Summer Week 6

We started this week off recovering from the weekend and thankfully our first swimming lesson got cancelled. We needed the rest. 

Tuesday bright and early - brought our annual Omaha trip. We hit up the zoo first thing. It was a little chilly and well we were dressed for summer. Beautiful day at the zoo. Too bad their was a lot under construction but it should be awesome next year. 

We love the tigers, lions and the monkeys. 

 This gorilla even banged on the glass to scare the kids. I have a fond memory of when one did that to my brother when he was little. My grandparents used to live in Omaha so we frequented the zoo.

 Check out the baby seal. Not quite the seal show as the aquarium in Florida but still fun to watch.

Of course, we love love to eat at Runza. If you haven't tried it is the very best! 

Then its off to the dentist. Crazy I know. But he loves us and we love them. Saw us all 5 at the same time and even filled my small cavity for us right then and there before we left. Took about an 1 hr and half. Crazy! Best best dentist ever! 

Then we had some time for some new haircuts. In fact we are still rocking them and they need to go. But the boys think they are cool.

And swimming lessons. Shadd made amazing progress on his freestyle and backstroke. Ells did too. And Sage got more and more daring. It made for some long days for Z but he loves the pool! 

shadd is jumping in on the far side

shadd swimming in the deep

We hit up the new minion movie.  Thankfully drama took z for the night.

Friday we went to Q mans birthday party. Always fun with our cousins.

And saturday was day at home w/ cousins and aunts and frama as the boys were working on a drywall project.

July 4th

We spent the day in Norwalk celebrating with D's family.

We made it the whole day. 

Z got in a few small naps and made it threw the fireworks but we left in our traditional melt down city.

We hit up the parade first thing! Lots and lots of candy.

Then to his sisters for food and water fun

Then to my brother in laws for fireworks as they shoot them off across the field so we can just hang out on their driveway. We did sparklers (kinda - they didn't want to light real easily) and always some sweet glowsticks. Aunt K comes well prepared and makes it a blast for all our littles!  

Z almost fell asleep and well the quote of the night was Sage. During the build up to the fireworks and during the show he was busy playing with a blanket and moving it around and his mega glowstick hoop that when it was time to go, he let loose with, "I missed the fireworks" - in a major screaming crying meltdown. 

So like normal we exited in a blaze of glory. One day we will leave in peace and quiet and remember these days, right???

Summer Week 5

Probably my favorite thing about summer is picnics at the park with friends from all stages and facets of our life past and present. We are so lucky to have friends from college, church (now and then), bible studies, etc. I just love it. 

We got to get together this week with our friends (who used to live behind us at our old house). Our boys are weeks apart and we still wish we lived that close. Minus our crews that just keep growing and Sager needing to go to the bathroom multiple (i mean multiple times) we had a blast. 

We wrote our favorite disney characters. They say it takes six to eight weeks for a reply so we will see. We wrote Jake from the Neverland Pirates, Olaf, and Elsa & Anna.  Made for a fun afternoon mess!

 This guy spends a lot of his days making messes and well trying to keep me watching. You can't quite see in the picture but he has the grill scraper here. He is making a quick dash for the stairs on our deck (we need a gate) and has chalk all over his face and probably had some in his mouth. He can be found sampling all sorts of dirt, sand, water, rocks, etc. Thankfully he isn't a swallower but he does like to keep things in his mouth.

We hit up the jumping pillow close to our house one morning. $5 a kid for a morning of fun. Its at a local campground. We will be back. Hopefully with dad as he always makes it way more fun!

But dad was off to pick up the beams for our new house (yes - we are building again). These are from my grandpa's 100 year old barn they tore down. Are they not amazing. Now if only I can find a way to incorporate them all into my house without making it look quite like a barn.