Happy summer! The boys started off their break with Youthfront day camp. It was pretty chilly, upper 60's and low 70's were the high for most of their week at camp. There was very little swimming but they each had friends at camp to hang out with and they played epic rounds of Connect 4 games so I heard a lot of good things and they had a lot of fun.
Poor Patrick had to fit in some evening baseball after a full day at camp. Juliet had discovered the joys of puddles after thunderstorms and got herself so dirty that a group of girls refused to play with her. Eleanor was enraged by this and I found myself having to sort out 9 year old girl beef with a group of 3 and 4 year olds. Dear goodness.
Meanwhile, Patrick played baseball. He's a cute little catcher.
Family jokes at dinner time. Juliet started this and I'm not exactly sure why. Then everyone needed to tell a joke!
Eleanor went to a rock climbing summer camp and loved it. It was nice to have them teaching her some legitimate techniques and she finally made it to the top of a 50 foot wall after going to camp! My mom got to take her one day and Eleanor made sure she followed the group around everywhere she went and admired every climb Eleanor did. It was very cute. Grandma definitely preferred it to having to sit through a freezing soccer game or a boiling hot baseball game. Indoor sports are the best!
Big climb time!
Meanwhile, Juliet and I kept ourselves occupied as best we could during these camps. We found a Mexican ice cream shop and I wish Juliet would look at me the way she looks at this strawberry ice cream.
Nearby playground.
Afternoon playing in our driveway. This is what summer is supposed to be like.
I made nutella mousse with a little help from one of my best buddies.
Juliet still loves her toy microscope from Uncle Thomas.
Our neighbors gave us an old bike for Juliet. She's a big fan!
I went shopping at Kohl's with Juliet one afternoon while Eleanor was at her rock climbing camp. I immediately broke my flip flop and was trying to sort of keep the shoe on my foot so I wouldn't be barefoot while shopping. Juliet ran ahead of me and was adamant that she needed to create this fort. We like to keep it classy wherever we go.
Layla helped me and Bradley test out some new Unmatched sets that evening.
Nathan got the golf cart fixed up for the summer and took the youngest two out for a test drive.
Linn Valley time!
We hosted a Girl Scout event and it was so fun.
I often forget how novel getting to paddle kayaks and playing on a lily pad was for us when we first got the lake lot. Eleanor's friends had a blast.
Patrick getting in some golf cart time with his daddy.
Another activity for while Eleanor was at rock climbing camp. I took the boys and Juliet to the Olathe beach! The beach was closed but at least they had a cool little stream we could play in.
Patrick was beyond adorable helping Juliet walk through the bumpy stream.
There was a waterfall that Juliet was desperate to walk out to. Patrick helped with that as well.
Meanwhile, Bradley hung out at the splash pad.
All the siblings together! There have been a fair number of dog piles lately and somehow Patrick always ends up on the bottom. The funniest participant is Eleanor though. She's so anti-touch around her brothers except when this happens. Then she gets a little gleam in her eyes and piles herself on top of them.
A very tired Juliet. Keeping up with the big kids in the summer is a big job.
We had VBS at our church and it was perhaps the best week of Juliet's life.
It was also perhaps the most exhausting week of my life. I was in charge of a class of eleven three and four year olds. It was actually fine after the first couple of days and I really enjoyed all the kids in my group.
Juliet is so very ready for preschool. She was very happy about all the activities and keeps asking for more VBS.
Patrick would help at the beginning and the end of VBS and all the kids loved him.
That evening during our regular Friday night dinner at my parents' house there was a VERY exciting discovery. Bunnies! Trapped in the window well! Both Patrick and Juliet each got to hold a bunny in a bucket as my dad drove them about 15 minutes south to their new home in the country.
Reading time with Grandma.
Eleanor helped us teach my parents Five Crowns for our game after dinner.
We got to play a six player game. I love games so much, family time like this is amazing.
The big winner and the big loser!
On Saturday before Patrick's baseball game we got to go to the Burns & McDonnell company picnic. We saw Mabel and her brothers there!
There were a lot of free fair games to play.
