Last Week of Summer

Knowing it was our last week of Summer I wanted to enjoy it with some fun activities with the kids. Tuesday morning we had to stop at the school for Savanna's kindergarten assessment test. She did very well while Miles and Avery tore apart the class room. After the test we headed up to Thanksgiving Point Farm Country. We had never been before I wanted to take advantage of the 2 buck Tuesday deal. It would have been well worth it to me to go on another day, pay full price and not have to deal with the crowds! It was nuts, but the kids had fun anyway. They got to see and smell various farm life and go for a tractor ride. We had lunch at the restaurant there then stopped to get new shoes for the girls on the way home. I wanted Savanna to get velcro shoes for school so she could easily get them on and off by herself. She picked out her own shoes so Dora the Explorer will be going to kindergarten with her. A couple of days later she brought me some older shoes she has and showed me that she can now tie her own shoes, no problem. I hope I haven't stunted her shoe tying ability by making her wear those velcro ones anyway, oh well!
Later in the week we spent some time at the splash pad and playing in our backyard. We ate popsicles and ice cream cones too. On Saturday we went up Provo Canyon and had a picnic with my family and went to Bridal Veil Falls. The kids loved sitting at the bottom off the falls fishing rocks out of the water and throwing them back in. We also happened to have Backpack (we like Dora ok?) with us and filled him (her?) up with river rocks. While we were at the park having our lunch, there were a couple of guys going around with metal detectors. My dad filled his pockets with change and casually walked around the field where the metal detector guys were. My dad started dropping change at random spots in the field, just to give the guys something to find you know? That's just the kind of guy my dad is, kindhearted and helpful. I don't think I have laughed that hard in a long time!

Manual Labor

The joys of being a land lord are in full abundance lately! James and I get to trade off either telling adults to clean up their messes or just cleaning it up for them! It's awesome! I'm being sarcastic of course. The Orem house is giving us grief again (as per usual), so we have had to put more work into it. We have gotten discouraged, but right now we are being positive about the whole thing and just getting it done. This post is mostly being written as a shout out to my husband. He has been working himself to the bone this summer. Work with his business has been extremely busy and when he is not doing that he is working on the apartment. I wanted to help out and take some of the pressure off him, so I offered to do some of the apartment work myself. Monday I spent an entire FOUR hours cleaning and prepping the place for paint. At the end of the day I was exhausted! My eyes, nose, and throat hurt, I was so dirty and tired. Today I was there for just over FIVE hours doing some more grunt work because I have no skills. I am also very tired today. The whole time I am working I am thinking, how does James do this? I have been here for two hours and it sucks and James works like this for 12, 15, 20 hours a day! He is Super Man and I am a huge wuss. For all my hard work this week I get to have a break and go to dinner with a friend tomorrow while James does a backyard camp out with the kids. Things seem a little unbalanced, don't you think? I can make myself feel a little better by remembering that James has never used the dishwasher since we moved here five years ago.

Things I Don't Want To Forget

This post is for random, completely unrelated events that don't deserve their very own post but are things I don't want to forget. Most of life is like that actually, random events that somehow merge together to form an existence. And because it's my existence, I better not forget! I will start with "I am grateful for the splash pad." Last year a new park opened up about 5 minutes from our house. The best part of the new park is the splash pad. The kids love it, and it has given us something new to do this summer, it's free and safe and a great way to cool off!




Next: Funny posing and playing with camera. Savanna and Miles like when I get the camera out, especially Savanna. She is always posing in weird ways and making funny faces. They also like to take pictures themselves. One day we were playing in Miles' room and Savanna and Miles started playing "freeze pose", a game Savanna made up. I got out the camera and we took a bunch of silly pics, it was fun.
Finally: Paint Stick Swords. As I was preparing for Miles' pirate party I came across a crafty blog that had the idea of making swords out of paint stirrer sticks. I went to Home Depot and got a bunch, the sign said FREE! Take as many as you need! Sweet! My mom came over and helped us make them. We cut, painted, glued, and wrapped leather around the handles. I think they turned out pretty cool.
The End!

Savanna Starting School

I love summer and I hate winter. I am so glad it's summer, but it is going way too fast! I have already mentioned my anxiousness about Savanna starting school, and I think that has a lot to do with why I feel this summer is just slipping away from us. I am trying to make each day count before my little five year old leaves me! Okay, it's not like she is going to Japan for ten years, I need to relax. Do all moms go through this when their first child starts school? Some moms I know are so excited for school to start. They can't wait for their kids to be out of their hair but I feel different. I quit my job about three weeks before Savanna was born and I have not had a job since. My kids have never been to day care, they are always with me. This is a huge blessing and something we (James) have worked really hard for. It feels so strange to turn my daughter over to people I don't know five days a week. I know it is something that almost all kids go through. I did, of course, and I am excited for Savanna to have the experience of school but I do have some reservations. I don't like not knowing what she is doing and how people are treating her. I hope that we have done a good enough job with her so that she will be able to stand up for herself and know what is appropriate and what is not. I know that my Heavenly Father gave me these children and has entrusted me to raise them, teach them, and protect them. I feel like sending them away at such a young age is well, almost wrong. As I read this I know it may sound a bit extreme. I mean, it's only kindergarten! I think I just need it to begin so I can see how normal and good school is, but I also don't want it to begin at all. Summer forever! I love my kids, I love being a mom and I hope I am doing an okay job. I am sure I will be the one crying on the first day of school.

