A Birthday and Father's Day

Father's Day was super early this year. I usually have about 10 days in between David's Birthday and Father's Day. This year, it was all within 4 days. And then he joked, that I got it over with quick and don't have to make him feel special for anther year!

First up was his 43rd birthday. The kids gave him a card, and we got him a few gifts. Shoes. Actually, that's it. He got 2 pairs of shoes. Then, Noah cried that he wanted to give him something. So, I grabbed the lantern we had just bought at Walmart and put it in a bag. Noah was happy. David acted happy. That's what Dad's do, right?



We went to the pool. Then, we went to Texas Roadhouse for dinner. David HATES to be called out and sung at a restaurant on his birthday. But, Emily really wanted them to. Meaning, Emily really wanted the free dessert. So, I slipped the waiter a note. David wouldn't get on the saddle when they came over, but Emily and Noah gladly did.


We made him a cake.


And sang happy birthday...




Then, came Father's Day. We always go to the pool on Father's Day. And we always get this same photo.


One year, I'll have to put them together in a collage.

Then, I made David his absolute favorite meal. Lasanga. I only make it once a year.

And, we hung out at home and didn't do a whole lot. Exactly what we like!

Now, I'm off the hook for a year.

Surfing, Slides and Two for Two

I've been having numerous complaints about photos not loading since I started using Flickr as my picture upload site. I ran out of room on photobucket, so I switched. Well, I'm back at photobucket now (under a new identity). :) It may take a few posts, so that flickr pictures aren't coming up at all on the main page and then hopefully, it won't crash your ipads and iphones anymore! I don't want to upset my loyal fans. All four of you! HA!

We've been going to church. It's the right time for us. The last time we tried church, I was in the lobby with Ben after 10 minutes. I wasn't getting anything out of it. Then, Noah came along. First he was sick for almost his entire first year of life, so I certainly wasn't going to put him in a childcare setting. Then, he wouldn't leave mine or David's side. He's grown a lot this year in preschool, and he's finally ready. We are finally ready.

We are going on Saturday nights typically because it's just easier for us. This is a really fun church and they had a beach blast last weekend. Lots of huge inflatable slides and stuff. Emily and Ben had fun. Noah tried climbing the ladder, found it too difficult and opted only for the bounce house. To each his own. You can see Noah trying to get up the ladder in this pic of Ben.




And they had this really cool surf simulation ride. The kids had a blast and did it about 10 times. We watched a few kids who wiped out and landed hard on the surf board, so we told the kids to really jump if they felt they were losing their balance. Luckily, they did fine. Emily may have a career as a surfer.



Emily lost a tooth on Sunday. Then, she lost another tooth on Monday. Geez, the tooth fairy is going broke!


The summer is going well. The kids are behaving and fighting is at a minimum. We are keeping up with our worksheets, reading and journals. I don't do it everyday, but probably four times a week. Right now, Emily is at piano camp and that's about all she can handle a day. The kids definitely enjoy being lazy sometimes. Well, who doesn't?

(Wow, just previewed this and those are some large pictures. If I can figure out how to make them a little smaller, I will. If not, well, you get the up close and personal view!)

Fish

Our new pool opened the other day. Oh we are thrilled! We've waited 7 years for this pool. We had our dinky one, and there was always talks of this new pool and fitness center. Well, the market tanked and yadda, yadda, yadda. The good news is, it's here and it's AWESOMENESS!

We are having lap races. Ben is flexing his muscles here because he beat me.

And when I say beat me, we took off, I swam the length of the pool and he got out and ran to the other end and jumped in. I imagine it won't be too many years before he can actually beat me. David and I raced too. I taught Ben the backstroke and breast stroke. It was a blast.

Noah is getting more and more comfortable in the water and is becoming a little fish. I think I may have just found my new favorite exercise. The pool will be open year round and heated, but I don't think I'll be swimming in the middle of winter. There is a nice hot tub too.

We were at the pool every night anyway during the summer. This just makes it more fun!

Summer, So Far, So Good

We are 2 weeks into summer, and it's going well so far. We are settling into a groove, and I've only wanted to cry a handful of times. See, my kids used to never fight. Nobody fights with Ben. He's just too easy going and too himself to bother anybody. But, Noah has come into his own this past year and him and Emily have this little squabbles. She likes to pick on him and he likes to scream about it. Then, I yell and cry and it's oh so much fun.

We've taken things away and that works a little. Now, I've threatened them with bodily harm and that seems to work way better than taking away the tablet for a day.

We spent an afternoon at our little children's museum. We had never been, and my kids had a blast.


Here's Ben building a robot out of recycled materials. He named him Alfred after the butler in the Batman.


Noah loved this table. It moved this around with air and he thought that was awesome.


Emily LOVED this snap circuit set. We left and she said she'd rather have that than a Nintedo DS for her birthday. I had never really seen a snap circuit set, but you assemble things according to different designs and different things will happen, like a light bulb will light up or the fan will run or you will get a door chime to play. It's pretty cool.


Our new gym opened. It's 24 hours now and has great equipment. Dakri and I went early one morning. And by early, I mean I had to set my alarm and she was here to get me at 6:55. Not my cup of tea. Then, this happened....

I'm on the elliptical machine and there are these tiny peek a boo windows up top and I had to deal with this for 15 minutes. Not fun! I decided that was my sign that I shouldn't go back that early. :)

Ben went to a birthday party and they had a zipline. How fun is that????


