Grateful

Sometimes I just have to stop whatever I'm doing and feel blessed and grateful to live in such a beautiful place.  True, there's no mountains or beaches or other grandiose man-made wonders. But it's home and I love it.

LOST

Josh is the king of losing his footwear this summer.  Despite my protests, lessons, yelling, punishments, and general pleading, the child cannot seem to track of his sandals.

It's driving me batty.

He got a brand new pair of good hiking sandals the week before Lance and I went to Taiwan.  The week we came back?  Lost forever.

Luckily for him (and his allowance account) we found some old ones of Spencer's that fit.

At least every other day since then he has misplaced his sandals and or flip flops, always right before we are supposed to leave for somewhere.  No joke, he almost had to wear his church shoes to swimming lessons once because he couldn't find his sandals or either of his TWO pairs of flip flops.

But today he claimed he had forever lost this SECOND pair of sandals.

Frustrated doesn't even begin to explain the emotions I felt, mainly because 1) seriously, who loses shoes like this?!!??!?, and 2) I had warned him a full 90 minutes before we left that he needed look for those sandals and that he was to do nothing else until he found the sandals.

When it was time to leave I found him watching TV, sans sandals.

Growl.

As punishment I told him he couldn't play with friends or have any screen time whatsoever until the sandals were found.  Weeping. Wailing. Gnashing of teeth.

To his credit, he did find yet another pair of used sandals that fit him. (The benefit of having an older brother, right?)  ((Also, Spencer has got to stop growing so fast in the summer.  His sandals never have a chance to wear out...))  I told him that was great, but he still had to find the other sandals because how could I trust him with these "new" ones when he had already lost two other pairs?

Mope mope mope, whine whine whine.  That's what I got to listen to all afternoon.  Finally, I said "Why don't you pray about it?  I bet Heavenly Father would help you find the sandals, because what's important to you is important to Him."  Josh refused.  He has a thing against praying in pubic lately.  So I said a prayer, because I was going batty with this child and I probably wanted those sandals found more than Josh did.

Not five minutes later I found the sandals out in the garage.

After a quick prayer of gratitude I marched triumphantly back into the house.  Josh was dumbstruck.  I made him say "Mommy is the best Mommy in the world" three times before I gave him the sandals.  Then I told him he needed to thank Heavenly Father when he said his bedtime prayers. (I knew I wouldn't get it out of him tonight.)

And after that, everything was domestic bliss at home.

Wait, no.  That's not even close to the truth.  Spencer's moping around because I won't let him play on my phone, Josh is throwing a trantrum on the floor for some unknown reason, Cole is begging everyone to play a game, only being really obnoxious about it so no one wants to, and Tess is fussing for a snack even though dinner is in less than an hour.

But at least everyone is now properly shod.

Swimming Lessons

This year we did two 2 week sessions of swimming lessons.  Four weeks of swimming lessons doesn't sound that long, but it really is, especially when the lessons are a good 15-20 minutes away from home.  (But they were exactly half the price of what we would pay for swimming lessons at the high school that is only 5 minutes away.  With four kids in lessons, that cost difference more than makes up for gas and time!)

Having the kids do two sessions was a good idea; they really improved and are much more confident in the water.  Hopefully we can do it again next year and that the weather cooperates for the rest of the summer and we can swim more.  Right now the weather has been really mild - low 80', mid-70's - so it's just a bit too cold for my 0% body fat children to be in the water at our neighborhood pool! (The pool for lessons is heated.)

Today was the last day of swimming lessons, and the last day is party day, meaning that the kids can just have fun.  Unfortunately, I forgot my real camera, so I had to use my phone.  It takes decent pictures, but just not quite as good.  Oh well.

Miss Tess, as you can see, was ready to party!

She was too busy playing, so I couldn't get a good shot of her in the pool.

Mr. Cole LOVES swimming.  Despite the look on his face here.

What he didn't like?  Having to wait an extra 15 minutes for Spencer and Josh because their lessons were a bit longer.  Seriously, what a pill!  By the end of the wait I was ready to toss him back into the pool! (Which he would have loved.)

Don't let the smile fool you.  We had a huge fight today because after lessons I needed them to get changed so we could stop by the optometrist to pick up my new glasses.  He FREAKED OUT about going into the women's locker room, even though that's where he has gone no less than 8 or so times in the past month.  Sorry, Cole, but five is just too young to go into the men's locker room by yourself.  Sheesh.

Fortunately, he had gotten some candy from his teachers and had made the mistake of handing it to me after his lesson.  As long as I held his candy hostage, he had to change where I told him to!

Poor Josh - that's the only picture I got of him.  He wouldn't get out of the pool and kept going under and ignoring me.  But here is proof that he was actually there!

Spencer had a GRAND time jumping off of the diving board.  I got lots of action shots that he very proud of.  I am, too, since this is the first year he's really been comfortable enough to actually jump off the board rather than just kinda fall. :)

Hooray for swimming lessons!  And hooray that they're over! (Now I'll have my mornings back!)

A Room With A View

You want to know why I put my garden where I did?  So I could have a room with a view.

