end of June

My mom and I celebrated June 30th together.  She retired officially!!  I hope that means we'll get to hang out more during school hours.  I also hope it means she'll get to do all the things she's wanted to fit into a summer but not enough time to do it.  My dad, siblings, and I had these beautiful earrings made for her, thanks to my sweet sister in law and fabulous jeweler - Erica Jacob. 

I also turned 34.  Since it was Saturday I went to garage sales and a stuff swap at the church.  We had a bbq and cake that night at my parent's house.  Kids are what make celebrating birthdays the most fun.  For my birthday I asked my kids to learn a song (with Jake) - I just called to say I love you.  They sang it to me in the afternoon, just us, and I couldn't have received a more beautiful gift.  I loved it, they sang so well.  It's the gift that keeps giving since I still hear kids singing parts of it to me.  Even Isaac will sing parts.

Summer to do list

In our house, the door from the dining room to the garage is painted with chalkboard paint.  On it we've got a list of things we want to do this summer.  I can't imagine we'll get to all of it, but hopefully we'll be able to manage most of it.  While my sister was in town I wanted to do a lot of them since things are always more fun with friends.  One was go to the drive in.  There aren't very many drive ins around the country anymore and fortunately Sacramento still has one.  I remember going as a kid, and I wanted my kids to have that experience before it's turned into a mini-mall or something.  We had so much fun!  The first time we went we saw Madagascar 3 and then our 2nd time around we saw Brave.  My parents have a pickup truck that the kids loved being in the back of, and the adults sat in lawn chairs. 

Another one on our summer to do list was sleep on the trampoline.  I'm so glad cousins were here for that one too.  John and Kelly braved the night with Nick and Annelise.  Carly wasn't up for it, but she joined in in the morning.

Also on our chalkboard - cement slides.  I heard a friend of a friend recommend them as a fun & free thing to do with kids in our area.  It's on the edge of a neighborhood park, Lincoln Estates Park in Roseville.  I wouldn't have thought there would be anything special with a cement slide, but hop on a piece of cardboard and it's tons of fun.  We will have to go again soon since Jake wasn't able to come with us this time. 

Yesterday we took the kids through a drive thru car wash, the kind with the spinning brushes on either side and on top.  They loved it, lots of laughing!  Try it with your kids.  Another check mark on our chalkboard summer list.

Keeping cool with cousins

The day school got out my sister and her kids arrived from Utah on a train.  We had a really great time while they were here.  It's so hot here we spent most days heading over to a friend's big backyard pool.  We also went to the splash pad a couple of times.  Nick and Carly both swim pretty well.  Annelise started our summer off with a life jacket on constantly and not ever putting her head in the water.  She's made huge progress over the last two months.  Now she can totally swim on her own and likes to swim under water.  She can swim the length of the pool if she has little fins on her feet to make her go a little faster.  Isaac now wears the lifejacket and can get around all over the place in it.  I still don't go to the pool without another adult with me so I can have 2 sets of eyes on things, and when I need to take care of Erik it helps a lot.  I'm hoping we'll get to do swim lessons again soon to strengthen these skills.

June 8th - the tree comes down

I've got lots of things I want to record.  It's hard to believe we are almost to August!  I'm going to start where I left off. 

The beginning of June the tree in front of my parents house was removed.  It was leaning into the street all of my life and was lots of fun to run up and down the trunk.  I felt like it was our own little giving tree because we played on it, and my kids played on it too.  My brother, Robert broke his arm when he fell out of the tree superman style.  Right at the beginning of June one of the main and partially exposed roots cracked and the tree leaned even more so it had to go.  We took a picture in front of it the day they took it down.