Out With A Bang

There are only a few precious hour of summer left and as I look back on this past week, I have very few regrets.  As promised we made the most of just about every minute.  One of the most significant events of the week started on Monday and became a staple of just about every day after that.  On Monday afternoon, after previously being adamant that she didn't want to, Carrigan announced that she wanted to learn to ride her bike without training wheels.  So as to not lose the momentum, we immediately headed to the park to start working.  By Thursday Carrigan had really turned the corner and now she is practically a pro (as long as she is riding straight and doesn't have to start or stop).

Some of the other highlights of the week included a trip to the bounce house and our annual summer Oaks Park day with cousins.  The weather for Oaks was perfect this year and we rode rides from open until close.

The other big milestone of the week was that our Elsie girl turned 6 months.  She is getting bigger everyday.  She rolls from her stomach to her back and her back to her side.  She loves to do mini crunches when on her back and I can no longer put her in her bouncy seat for more than a few minutes because she pushes at the bottom with her feet so hard that she can flip the whole thing over.  She loves to eat.  She loves her fruits and veggies and loves to nurse.  In fact she has decided that she wants to nurse every 2-3 hours every night and we are getting very little sleep.  She is able to put herself to sleep at night and at naps though so fingers crossed that eventually we will get nighttime figured out.  In the meantime it is good thing she is so cute.  Happy half year birthday Elsie.

Quintessential Summer

This week for me was all about classic summer activities.  It was about playing outside, riding bikes and swinging on swings.  It was about playing at the park and at Nana and Papa's house and going to the zoo.  It was about eating snow cones and apples that we picked from Nana and Papa's trees.  It was about having a Kool-aid stand where you drink more of the product than you actually sell.

It is a good thing we got some of these activities in before it was too late.  This coming week is the last week of summer and it is time to have "meet the teacher" and get ready to get back at it.  I wish there was a way to slow down time.  I wish there was a way to have more of these precious summertime moments with my kids.  I can tell you one thing for sure, I am going to make the most of every moment of this coming week.

Return of the Fun

After the craziness of last week, this week, thankfully, the good times returned.  We laughed, played games, and went to fun places.

One of my favorite stops of the week was to the river beach (Merrick's pick).  We found a good spot next to a stream that fed into the river.  Carrigan loved playing in the stream and on the sand.  Merrick discovered that he could swim all the way across the river (it was very still) to the island in the middle of the river.  They both had a great time.

Also this week we hit the Children's museum (Carrigan's pick).  Ben and Becca are out of town and left Colvin with Nana and Papa so we scooped him up and took him with us.

 
My favorite stop of the week (Jeremy's pick) was Silver Falls State park.  We went on a hike and played in the river.  A couple of cool things about Silver Falls are that there are several different trails that loop together so you can hike anywhere from 2.5 to 8.4 miles and some of the trails take you behind the waterfalls.  It was a really cool experience.  I can't wait to go back and explore more.

Summer is coming to a close and we only have a few more weeks to fit in as much as possible.  Let's hope the coming weeks are as fun as this one was.

Accidental Fun

This week has been less than fun.  My stomach bug continued through the week, we had a leak from our upstairs to the dining room below, and we had a real scare with Elsie.  All through the week I tried to make the best of things and squeeze in some fun when I could.  Despite feeling sick we did some park days, played with cousins and even had a play date for Carrigan's incoming kindergarten class. 

Things took a turn for the worse on Friday.  We noticed that we were having some discoloration on the ceiling of the dining room and realized we had water coming down from somewhere in the kid's bathroom.  After investigating, we determined the kid's toilet was leaking and it needed to come out.  Unfortunately, Jeremy's back has been out so that meant I had to do the heavy lifting to get the toilet out.  Even more unfortunately, taking out the toilet was just the start of the excitement on Friday night.

After putting Elsie down for bed we started hearing her make a weird noise. Eventually I decided I thought she was throwing up and ran upstairs.  She had indeed been throwing up and continued to throw up after I got her up.  It was so violent that she was having difficulty breathing and was turning gray.  We decided we needed to take her to the ER.  The ER was so busy that we didn't even get seen by a doctor until 2am and in the meantime Elsie stopped throwing up and her color and energy returned.  It was like a switch just flipped and she was ok.  The doctors didn't end up doing anything for her and at 4am we were finally able to go home.

Saturday, after very little sleep, we set about putting in a new toilet.  With Jeremy still really hurting I had to do most of the lifting of the toilet into the house and up the stairs and bringing the old toilet down and out.  It was a long and difficult process but we have a new toilet and hopefully no more leak.

The other thing is that today is Jeremy and my 13th anniversary.  We really know how to celebrate!  What says "happy anniversary" like buying and installing a new toilet?  We did get to get away Saturday night, despite the exhaustion, for dinner and to go to an escape room (which is so fun by the way).

The thing about this week is that we have kind of just been in survival mode which doesn't leave a lot of time for fun but thankfully we did stumble into some fun. While we were at Home Depot buying the toilet as they were having their kid's craft and the kids were able to build some bookworm bookends.  That is just how I feel like the week has gone.  Despite the crazy he have had some accidental fun along the way.