It's not much, but it sure makes this girl happy every time she walks by.

You know what else makes me happy?  That I picked flowers out of my garden to make this little bouquet.  I think next year I will have to grow more flowers for cutting.  (And perhaps take a class in flower arranging.)

I'm On to this Girl

Tess has had pooping issues since potty training started in February.  (I know. I KNOW.)  For quite a while I just thought she didn't get it.

Until today.

Today Tess pooped in the potty and it became very obvious that she knew what she needed to do.

She happily enjoyed the mini packet of M&Ms I used to bribe her.  Little did she know that I am now on to her!

I am under no delusions that life poop-wise will be hunky-dory now.  But there's now a light at the end of the tunnel.  It's just a matter of convincing this SUPER stubborn child that pooping in the potty is waaay better than having accidents.  (It seems she disagrees about that, for some weird, gross, stubborn reason.)

I've thought about this a lot.  Is it that we have children genetically disposed to being very hard to potty train?  Or is it just that Lance and I are really bad at it?  I like to think it's a bit of both.  (Mainly because thinking it's all my fault makes me very, very depressed.)

The Cake Worked

I totally earned my kids' love/admiration by serving cake for breakfast. Josh couldn't believe his eyes at first.  After I key him have seconds he was putty in my hands. (One of the perks to getting up before all of your siblings.) ((Oh yeah, for the first time ever my kids are actually SLEEPING IN during the summer! Sometimes until 8am! Miracles.))

I didn't think to take pictures until Josh and Spencer were already done and off doing their chores. Ignore Cole's look - he enjoyed the cake, just not me taking a picture of him. (I can never tell, day by day, what will bug this kid. He's a tricky one.) ((Random side note: remember how he hated going to primary?  Now he wants to go and give the talk/scripture/and/or/prayer every week. Didn't see that one coming. Fortunately our primary president is very accommodating!))

And the cake? So yummy! Nice and most and not too sweet. Very much like eating a blueberry muffin shaped like a triangle. Which is pretty much what it was.

Castle

Umm... What are you making, Tess?

I'm making a castle.

Oh, of course.

A tasty, tasty castle. Soooo tasty!

Cake For Breakfast

I am really trying hard to get back into the habit of writing every day, but it's just not working. I'm either just too dang busy to write our nothing noteworthy happened. (Not true. Something always happens, I just get tired or lazy.) ((Dang.))

So, here I am at bedtime.  What do I have to blog about today?

Well, while I was in the shower this morning Joshie came screaming bloody murder into the bathroom. Seriously, I got really nervous and really started to think something bad had happened. Nope. Tess just spilled her milk at the table. I told him to clean it up, but when I came out it was of course still a big mess. So then I made him clean it up.

I also made my entire family go blueberry picking tonight for family home evening. We picked just shy of 32 pounds!  Well, Lance, Josh, and I did. Spencer picked maybe a pound, Cole even less, and Tess just ate her weight in berries.

I made this delicious looking buttermilk blueberry breakfast cake for breakfast tomorrow because I am always looking for ways to buy my children's love and affection.  I'm pretty sure cake for breakfast will do it.

Back Yard of Fire 2014!

As per usual, this year's Back Yard of Fire was awesome.  (Let's hope it's awesome every year; I hate to think of what an un-awesome Back Yard of Fire might entail.)

This year we had a Party Bling station, because that's how we roll.  I asked Lance to come up with something to hang the necklaces on, and this is the pvc awesomeness he created.  I feel like I can start a booth at the farmer's market now. :)

And yes, that does say "Tattoo Station" on the left-side sign.  Those turned out to be a HUGE hit with the girls at the party, which was a little surprising to me.  In fact, I only got the tattoos so I could get free shipping from the site where I ordered the necklaces. Guess they'll be a permanent part of the party now!

In years' past we've run out of room on the table for all of the food our guests brought, so this year I created a little riser to help get some of the big platters out of the way.  Unfortunately, we didn't have an over-abundance of food this year.  Maybe people figured everyone else would bring a lot of food?  Maybe everyone was too busy to make much?  I don't know, but there was a definite lack in that department this year. Bummer.  (Note: No one went hungry by any means; it just wasn't as prolific as other BYOF's.)

And of course we had our usual pennants and lights.  See the sky?  It was a perfect, beautiful day!  Temps were in the mid-70's and there was a light breeze and no humidity.  Gorgeous and very unusual for Indiana!

The day before I had gotten into a baking mood and in a fit of trying to be creative I made a bunch of cupcakes without really using a recipe. The cake layer was blueberry (made with homemade blueberry butter) and the frosting was cherry Jell-o buttercream.  The cake was sooo yummy, if I do say so myself.  The frosting was a little... pink.  Plus, I'm not a huge fan of a ton of frosting, but that didn't seem to deter anyone else!

I also made a bunch of s'mores pops because those are always a hit with the kids. (And I love s'mores.)

This year everyone in our family got an Old Navy Flag Shirt - not that we have any photographic evidence of this.  Dang.  But Tess and I sure were cute in our matching shirts and necklaces!