My Pirate Birsday!!

Miles just turned 3! Miles has been into pirates lately so we decided on a pirate party! We have been talking about it for months. We had been talking about it so much that one day Miles told me, "Mom, my birsday is July 21st and I am having a pirate birsday." It's always birsday, never birthday. We had the party at the new park here that has a splash pad and a fun playground. The one thing they don't have there is shade, it was so hot, but I think everyone had fun anyway. I know Miles did! He was such a good boy all day, so happy and excited! I can't believe he is 3! To me it actually almost seems like he is older! Miles was only 10 months old when I found out I was pregnant with Avery. This was not a planned pregnancy and I pretty much freaked out. I feel like I missed a huge chunk of Miles' babyhood because when the news of Avery came, I pushed Miles to grow up fast. I was terrified to have two babies! This is something I regret because I almost don't remember that year or so of his life. Poor Miles, I'm a terrible Mom! Maybe I made it up to him with an awesome party? I try to remember to slow down and enjoy all my kids everyday. I love Miles, he is the goofiest, sweetest little boy! My parents gave him a slip n' slide and he didn't really know what it was when he opened it. Finally he exclaimed, "I got my very own river!" So cute. Happy Birthday Miles!

Time Well Spent

I was talking to my mom recently and she was saying how important it was to make memories with your family. She said, "Do your kids remember what they got for Christmas last year? Or their birthday? No, but Savanna is still talking about the time we all went to the zoo together. (which was before Miles was born!)" She said that the toys and stuff they collect won't mean nearly as much to them as the things we did and the time we spent together. I haven't had the best attitude about Savanna starting school this fall, and there really is no reason for this except that I am so sad that she will be away from me and that my kids are growing up so fast! I felt like since this is the last summer we have before "real" school begins, I really wanted to make it a summer to remember. While we can't vacation all over the world, or even make to the swimming pool each week, my kids are happiest just playing in the backyard. I've said it before but it's true, even though motherhood makes me tired and stressed sometimes, I love it. I can't imagine doing anything else, that's why it scares me that they are growing up! What am I going to do when they are gone? I guess I will worry about that later, but for now I am enjoying this time well spent.

4th of July!

What?! It's the 4th of July already?! Less than two months until my Gooshie goes to Kindergarten? AHHH! ... Anyway, we love the 4th of July! This year was especially enjoyable for many reasons, some of which I will now share with you. We are right in the middle of the busy season for James' business and he has been so busy! This is awesome, but it means he is gone a lot, so on the 4th of July he got to spend the entire day with us, which was so nice. We have had a tradition for the last few years of going to the hot air balloon launch in Provo then to breakfast at the park, so we carried on the tradition this year. Waking up at 5:45 on James' first day off in months seemed insane, but we did it anyway (we made up for it later with the entire family taking a three hour nap). Because of weather conditions, the balloons didn't get to actually fly, just like last year. The kids had fun seeing a few of the balloons filling up, but were kind of grumpy and hungry. James and I decided that next year we'll skip the balloons, sleep in, and head straight for breakfast. We went to the Scera park in Orem this year and had doughnuts and breakfast burritos, we don't mess around. It was a cloudy day too, so it wasn't too hot to play on the playground for awhile. Miles still likes to swing in the "baby" swings at the park but one of them was wrapped around so the swing was really high up. James put him in there anyway. We had to flip the swing upside down and slide him out head first to get him down. After the park we went to get some bbq supplies and fireworks. This year Utah legalized aerials, which I thought was the dumbest idea ever, until James bought some and I saw how awesome they are! We let off a few but there were so many going off all around us, we had a great firework show from our front porch. I was a little surprised that our neighborhood didn't burn to the ground though, there were seriously so many! That's a lot of hard earned money us Americans burned up! Anyway, we had a relaxing day at home then grilled up burgers, brats, and hotdogs for dinner, just like the founding father's would have wanted. I also made a flag cake with strawberries and blueberries, so yummy! It was Savanna's idea to put the strawberries in a curvy line to make it look like the flag was waving. This year was the first time since we have been married that we spent the 4th at home. Every single year we have been at the in-laws and it was so fun to stay home! The kids were in their own environment, I didn't have to worry about them making messes or breaking things, there was no fighting to wrestle them into the car at the end of the night, we made our own dinner so we knew we would like it, and we got to see how much Spanish Forkites love fire! Family get together's are fun of course, but I think it was nice to be able to be alone together and spend some quality time with each other and our kids. At the end of the night Savanna said, "I don't want the 4th of July to be over, this was the best day ever!" I agree.