And we've been at the pool every day. I told Noah that this summer he will become a swimmer. All of our kids officially lose the floaties the summer before Kindergarten. He's old enough and doesn't need them. Last week, he was crying. Literally, crying so hard he was shaking because he feared he would drown. This week, he seems to have gotten over that fear and is swimming around.


He spent 30 minutes swimming around to people and going from the stairs to the side of the pool yesterday. This means, I can't gab with my friends and play on my phone while my kids swim. I actually have to watch him. He can stand in the shallow end, so I think he feels comfort knowing he can just stand up if he gets in trouble. He's doing great and we are so proud of him.

Our new big pool opened today. Finally. It was supposed to open a month ago. We haven't been yet, but are super excited to go. It'll be a nice change of pace and just what we need this summer.

Happy Campers

This is our fourth camping trip. I can actually say that we are becoming campers. It's getting easier and we know the drill. It helps that we do all our meals with our friends, so we don't have to do any cooking on our own. This was our first trip to Dogtown Lake in Williams, AZ. It's about 90 minutes from our house. We went with a large group of 12 families and stayed in the group campsite. I liked it because the lake was a 2 minute walk from our camp and not right behind it. It makes me nervous to have water so close with Noah.

The weather was nice and cool the first day and the kids got right to playing.


I took the boys on a walk to the lake. That little mountain in the back is a small ski spot in the winter.






Ben kept doing bunny ears on Noah. I told him not to do it to him, so he did it to himself.




Noah and Ashlyn get along great. She is six and such a fun little girl!


We got to have a campfire! We were shocked. It's like a matchbox here. The Sedona fire is only about 30 miles from our campsite. But, since we had a designated ring and we kept it small our camp hosts said we were fine. That meant smores!!!!




Noah was helping David gather fire wood.




We shot BB guns. Such fun!


Ben couldn't hit the can, so he went for the close kill.


Same with Noah...


Then, he hit the can so good, it did a backflip!


The Dads were having a blast. Doesn't David look hot with a pink gun? Look at those eyes, that focus! So sexy!


Noah was pretending to be Olaf from Frozen.


One of the best parts of camping is the relaxing!


Here's part of our huge group just chillin'.


Alanah lost her retainer, so they had to search for it in the garbage.


One of the boys got a ladder ball stuck in a tree (don't ask) and the guys were trying to get it out.


The weather was nice and cool until the second night. It rained. About half of the families were in trailers and the other half in tents. Us tent folk, all hopped in a trailer. Dakri's had 12 people in it!


When it let up, we went to our tents and then it started back up. Luckily, we were all snug as bugs and went to bed early.

The next day was beautiful and we walked to the lake.


The lake was really low and we were in way to shallow water, but the kids just like to fish. We don't really want to catch anything.



We only had 2 poles, so Ben made his own pole with some line we found.


Noah was doing this little photo shoot and striking a pose with each click of the camera.


We went for a hike that afternoon. You can kind of see some gray smoke in the background. That's the Sedona fires.


Noah went for at lest 10 hikes and each time, he brought me back a flower. He's so sweet.


Then, an afternoon game of whiffle ball. Parents vs. Kids. Kids won, but parents let them.


Some of the kiddos.


Here's most of the kids. Some were missing too. There were 23 kids in all.


This was silly faces.


And our epic fail of a jumping photo. Well, Emily nailed it.


More relaxing...


And beautiful sunsets....


I'm wearing Ben's sasquatch hat.


It was such a great weekend and such a great way to kick off the summer!

Who Wants To Get Stupid?

We kicked off our 73 days of summer vacation with a wonderful three day long camping trip. I have a mountain of photos to sort through and a long post about all of that to come. Today feels like our first day of summer vacation since we are home. I let the kids do whatever they wanted this morning until 10:00. Then, I told them summer is fun, but it makes you stupid. Who wants to get stupid? Luckily, nobody raised their hand.

I'm asking them for 1 to 2 hours a day of their time for school work and chores. That's not too much to ask I don't think. They were all very receptive to it. Emily even wanted to grade everyone's paper when they were done. There are so many online worksheets to print for free. It's awesome. Ben and Emily did a math assignment and wrote in their composition books about our camping trip. Noah did some work on the letter A and the number 1. It's better than having them sit on the DS or tablet watching youtube videos all day long.

I usually do this every summer and then after a few weeks, I get lazy and my kids get stupid. I'm vowing to not let that happen this summer.

Noah's Preschool Graduation

Well he made it! The night was such much fun. I love watching all these little kids get dressed up and look so cute!

This was my favorite picture of him which was in his memory book.


But tonight, I tried to capture that same photo, but didn't quite get it. He makes me laugh.



Emily took this of the three of us. I need to teach her to zoom and center.

This one is a little better.


Here he is after they walked in.


You can tell he's a little freaked out.


Then, they sang. Grand Old Flag was Noah's favorite.




He got his diploma.



Then, he had to stand and wait for the other 30ish kids names to be called.


This little girl got bored and started flirting with Noah.


I'm not sure if he was impressed.


Well, maybe he is impressed, or at least surprised by something.


Oh yes, someone has a crush.


I don't think Noah feels the same.


I shed a few tears, but held up okay. Noah has one more day, a fun splash day and Emily and Ben have 2 days left. Then, we are off to go camping! What a great way to start the summer.