Going-Into-3rd-Grade Swim, Frisco Aquatic Center, Dates, Summer School Routine, Soccer Water Fight, Cars 3

Going-Into-3rd-Grade Swim (Picture fail...)
We have been working towards building up the community in the school and one of our ways of doing that is having a couple of room moms per grade. Courtney and I are taking on 3rd grade this year and Courtney was willing to host the first get-together at her place. We loved getting to meet a few of the new moms and just having chat time while the kids had fun swimming!

Frisco Aquatic Center
We hadn't planned to go this year but because the kids earned passes through the reading program we decided to add it to our list. They had a great time! Their favorite was the lazy "crazy" river. I went around with them multiple times but they went a few times on their own too. They didn't love the bigger slides because the line was not worth it in their opinion. :)

Dates
Brad took Lorelei out for lunch at Jersey Mikes and then to a pet store where she was able to pet some bunnies and play with the cats. Makin and I headed for our "breakfast dessert" at Krispe Kreme.

Summer School Routine
This week I worked on not over-booking us, so I it looks like a good chance to fill you in on our summer school routine! The kids are working on math facts and reading. We do our school work M-F and it typically takes under an hour. They both work on their wrap ups and then take a timed test. We are focusing on improving our time each day. The first few weeks went really well, and then the math got a little harder so we are working hard on not getting discouraged and just improving! Lorelei is content with lots of reading and Makin usually just hits his 15-20 minutes. :) They are also both writing once a week, which we just fit in on a day that we have less going on. Proud of all of us for working hard even though it is tricky to fit in before so much summer fun!

Soccer Water Fight
Coach Andy decided after running in the Texas heat for 45 minutes the kids needed to cool off with a water fight. So fun!

Cars 3
SO. GOOD.

Wildlife Encounters, Photo Shoot Fun, Park and Swim, Lego Camp, Late-Over, Smiles

Wildlife Encounters
Library activity - The kids loved getting a chance to learn more about animals...even the creepy ones! My favorite part was the turtle vs. tortoise race! They had no qualms petting any of these creatures, or even holding a children's python.

Photo Shoot Fun
We headed to Deep Ellum for pictures in front of a huge flag mural. I'm going to save those for the 4th, but wanted to include our fun after. :) We met up with friends (Courtney is way more advanced with photography than I am, but she is a sucker for a new photo spot so she dragged her four kiddos along!) so we had to have a little fun with the kids after their cooperation. :) The mall for carousel, lunch and a sweet was a fun treat for them.

Sphero
At the library Science Night we found out that they had some fun gadgets available to check out. When we put our name on the list for Little Bits, the librarian also added our name to a few more items. The kids have loved trying out this little robot ball called Sphero! Brad even helped engineer a Lego car for Sphero to "drive".

Park and Swim
We try to take advantage of summer and make sure to get together with friends we don't see much being at different schools. We met Kaitlyn and Haley at the park until they were all hot and then headed to the pool for a swim! I absolutely love making new friends but its also fun to get together with people who have known your kids before they knew their ABC's. :)

Lego "Camp"
With both kids being school age it feels like so many more friends are attending camps over the summer. You can imagine the world of possibilities living in the metroplex.  We could spend a fortune if we wanted. As we started feeling the pull towards letting the kids experience ONE camp this summer, we looked at prices and analyzed. (We are proud of setting our a summer bucket list budget this year and choosing to nix some things to stay in budget! We consulted the kids on a few items so they could choose what they thought was more important.) I'm also wary of sending young kiddos to a building/home where I do not know the adults well. This resulted in...our own versions of "camp" at home. (Lorelei will have an art/baking camp in July with friends.) Makin, no surprise, chose Lego camp. They have awesome choices around here and I think we will splurge for one eventually when he is a couple years older. However when we offered him his own camp at home and he found out he could then KEEP the Lego, this was too good an opportunity to pass up. Even though my version of this camp would involve several more kids, he was only ready to share this Lego with Charlie at this point. Maybe next year we can have more friends? Savings: $60 minimum + Mom's stress ;)

Both boys each had their own Lego set,
but since Charlies was smaller he helped Makin after he finished.

