Summer's Last Hurrah

The kids have been back at school for two weeks now, but with Labor Day upon us, summer seems as if it is finally coming to a close.  I know that technically we still have until near the end of September, but this past weekend we tried to live it up and have a great time together before the changing of the seasons.

My friend Stacey's parents have a pool at their house and she invited us to come over for a swim on Saturday before her parents close up the pool for the season.  My only plans for the day involved dishes and laundry so I ditched those fairly quickly and told her we would meet her later on after her errands.

I did two loads of dishes and the kids mostly cleaned their room before lunch and then we got packed up and started to head out.  Because of my lame texting abilities, Stacey and I had a miscommunication about when to meet. Since the kids were already in the car, I figured I'd just keep driving until I heard from her and then we'd turn around.

We actually ended up taking a very nice drive through the mountains and made it all the way to West Virginia!  We got out and took a few pictures and then I decided that we'd head back even though I hadn't heard from Stacey. Of course, the real problem was that being up in the mountains meant I was out of cell service and as soon as I got back in communication with a tower, my phone blew up with a bunch of messages!

After finally arriving at Stacey's parents house, the kids all jumped in the pool.  Even Benjamin surprised me by putting on his life jacket and getting in all by himself.  We spent about 5 hours at the pool and I never got in!  (I don't actually like swimming.)  But the kids had a blast!  Henry even went off the slide with no life jacket.  Granted he panicked and started to flail around in the water, but he made it to the edge and grabbed on right as I got to him. He was scared, but otherwise fine.  He did the same thing last time we were there.  I assume that eventually he'll either learn to swim or learn to stop going off the slide with no life jacket!

We ordered pizza for a late night dinner and then said goodbye to our friends.  Life is always hectic and schedules are always crazy, but I love it when we are able to get together.  And the kids love it too!

A Whole Week!

Well, I actually went a whole week without blogging. I didn't set out to neglect my online journal for quite so long, but it was a busy week and things just got away from me. Here's a quick update on what has been happening around here:

• Last Saturday afternoon, we packed up the car and headed to Culpeper to visit Ken's family. His sister, Christie, and her boyfriend, Brian, had flown in from Florida for a visit and we wanted to see them. Ken's brother, Dan, had also come up with his wife, Nikki, and baby daughter, Abby. It was a crowded house! We had a great time visiting with them and Frances got to hold her baby cousin and just LOVED it. Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures yet because while I did remember my camera; I forgot my memory stick.


• Sunday we spent the day in Culpeper with Ken's family. We tried to go swimming, but Mother Nature had other plans for us. Ken, his dad, his sister, and Brian did get to play golf before the major downpour. We headed back that evening and stopped at Dairy Queen for some ice cream on the way back.


• Monday I was back to work. It was all set to be a crazy day because of all the summer kids being there. I was not disappointed!


• Tuesday I worked at the church. I got quite a bit done in between putting out fires at the Day Care. I managed to get 100 youth registered for religious education classes this year. The bad news, is that is only about half to a third of the ones that were registered last year, so there are a lot more coming.


• Wednesday, I had a fun day planned with Katie. She is going off to college soon *sniff* and we will miss her tremendously. We met for lunch at Burger King. Frances made her a picture frame that says "Frances" and "Henry" on it and we promised to send picture for her to put in it while she is away form home. Then we went to the pool. Frances had fun in the baby pool and Henry "borrowed" an inner tube from another child who wasn't using it and had a great time running around. He did manage to flip himself over in the inner tube, The result was that he floated upside down in the water for a second before I picked him up by the thighs and tried to turn him around. Of course I couldn't get a good grip on him because he was wet and surrounded by an inner tube, so it is quite a good thing that Katie was there to help me out. I aged about 12 years in that instant.


• Thursday I was back at the day care. We took the kids to the Rockingham County Fair. And by "kids" I mean everyone over the age of 2!! We took about 35 kids and various parents on the school bus, church van and Kristen's personal van. We got there and walked through the poultry barn. Then we went to a "Safari Comedy Show" which was rather amusing. After the safari show we ran over to the circus, but we didn't get there in time to get seats, so the kids had to stand. That coupled with the fact that they were hot, tired and hungry means that they mostly grumped during the show. After a pit stop to get some lemonade, we went through the petting zoo and then headed to the park for lunch. It rained while we were there, but no thunder, so we just let the kids play in it. After they were exhausted, we headed back to school. My memory stick wouldn't work, so I borrowed these pictures from Kristen's camera. (Thursday night we went back to the fair as a family.)


