Summer Fun

Lately we have found some fun ways to fill our summer days. We love going to our friend’s giant pond. They have a rope swing, paddle boats, a man made beach, a water trampoline and all the tadpoles you can catch. It’s the best.

We also discovered the new BMX track here. The kids are in love with it. They think that it’s a roller coaster for bikes. I guess it is. The funniest thing is watching little Sawyer ride his tiny bike with training wheels all over the track! He goes down huge hills and over steep jumps, and doesn’t think twice about it. He’s nuts.

A couple of times when we have been at the track, racers have been there practicing. They are cute with the kids, and teach them how to ride the track right. They get a kick out of following Sawyer around the track and watching him. They frequently glance over at me like, “Are you really going to let your kid do this?” Then they see Sawyer fly passed them, and they just shake their heads and laugh. It’s funny.


Yes, those are gardening gloves that he is wearing.
She must have caught like three feet of air.

We have also become quite avid bowlers. The bowling alley here is clean, cheap and serves really good onion rings. During the day, we are usually the only ones there. We have a good time bowling with the kiddy bumpers and our 6-pound balls. Even Macey has fun. She pushes her little ball down the lane, and then jumps up and down cheering, “Go ball. You can do it!” She’s the most entertaining part. This week, she beat us all with a score of 82. No joke.

Anyway, we are having a fun summer. It’s so nice to have so much time together as a family. That’s my favorite.

Art Week

This week we are studying art. It has been fun.

I love the self-portraits.

We also did my cousin, Tif's, color experiment. Very cool.

Our Latest Project

This week we get to spread all of this gravel in our garden and play area. This is one of three piles.

Anyone want to come and visit?

The kids are in heaven. They think that this is a toy to dig in, slide down and jump off of. They can't understand why we want to spread it out flat.

Cousins

This week my nephew and two nieces came and stayed with us from Sunday to Friday. We had the greatest time. Those kids are so kind, appreciative and FUN. I couldn’t believe how few arguments they had in six days together and how gentle they were with each other’s feelings. (And I'm not just saying that because their parents will read this.)

Here are some highlights from our fun week:

We went swimming and the kids went down the water slide one right after another about 100 times. There was a lazy river at the pool with a whirlpool in the middle of it that the kids called “the toilet”. We were then graced with a barrage of toilet jokes while they swam in it all day. They’re very creative kids.

We went grocery shopping and I gave each of the kids a list of groceries to pick out all by themselves. I learned two things. One, kids pick the least healthy and most expensive form of all foods. Two, seven kids seem like 21 in a grocery store.

We went bowling and we had a really fun time. However, I am not sure if the bowling alley will ever allow us to come back. They now have several dents in their lanes from bouncing bowling balls and melted ice cream in the holes of their balls from lots of sticky little fingers.

We went to a huge park and played games and had a picnic. We went to the movie, Kung Fu Panda, and our row laughed so hard throughout the movie that we made the rest of the theater laugh. Very cute.

At home, the kids filled the week with skits, musicals, games, four wheelers, Wii tournaments and lots of trampoline wars. They tried several times to sleep outside on the tramp, but never quite made it through the night. They got rained out twice and scared three times.

They all are such cute friends. It does my heart good to see my children being influenced by such righteous, sweet cousins. We are really lucky. What a great week!

Us

I’ll give you a quick update on everyone. I just went on a temple trip with my young women to Utah. We went to the temple, went bowling, shopped at the mall and had a pajama party. I thoroughly enjoyed myself. I’m not sure what is says about me that I truly love hanging out with those sweet girls. I’m sure it means that I’m young-at-heart, not that I’m immature.

Jason finally realized that buying a tractor is impractical, so he settled for a four-wheeler. Now he is planning on putting every attachment possible on it – snow plow, brush hog, trailer, etc. I think he is hoping that when he’s done, it will look like a tractor.

Skyler has recently discovered a big box of old books that Jason had growing up. He is loving Encyclopedia Brown, The Three Investigators, Summer of the Monkeys and Where the Red Fern Grows.  It's fun to see him enjoying the books we loved growing up.

Shaylin is very into art of late. She is constantly drawing pictures on paper, chalkboards and sidewalks. I love finding sticky notes with pictures drawn on them all over the house.

Sawyer is learning to write his letters, and he loves it. He’s so proud of himself. He will write so many letters on a piece of paper that it looks like it's been completely colored. He is so cute.

Macey is a jabber box. There is always a running commentary streaming out of her mouth. Half of the time, she isn’t even talking to anyone. She just talks. It’s my favorite thing.

Summer School

Last week was our first full week of summer. We started up our little Summer School again. I keep waiting for my kids to tell me that they are getting too old for that, but they still love it. They each picked three subjects that they want to learn about this summer. Skyler picked electronics, cartoons and optical illusions. Shaylin picked geology, cooking and art. Sawyer picked racing cars, cars that race and really fast cars. That’s it.

My kids still insist that we call roll and have show-and-tell every single day. It is so funny. Then they write in their journals, read for 20 minutes, do a science experiment or craft, have P.E. and learn about the subject of the week. It only takes about an hour, but you add that to job time and it fills up our mornings. Yay.

This week we are learning about electronics. (I had to do some major research on that one.) We also made homemade silly putty, homemade ice cream in zip lock bags and homemade disappearing ink. We’ve had fun.

We decided to go on one or two “field trips” a week. We have a big list to check off this summer. We’ll see how we do.

I look forward to summer all year. I really enjoy having my kids all to myself. Living out in the country helps too. I don’t have to hang up the “we can’t play until noon” sign on our door anymore. The only ones who would read it are the deer. My kids still play with friends several times a week, but because we all live so far apart, it has to be planned and scheduled. The rest of the time, they are mine. It’s wonderful!