Eleanor got her face painted.
And we had time for one adorable ride. The egg spinner!
There were also a ridiculous amount of free treats.
We made it to a very hot baseball game and then headed straight for the pool. Pool time is cool time for a game!
Nathan and Layla's relationship continues to be special.
So ... Juliet likes to wiggle her bottom at people when she's naked. But we can't get her to stand up while she does it, every time she leans down and puts her hands on the ground in order to maximize the wiggle. It is a LOT and sometimes she likes to do it right by people. It is a beautiful sight to see Eleanor running away screaming because her three year old sister is trying to rub her bum against her.
I had my first round of board game camps! They went really well!
Of course, I had excellent helpers.
leanor and I even fit in a mommy daughter rock climbing session on one of the evenings after board game camps.
They had a block party that night at ROKC and we got ice cream after we climbed. It was fun because we selected the one called This $%&@ Just Got Real and I got to explain to Eleanor why there were a bunch of funny characters for the second word. To be fair, it was really amazing ice cream and probably deserved that name. Sea salt caramel with fudge swirls and cashews. Yum!!
My mom reading to happy children.
Poor Patrick got a bad bounce at baseball and got his first black eye. I was very upset and so was he until he realized that he had always wanted a black eye.
The poor boy. Luckily some nice dads ran and got him a bag of ice right away when it first happened so it wasn't nearly as bad as it could have been. Still ... this never happens in tennis!
Playing Don't Llama with me the next day. Looking so very much better.
Meanwhile, we found a few fleas on the cats and it turns out we were actually both still a little traumatized from the flea episode a couple years ago and we sprung into action. Flea collars, baths, washing a bunch of blankets, and vacuuming. This all before we were about to leave on a trip. Fortunately, it seemed to work and there have been zero flea sightings since this all took place! Phew!
And then - the big event for June - we departed for our trip to visit Diana and Bill in Soquel!
We had never flown as an entire family with Juliet before. We were quite the crew going through the airport!
We all wore Santa Cruz shirts in honor of the vacation destination and Patrick and I were especially matchy matchy!
My seat row buddies.
The boys!
We allow a fair amount of screen time on planes - that's much of the fun. But I make them wait until we've reached cruising altitude for takeoff and they put everything away in time to watch us land because I think that's half the fun of flying when you're little.
Juliet discovered that there was hot cocoa on the flight menu.
It took forever for it to cool off for her and she spilled a bunch. Seems about right.
In California there was a very different reaction to seeing our family than there was in the Midwest. We kept on getting a lot of "wows" and "Oh, there are so many of you!" Our favorite experience though was trying to explain to the rental car attendant that there were six of us and we required a car with six seats. Multiple times he said, "this car has only five seats but it's a bit larger and available" and Nathan had to say, "but we have six people." Hilarious. We finally got a car although it was a bit of a nailbiter for a second.
This was the first of many car naps for Juliet this trip. She was an absolute champ. We threw a time change and nonstop activities at her and she was gangbusters for everything.
Checking out the garden with Bill.
Setting up bedroom space with Diana. Juliet was instantly delighted with everything to do with this trip and has been demanding that we go back except she wants to stay for longer this time. We stayed for 6 days, seemed pretty good to me!
And yes, of course we packed some games. Bandida!
Actually it was Bandida combined with Bandido because we are so cool.
We went to the Santa Cruz boardwalk for our first full day.
So many rides and arcade games!
We threatened Juliet a bunch that she better smile and this was still the best photo we got of her by the caveman. To be fair, he is definitely a little creepy.
Cute photo! That surfer is carrying lots of ladies!
We got churros for the kids. A popular decision.
Diana has a thing for the Bulgy the whale ride and it seems Juliet does too. She had an expression of joy the entire ride and we cheered for her each time she went by us.
Churro break
The older kids' favorite ride - a cool hang-glider.
It had nice views of the beach and the ocean as they went around.
I love this one - we figured out that Juliet met the height requirement to go on the kiddie roller coaster as long as she went with a chaperone. They let Eleanor count as the chaperone.