• Friday, oh Friday. In retrospect it wasn't actually that bad; but man! did we have some chaos. We had two sick teachers and another with sick kids. We sent a bunch of kids home sick-not fun. And the kids were wild that afternoon! I was ready to pull my hair out-so of course, it rained just enough so we couldn't really go outside. Another one of those days where I can say I earned my weekend!


• Saturday was supposed to be my day off where my wonderful friend Julie was going to kidnap my kids and give me a day to myself!! Apparently Henry got wind of the plan and didn't like i. He threw up three or fours times between 5 and 8 Saturday morning. Never very much, but enough so I couldn't pawn him off on Julie with a clear conscience. But Frances went, so it was just Henry and me home all day. He slept quite a but, ate very little and never threw up again. I slept off and on all day and accomplished nothing of great importance. Oh well, I guess that can be considered a good day.**One exciting thing I forgot...I went to the bathroom and left Henry in the living room with my cell phone. It made a strange beep, but when I came out he had closed it. No big deal, right? Nope, you guessed it-a few minutes later the phone rang, "This is 9-1-1 dispatch. We received a hang up from this number. Do you have an emergency?" Um...no...just a handy 14 month old. OOOPS!!**
  
• Sunday (today) we met Julie at church and retrieved Frances. After Mass I met with some more people who want to get involved with out youth program-AWESOME!! I took care of about 10 more registrations and did a LOT of laundry. Right now there are five baskets that are clean and folded and waiting to be put away. Ken made us dinner and then we went for a walk. No pictures of that because I washed my memory card along with the laundry and apparently that isn't good for them! The new memory card we have is too sophisticated for our camera, so we will have to either upgrade the camera or downgrade the memory card....I'm guessing it will be the card. :(


• Tomorrow starts the last official week of summer for us at the day care. While I will miss my summer class, they and I are all more than ready to move on and get the school year underway.

Swimming Pool!

Every Thursday this summer we have taken the day care kids to the pool at Gypsy Hill. They have a really large shallow end where the kids can jump around and play and still be safe. All of the kids get in the water; most of them will put their faces in the water and a few of them can even swim. Here are some pictures and video I took today. This first one is Frances going under the water effortlessly.

The next one is Hunter and some of the boys running around.

For some reason, I can't upload any still photos right now, so check back.

A Day Off...

Wednesday is usually my day to work at the church, but Henry had a doctor's appointment right in the middle of productivity time, so I took the whole day off. I kept Frances home from school and Ken had the day off as well. It was nice having an unplanned day.

Henry had his one-year check-up today. He is 20.2 pounds and 31 inches tall. According to the chart from the doctor's office, his height seems to be in the 90th percentile (YEAH!) and his weight is about 15th-20th. Not sure how he is so skinny since all he does is eat, but that's what the scale says. He got two shots today and was a real trooper about it. I held him as the nurse did it. He smelled the alcohol and gave me a look that said he knew something was going to happen. He cried briefly, but then he found his thumb and was quiet by the time I left.

We got home and he took a nap. Ken and Frances had gone out to the store, but got home shortly after we did. Frances was supposed to eat lunch and then nap, but of course, she never went to sleep. What am I going to do with her? I would be fine with her skipping her nap if she wasn't such a pill by 6pm. I took a short nap and then had to go out to a meeting at church.



This afternoon I went out and filled up the kiddie pool. The kids put on their suits and jumped in. I put up our umbrella to keep the sun off of them, but it made the water cold and poor little Henry was shivering while we was crawling around the pool.
He also discovered how to get in and out of the pool by himself. We ended up putting the Little Tykes slide into the pool and both kids got a kick out of sliding down into the water. Henry did it head first most times!

Check out his "I don't really like the feel of grass, but I have somewhere to go" crawl. It's precious!!