Did you know we had to buy a new grill for the party?  Yep.  Last week I had Lance clean out the old one and we discovered the bottom was all rusted out and dangerous looking.  So off to Lowe's Lance went, where he bought a shiny new grill.  It could only be delivered on 4th of July morning, which was a little nerve-wracking, but it made it in time!  I had to take a picture because this is the cleanest this grill will ever be.  So shiny and pretty!  (And now it looks all black and greasy... as it should, I guess.)

Once again I had every intention of taking lots of good pictures of everyone.  But I didn't. I wandered and chatted and chased kids out of the house, that sort of thing.

We had a TON of people come this year!  Unfortunately, lots of them didn't RSVP until the last minute, which normally would have been fine, but I was bound and determined not to have a ton of leftover hamburgers and hot dogs this year, so I didn't buy as many as I have before.  (Last year we had scads.)  Oops.  I think everyone got at least a hamburger or hot dog, but we still ran out earlier than I would have liked.  There's nothing worse than that feeling of running out of food, so next year we will have plenty, I promise! (And I bet next year we will have lots of leftovers!  Such is life.)

So our friends the Harringtons brought this GINORMOUS firecracker.  Well, I should say Jared brought it - I don't know that Sarah (his wife) will claim anything to do with it.  It was this giant thing that had - literally - 16,000 firecrackers inside.  They unrolled it down our sidewalk on the east side of the house and it started going... and going... and going.  IT. WAS. LOUD.  It lasted, and I am not exaggerating, a good five minutes.  And it would have lasted longer, but more than one fuse caught and so instead of just one line going at a time all three went.  I think everyone (especially the neighborhood dogs) was okay with this.

The kids (on the whole) were thrilled with the whole thing, as were all the men.  Not quite sure how the neighbors felt about it, but we haven't received any threats or anything so I guess we're good.

Here's a little video of it, just to give you an idea of what it was like.  Sorry about the shakiness - I was trying to plug my ear with my shoulder.

And just look at the mess it left!  Fortunately, Jared's a great guy and was very willing to help clean it all up.  (Although I suspect we will find bits of red paper and such around there for months to come...)

We did have one injury of the night: poor Bergen had a front baby tooth knocked out by a rogue frisbee thrown by (of all people!) a missionary!  It was bloody and it hurt a lot, but she came through like a champ. (After she calmed down!)  Now her smile matches Josh's!

The weather was great for a barbecue, not so much for playing in the water.  But most of the kids were bound and determined to play in the kid wash sprinkler we had set up.  Cole did for a bit and then decided to get dressed into drier clothes.  He refused to believe his shirt was on backwards.

Bottle rockets and other small things were shot off most of the evening.  We even had a few sparklers, which I am not a fan of because someone always gets burned and no one pays enough attention to the kids while they're using them. (Case in point: for whatever reason Cole dragged a rather large quilt up the hill.  I caught his JUST before another kid caught it on fire with his sparkler.  Yikes.)

By the time we started to get ready for the big show it was... chilly!  Can you believe it?! I went through the house and pulled out all the extra blankets I could find for our chilly guests.  I never thought that would happen for our party!  Tess and I snuggled under a blankie for the show.

So did Gigi and Craig.  That's a good look, Craig.

 Mr. Cole after his close brush with death via flaming quilt.  I practically had to drag him kicking and screaming down the hill.

Notice anything about the lights?  I totally did that ping-pong ball on the Christmas lights project I found on Pinterest.  It turned out so well!

The fireworks were extra big and loud this year.  Seriously, we were all quite impressed with how big they were.  (I'm wondering if Lance got them in a shady alley off the back of a truck or something...) It was cool to be right underneath them.  That's the power of pooling your money together to have a private fireworks show!  (Now we just need to work on timing the fireworks better...)

My friend Deidra had to leave before the fireworks.  So sad.  But never fear - I took a little video just for her, because nothing's as cool to watch as a fireworks show that you weren't at...

It was pretty late by the time the show was done.  Gigi found Tess all snuggled up in blankets on a chair and snapped a few cute pictures.

Tess was so excited to get to be up so late!

And then, just a minute later, she was sound asleep.

A big thank you to all of our friends who joined us for another successful Back Yard of Fire!

It's Mommy and Tessie

Tess came up to me and said "Look!  It's a Mommy and a Tessie!"

"Which one is the Tessie?"

"The lit-tell one.  Because I am lit-tell."

Cuteness.

Tess the Graceful

As you can see, Tess had a literal run-in with the sidewalk today.  The picture doesn't really do it justice; her forehead, nose, and right knee are all pretty scraped and bruised.  

Poor Tess has been pretty clumsy lately.  Most of the time it's because she's not paying attention to what's going on, but I can tell that some of the time it's because she's not used to this rapidly growing body she inhabits.  Growth spurt, anyone?

In other news, I spent the afternoon trying on a ton of clothes I had ordered online.  None of them fit because they were all too big.  While this is a pretty good problem to have, it is still a problem nonetheless.  I feel all frumpy and disheveled lately, but I can't bring myself to go clothes shopping with four children in tow, and either Lance or I have something going on just about every evening.  Dang.

Still, life could be worse - I could have run-ins like Tess.