Juliet's expression once the ride got going was one of horror and regret.
Relief and joy at the end of the ride and after Eleanor's pep talk. And check out Patrick cheering.
Back to the right type of rides!
It was so neat getting to do a whole family vacation. Nathan had been a little jealous of me going with a child or two every year, it was so nice to have him there too.
Older siblings started demanding to join Juliet on her rides.
Patrick was a great help making the dragon fly on this ride.
Juliet's fair type game where she won a prize.
They weighed the fish and everyone got a prize even at the lowest level. Hurray! Great game.
Helping her daddy eat french fries. Keeping everyone fed was a priority for the day.
Then I took the younger two and met up with Bill on the beach while Nathan and the big kids waited in some longer lines for bigger rides.
Juliet got sand in her swim bottoms and insisted on taking them off afterwards. I had very little say in this, she yanked down her bottoms and screamed at me when I tried to talk her into leaving them on. Fortunately I had spare pants for her but she was still covered in sand so I ended up carrying her around in a towel around her bare bum for a while after this until she dried off enough for the sand to fall off of her. Then I could finally talk her into wearing clothes again. Ahhh, three year olds.
We walked all the way across the beach and down the pier to the very end, where we were rewarded with seeing sea lions in the wild!
Everyone was very tired on our way home from the beach. Juliet fell asleep in my arms when we got back to the beginning of the pier and then I had to carry her the length of the boardwalk to get back in the car.
Bill fed us in style the entire trip. It's no wonder everyone is anxious to go back. He even made delicious gluten and dairy free options for Nathan every day. Yum yum yum!
Introducing Bill to Don't Llama. It's so fun when Patrick gets excited about a new game, he begs to play it nonstop.
And then - time for a family trip to the Mystery Spot!!
Comparing heights as we enter the Mystery Spot!
I immediately felt a bit seasick as we entered the cabin. The kids were completely unfazed.
And the afternoon was spend in downtown Santa Cruz, going to Bookshop Santa Cruz (the kids could have lived there, it was difficult to get them to leave) and going by Pizza My Heart for lunch!
Poor Nathan got to have a salad. No gluten free pizza at Pizza My Heart.
The kids couldn't get enough of Diana and Bill time. They got exciting lifts in the air and were taught new and enchanting rhymes like "You Can't Pay the Rent". I need to get it on video, it's a whole thing.
Bookshop Santa Cruz!
Some afternoon ice cream! Pictured here are all the people who liked their first choice of ice cream.
And here's Patrick. Oh Patrick. This isn't even the first time he's pulled something like this, it's fully half the time he gets an ice cream cone he decides he hates what he picked out once he's a few bites in.
I told Eleanor she might have to help Juliet finish her ice cream. Eleanor smiled at Juliet and then Juliet growled at Eleanor any time she got close. I'm raising half-feral children.
Violin practice!
Taco Cat Goat Cheese Pizza game time.
Juliet took it upon herself to both assist Diana in caring for all of her fish and also helping out with watering plants in the yard. It was a Juliet wonderland.
Nathan and I got a date night in, which was so fancy. Thanks to Diana and Bill for babysitting!
This is the happy face of someone who is at a restaurant with actual gluten free and dairy free options.
Then we got back home in time for some games before bedtime. Here I am being forced to play Taco Cat Goat Cheese Pizza, a game which generally seems to cause fights and so I hate it. I made a lot of loving threats so everyone exhibited marvelous sportsmanship and it was actually a fun time. Side note - I often get kids to get moving to go out to the car by saying something like, "the last person who gets in the car has to compose a love poem to me," and it actually offends me that they are so desperate not to be last in the car when I say this. Patrick is invariably last and he after he's done yelling with rage he sweetly recites, "Roses are Red, Violets are Blue, the best mom in the entire world is you." Thanks ... I think.
The boys' bedtime setup. It was weird to be here without Granddad. I'm just glad Patrick and Eleanor got to see him this past October when we visited.
We had a morning of actual culture when we went to see the giant redwoods.
I can't believe our best picture of the kids with Diana and Bill was in a parking lot. They all look so nice though!