Scrappy 4th Flip Flops
(Makin's suggestion that they make these while the boys build.)

Brittany was up for baking with the girls, so they made Lego brownies for snack.

9 PM (Late-Over Party Same Day) and Still Playing with Lego Train...and still have lots of energy!

Reagan's Late-Over Birthday
Lorelei was thrilled to celebrate Reagan's birthday. They swam, had treats, played, and watched a movie. Great memories and and hope these girls can be friends for years to come. :)










Got a couple of cute pics that I don't know when I'll post so here they are! :)

Father's Day

This year Father's Day was pretty low key. Brad decided on favorite foods and watching the US Open. It was 100 degrees out so golfing for real didn't sound very appealing. ;)

We are so thankful for Brad! He is a hard worker and puts his family first. He is present for conversations at family suppers, gets the kids going with showers so I can get dishes done and laughs out loud while reading them Hank The Cowdog books. He wrestles, colors and builds with Legos. The kids really cherish time with their dad and I'm thankful he takes the time.

We were both blessed by our dad's growing up and would not be who we are without them. We are so thankful our kiddos get to enjoy visits with them and they love their Grandpa's and Papa's farms. Happy Father's Day to you both!

Reading, Dinosaur George, Chalk The Lot, New Splash Pad, Family Science Night, Peach Picking, and Puppy Pool Time

We won't have many weeks without a library run this summer.

Lorelei is devouring her chapter books. I'm still partly in shock at how much that girl loves reading, even though she is following in her mom's footsteps. On a typical day she might read 1-2 hours, sometimes more. I'm absolutely loving it. My heart feels so full of how proud and excited I am for her. Right now Lorelei is into: Dog Diaries (I'm pretty sure she has read them all.) Horse Diaries, Nancy Clancy, Magic Tree House Fact Trackers, American Girl (so far she is starting with the "oldies" Kirsten, Felicity and Samantha), Little House On The Prairie and Trixie Belden.

Makin is doing amazing on his reading as well, but not to the point of wanting to sit and read for hours. :) The summer reading program kicked off early June, which was ideal motivation for him. He is definitely an incentives kid (especially at this level of reading) so it pushed him to read more than the 15-30 minutes I ask of them. He got frustrated he couldn't keep up with his sister, but we just tried to encourage him that he will likely be at that point next summer! He was SO certain that if he did not get the prize pack of coupons the same day as his sister his would not be as good as hers. So, he got a fresh batch of determination and reached his goal. This included me consenting to letting him read silently (for this goal) as I had been making him read all of his aloud at this age. He also got extremely excited when I suggested he could read the Magic Tree House series. These are great first chapter books, and he knows them fairly well from listening to the audio books, so I knew that could help him fill in the missing words without having to ask me every time he didn't know one. Books Makin is into: Gerald and Piggie, National Geographic Kids (Anything on topics he is interested in, Dinosaurs, Storms and Rocks and Minerals to name a few. He is a fact kid.), He loves Nexo Knights and Lego books but there aren't a lot of them! Of course, Magic Tree House!

At this point you might be thinking...these kids have got to be the most photographed readers I have ever seen... ;)
Probably...

Finished his first official chapter book!

I'm not sure you all know the gushing going on in my heart with these kids taking off with reading this summer. Its just so awesome.

For the summer reading program each child had to log 600 minutes. They loved their batch of coupons which included some free meals/treats/smoothies as well as some entries in to an Aquatic Center, Museum, bowling and Basketball games. They used up their Cane's coupon for lunch right after getting these. :)

Dinosaur George - As you may remember we have an awesome summer program at the library. Mondays they have a guest speaker. Dinosaur George not only taught us some interesting dinosaur facts (eh hem...many more like theories) but he made the kids laugh SO hard. It was great. He is very talented at what he does!

Stegosaurus Plate

Chalk The Lot
Back when Lorelei was about 1 1/2 we went to The Crayola Experience in Pennsylvania. I have had this love of crayons ever since my favorite Mr. Rogers episode where they showed how crayons were made! (Most of you may remember this.) Well, The Crayola Experience is coming to this area this coming spring! It looks like it will be a fun place to visit when it opens. They had a free event to kick off the store coming and we just had to check it out.

