Summer Thus Far

I've posted many of the following pictures on Instagram, but decided to repost them here with more detail.  I wish I had more pictures, but I'm just not that good at taking pictures.  For the most part, a camera is just one more thing to carry around and a picture is just one more thing to get my kids to do.

Alas, onto some limited pictures and too many details.

The week before school got out, we made this summer bucket list for family night.  I LOVE summer bucket lists.  They force me to do stuff.  But they also stress me out because what if we don't get everything done?!?!  Surely the children will hate me if we don't!  So I plan and plan so it all gets done and it's fun, but I also have to pull a Grandma Deon on occasion and tell the kids, "You will have fun, dangit!"

Rex got off the bus and was greeted with this on the last day of school.  Our water balloon fight.  Turns out he didn't really understand so he went inside to look for me and Alice.  I had to go knock on the door a few times, which, being the good boy he is, he didn't answer.  I finally had to go in and get him.  Then he cried because he got wet.  We tried again when Greg got home.  Greg also took forever inside because he decided to change first, but at least he didn't cry when he got wet.

Then we went and got frozen yogurt for dinner.  The way the kids acted you'd think we were feeding them kimchi.  They whinned and complained the whole time.  Don't let this picture deceive you.

We then came home and took advantage of our neighbors/landlords/friends being out of town and took a late night dip (it was 8:30) in the pool.  Henry swam for a bit but can rarely stand being awake much past 7:15, so I took him home to bed and then swam some more with the kids.  And that was all in one day.

Day 2 of summer, we decided to take further advantage of the neighbors being out of town and decided to camp at the camp site their 16-year-old built last summer.

Around 9, I tried to put Henry down in the crib in the tent but after screaming for about 10 minutes, I took him home and he and I slept in the house while Greg and the older two slept in the tent.  Greg said it was one of the worst nights of his life.  I slept quite well.  Henry actually slept through the night, which he doesn't always do.  Greg was up at 6 with the kids.  I rolled out of bed around 8.

The next week, we started on our art museum.  We learned about Michelangelo and the Sistine Chapel and recreated it.

Then we learned about Renaissance and Greco-Roman sculpture and tried our hand at that too.

Then we had swim lessons and that sucked our lives away for two weeks.

On July 3rd, Greg took the day off and there just so happened to be a day game at BB&T field so we went to the Knights Game during Henry's nap time.  But we took Henry with us.  We only lasted 7 innings.  Our parking was up anyway.

The morning of the 4th, we barely made it to the Harrisburg City parade.  And by barely, I mean, not only were we late but because the parade runs down a major highway, they only block off one side of the street so that traffic can still pass by on the other half, which means half as much seating for the parade.  We ended up sitting on a side street at the very end of the parade, but because it was a small side street the big floats couldn't turn down it.  The kids still had fun, by which I mean they got enough candy to be happy and Rex did a great job at looking at the bright side and staying positive despite the mostly crazy situation.  Next year, we'll be sure to head out a little earlier.

That afternoon, we headed to the Wheatley's.  We usually go to Greg's sister's house, but after last year when their neighbor's tree caught on fire, we decided to do something different.  So we invited ourselves and Greg's family to join the Wheatley's and their grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins.  And then word got out in the ward that the Wheatley's were having a party.  Over 60 people came.  It was big.  It was crazy.  And it was fun.  Have I mentioned here before how completed obsessed I am with the Wheatley's?  If you knew the Wheatley's like I do, you would be too.

Not to fear, in addition to more swimming, lots of food, and fire works, we also crossed a few more items off our bucket list.  We had two pinatas. Handmade by me.  I can brag it's my blog. After everyone else (including Greg) went home, Becky put the Sandlot up on the side of the house for the brave few remaining.  So Rex, Alice, and I stayed and watched the Sandlot with the Wheatley's and Overson's.  Rex, of course, was terrified of the Beast but told me something was taking FOR-EV-VER yesterday so I'll say the outdoor movie was a success.

Just this week, we went to Defy Gravity for family night.  The kids, as usual, had a great time.  Even Henry went, which meant that Greg and I didn't get to do as much since we were constantly pulling him out of foam pits, but we all had fun and slept well that night.  I didn't take my phone in, we snapped this quick picture of our wrist bands on the way out.

Friday night, Greg also let the kids stay up late to do a firefly hunt.  I didn't get any pictures, but Alice caught quite a few, which she put in her purse never to emerge or glow again.  Greg caught a bunch. I got two or three.  Rex, well, he spent most of the time playing with a glowing disk toy he'd earned for practicing piano until it broke then I think he caught one.  Then we had ice cream sandwiches and went bed.

And yesterday we went on a nice little hike at our very own Reedy Creek park.  We may have walked a mile and a half.  Maybe.  Alice only whined for the last 10 minutes or so.  Grant it, she refused to wear socks so she had a bit of a blister by the time we were done.

We stopped half way around the lake to do some landscape sketches for our art museum.  We had also planned to fished but realized as we were getting in bed the night before the hike that we don't have any fishing gear except for a Barbie pole.  This may be the one thing on our bucket list we fail to do.

Henry was in his element:dirt.  He loved every minute of the hike, that he wasn't in the pouch.  He hates that thing.

And today we made "ice cream."  We actually made snow cones with a vanilla flavored simple syrup and sweetened condensed milk.  It tasted like melted, freezer-burned ice cream, but we're counting it.  I'm not sure how homemade ice cream makes it onto our bucket list every year when we don't have an ice cream maker and I refuse to buy one because I don't want to store an ice cream maker for 364 days just to use it 1 day to cross something off our bucket list.  Wo is me and my first world problems.

And that's it.  Eleven down, nine to go.