Item of great importance - Patrick joined the Banan Slug Club on this trip. What is that, you ask? It's pretty simple. You find a banana slug and you lick it. You're in the club!
We paid him $20 to do this so he was well-compensated. It was amazing.
I was so proud!! What a kid!
Then we resumed with actual culture and bonding with nature.
Nathan took this picture. Pretty amazing!
I love how the trunks twist as they grow. The kids loved all of this for about three minutes and then they just wanted to climb things and run around. I'm still glad we went though.
Bill is a beast and carried a large ten year old boy on his shoulders.
Then everyone needed to be carried.
Bradley mostly wanted to cuddle Diana during the walk. She obliged!
Then we spent the afternoon at the very crowded Capitola beach. Who cares that it was crowded though, we had a fabulous time. The beach is definitely our best family vacation option, everyone is so happy while we're there.
Juliet got sand in her swimsuit again and pulled the same nudist nonsense so I put a pair of loose fitting basketball shorts on over her bare buns and it seemed she would tolerate that. Also, it was reasonably warm while we were visiting but the beach was windy so it felt a lot colder than you would have thought it might be.
Fortunately, playing in the sand is a great option even when it's a little chilly.
Bradley loved playing in the water and then literally spend 30-45 minutes like this with a towel in order to warm up afterwards. Downtime is part of the appeal of the beach!
The other three did quite the thorough jobs burying each other in the sand.
A recovered Bradley who wanted desperately to play in the sand for the 15 minutes before we had to go back to Diana and Bill's house.
Ice cream to finish off beach time. Patrick was only allowed to choose between oreo and cookie dough ice cream.
Juliet's ice cream face.
It was quite the day for Patrick. He had a very loose tooth on this trip and at dinner he said he could taste blood and you could tell the tooth was hanging by a thread ... which meant it was time for a fun way for it to get pulled! We arrived at having Eleanor play it off with a violin. Floss was tied to a tooth and to the bow for a violin.
On the second try it worked! Patrick was so proud. And quite frankly, so was Eleanor. I think Bradley refused to watch. Patrick earned another dollar by doing this and the tooth fairy left a dollar under his pillow that night. The silly fairy left the tooth on a nearby counter and we weren't sure what to do with it so Diana put it in a fish tank after we left. The fish LOVED it and cleaned ever speck of blood and grime off of it and the pictures she took of the end result were shockingly white. Patrick was so pleased.
And in an example of why I love games so much - this is what happened when Juliet joined in on our game of Tic-Tac-Toe one evening.
So much fun, so much joy.
And for Father's Day we gave Nathan a new game, which quickly turned into one of our favorites for the trip. Cinco Linko! It's really fun to play with Juliet, she adds quite the chaotic element to the game.
She was so busy on this trip. It's no wonder she wants to go back.
My birthday was the day after Father's Day and we got to go to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. It was absolutely packed but we all loved going.
Having a wave go over us!
The jellyfish are my favorite thing about the aquarium and the kids knew this so they were extra excited for me the entire time we were looking at them.
It's pretty amazing. Also amazing - the kids' ability to budge their way to the front of any exhibit at the aquarium. It's lucky that they were little, mostly they were scooching past adults so they could see. It's a life skill though! Well done, kids!
Eleanor hatched a Juliet while we were there!
I demanded that we take this picture.
Once again, a busy day for Juliet.
We went home and popped on swim gear and ran back out to the Capitola Beach. We didn't come to California to not go to the beach on every day we possibly could ...
Cinco Linko! A great beach game.
Then we got to go home and play a true classic game: Hell Bridge. Winner and loser pic!
We're lucky that Diana and Bill had a rather casual approach to small child nudity because there was a fair amount of it on this trip. We're really working on Juliet standing up while shaking her bottom at people.
Harvesting in the garden
Bandido with Eleanor!
Nathan hanging out with kids who were insisting on running around outside.
The next day Diana and Bill told us we really needed to try out more than one beach while we were visiting them so they took us to Natural Bridges State Beach. Juliet thought it was yet another opportunity for nekkie time.