There was plenty of space to draw with chalk. The kids saved this for the end and Lorelei had to do her "signature" artwork.
They also got frisbees and beach balls that could be colored (but didn't work great with washable markers), jumped on a spring free trampoline, played parachute and watched some chalk artists at work.

New Splash Pad
Sonya told me about a fun splash pad with slides. The kids absolutely loved it. They enjoy splash pads much more with friends! We may be going back since I forgot to bring boats!

Family Science Night
Our library program also included Family Science Night this year. We ran into Nayeli which made the girls so happy! Makin found a Little Bits kit you can check out from the library that he is totally enamored with. He spent around 45 minutes at this station.

Peach Picking
We headed out to the orchard near home and enjoyed trying to find some ripe peaches. We may need to make another trip as they were not quite ready yet. Still a fun memory and we will see if the kids want to go back again soon. :)

We also checked out the peach orchard's bee hive, climbed a few trees and hunted for ripe blackberries.

Puppy Pool Time
The Armstrongs invited us over for a swim. They also got a new puppy. Yes, can you imagine how much I'm hearing about the fact that they have TWO dogs and we have NONE. Anyway, a puppy and pool combo made this girl's day!

Celebrating 12 Years

I'm thankful for a weekend anniversary to make it much easier to enjoy our day celebrating. We decided to make our day a family fun day. The kids were very sweet and made us cards.

After church we had brunch at Harry's At The Harbor. It was delicious. It was in a community called Adriatica which has a European vibe.

We always feel a little sad on our trips to Arbor Hills because Brad is working, so we wanted him to be able to enjoy it with us. We headed there for a hike and walk in the stream. This is not something I would recommend putting on a schedule in between two cloth-napkin restaurants and we will not do again...anniversaries should not involve clothing changes in cars and park restrooms...twice. Lesson learned. ;)





We headed to our beloved Red Lobster for a huge feast and even splurged on dessert for the special occasion.

We got to chill with some wine on the patio and looked at our wedding albums. We love looking back and seeing family and friends who made the special effort to come and celebrate with us twelve years ago. Thanks to those of you reading this who are still celebrating with us each year! We are blessed by you and blessed with this life we have!

Summer Fun - Science Experiments, Summer Scavenger Hunt, Brad's Birthday, Muddy Mess, Water, Half Price Books

The kiddos absolutely love this summer bucket list item! They especially loved some of their experiments that were like "Blobs in a Bottle" Lorelei did at school. She said, "We learned a lot this year!"

We had a Summer Scavenger hunt this year. It included each kid getting the snorkel gear they have been pining for and the flippers are an enormous hit. It also included their Summer Bucket list.

We enjoyed Brad's favorite foods (which he especially enjoyed after being very low-carb for 8 weeks) as well as a bit of extra family time celebrating Brad's birthday. The kids spent several quiet time hours putting together some special gifts/cards for him. I love how excited they get to give us things like this and we were quite impressed with their creativity! It's fun seeing them using the ideas they have learned in art or at school to make these gifts. We had lunch out as a family before Brad took the gift of an afternoon off to go to a movie. We ended the day with him grilling chicken for fajitas at home.

These kids love to getting messy. We had a decent amount of rain recently and they have been spending hours just playing in the mud together. (Not typically dressed this nice...)

It wouldn't feel like summer around here without lots of water. The kids are loving getting a chance to get back in the pool. They are also loving the sprinkler on whatever half of the day we aren't at the pool. I'm enjoyed them getting tons of outside time before its 100+ degrees out!

When you talk disrespectfully to your brother and have to get out of the pool...you become the dolphin trainer.

Some of our pool fun included going to a friend's pool that has a couple of water slides!

One of our Summer Bucket List items was a trip to Half Price Books. The kids each got a $15 gift card to spend and I suppose I should be proud they were so frugal we will have to make another trip later this summer. Then it stopped raining just in time for us to have lunch at a park near the store.

I have to continue to remind myself..."The most memorable days usually end with the dirtiest clothes."
If my laundry piles are any indication we sure gotta whole lotta memories. ;)
Top right pic we got a little history lesson on cattle drives.