came up with twin costumes all on their own. Some people think they are twins or even just sisters. They are happy to be in the same class again this year. 

It really is so fun to have cousins at the same school. And makes it easy on Grandpa Al and Boppi. They got to see 9 of their grandkids at the parade this morning! So fun!

It was a busy day with early out of school. James and I picked up the kids at 11:30 and drove over to  to visit Adrienne at work and bring her some Halloween pumpkin bread. Then home for nap, piano practice and quiet time. Madi had a make-up tennis lesson at 4pm but I didn't want to stick around until 5pm. Instead we headed off to hit up some of the free Halloween  offers around Camarillo. NO luck at Jamba Juice, but Ihop was giving away free scary face pancakes to kids 12 and younger. Made for an easy, fun dinner. 

Then we stopped by to say hi to Boppi and Grandpa Al. Corinne and the girls were over there so we invited them to join us for trick-or-treating the Thunell's neighborhood. We went last year and it was a lot of fun!

James was hands down my favorite to watch this year. he was totally into it and thrilled about just having to knock on doors to be handed candy!

He'd work his way to the front of a crowd and hold his bucket high. Then he'd sign "please" (just cause he doesn't have thank you down yet), and yell "BYE" as we walked away. 

After hitting up the Thunell's neighborhood, it was getting dark and we headed over to our neighborhood with the Bowen's. It was fun to have the company. We only did half of Fremont circle and ended up getting overflowing buckets of candy!

Elle and Ava had fun sorting and trading. 

Then I got the boys into bed and stayed up to watch Hocus Pocus with the girls. Elle was tired and ready for bed by 9pm (I think the movie was a little scarier than she wanted), but Madi stayed up until after 10pm when I called it a night and said we could finish the movie later.

It was a fun Halloween despite not being with Spencer, 

Halloween Piano Recital

On October 28th the kids had a piano recital at the Camarillo Healthcare Center. It was Calvin's first recital which made it extra exciting! Sister Watson held 2 recitals this month because of everyone's busy schedules. We fit in the Saturday recital time before Elle's tumbling and Cal's soccer game. Some people just played and left. We were the last on the program, making it a pretty small group by the end.

Calvin played Hey Mr. Mummy!

Elle played Snake Dance and Ghosts of the Piano

Madi played Halloween Night and Graceful Ghost Dancer

We are so grateful for our amazing piano teacher who brings the joy of music into our home!

It was fun to have Grandpa Al and Boppi there to watch! 

Trunk-or-treat

Our ward Halloween party was on Friday the 27th this year. Loved these kids cute costume choices this year!