This was probably my favorite family picture of the trip!
And this was certainly Diana's favorite picture. I need to find the one where she was standing on Bradley when he was about this age. It's a tradition now!
Playing at the beach was great and fun.
Juliet loved digging in the sand with Bradley while the other two kids went to check out tide pools.
But then Juliet discovered that there were BUGS in the sand and had a bit of a meltdown. Justified, to be sure, but it was tricky when she still demanded to be carried out to the water but under no circumstances was she interested in touching any of the disgusting BUG sand!
There was a small amount of hysteria over the situation.
Diana and Eleanor went on a little hike around a bend together and came back with jellyfish remains. Gloopy and interesting!
Here is Juliet cuddling with Bill while telling him of the travesty of bugs in the sand. The very idea.
And I'm not saying that Nathan and I aren't sun worshippers but this is a fair picture of what we do when out in the light with our pale pale baby skin. Wrap everything up, put a toddler sweatshirt over your neck if you have to.
There was some seaweed jump roping that happened!
But I mean, this is what I'm talking about when I say we love going to the beach. The kids run all over playing in the sand and water and everyone is so happy.
Even Juliet. We found her a bug free area and she was relieved to have improved circumstances.
This time it was Daddy who needed a nap after a morning outing.
Cool guys without shirts. The boys are very proud of saying "sun's out guns out" whenever they have the chance.
We took the crew back to Capitola Beach for our final full day and Juliet was relieved to be at a superior beach without gross bugs.
The waves were coming in a bit stronger than they had on previous days and Juliet got knocked over and swept underwater by one. We were right there and we grabbed her but it was a bit scary for her (and us!) so she had a parent buddy by the water for the rest of our time there.
Nathan said pulling her up to jump over the waves was probably one of the best parts of the trip for him and I have to say, watching it was pretty sweet as well.
The big kids made a really big sandcastle that they loved until it got swept away by the water as we were leaving.
Smooches for wonderful Daddy!
Eleanor got to help Bill make her birthday ice cream cake.
It was so so good - they did a wonderful job! Eleanor was so excited to get to celebrate her birthday on the trip.
We had a pretty relaxed morning the next day as we packed up and got ready to go home.
There was time for games. Winner and loser picture plus bunny ears.
We went to the nearby playground to burn off energy before our flights.
And we got to go back to Bookshop Santa Cruz to exchange a book because in a shocking twist, Patrick wasn't paying attention and we managed to get him two copies of the same book earlier in the trip.
Meanwhile, I went shopping at H&M with the girls and none of the clothes were for them but we're pretty sure they could have purchased all of the beautiful purses we found.
One last visit to Pizza My Heart before leaving.
I rather love this group picture as well. The kids were all quite insistent that they needed flowers to hold.
Me too, I wanted a beautiful flower.
Checking out the best part of the San Jose airport as we headed for our gate - it's the clock show in the baggage claim.
We left on Eleanor's actual birthday, which was done on purpose. I thought Eleanor would love being in California on her birthday and it's fun to have them make a fuss over you on the flights. She even got to push the button to start the plane on our first flight!
And on our second flight the flight attendants outdid themselves and made Eleanor a crown out of snacks and gave her a barf bag full of brownie snacks. Eleanor was delighted!
The drive home from the airport. We got back to our house at 1AM. Even with being on west coast time this was very late after a very long day.
Dogpile the next morning. Please note that once again, Patrick is on the bottom.
And because I'm just a little crazy, we hosted a birthday party for Eleanor at my parents' pool the day after we got back. I wanted to have it not on a weekend when it would be a bit rude to have a bunch of guests join us at the pool so the day after we got back seemed like the best option when we sent out the invites. It worked out!
And yes, once again Nathan inflated the giant unicorn floatie for the occasion.
Many thanks to my mom for making a ridiculously delicious cookie cake and having Eleanor come over to help decorate it with her.
We think it's hilarious that Eleanor and her friend Ava managed to get the same exact swimsuit, just in different colors.
And you'd better believe Juliet was in on all of the party fun. The kids should have been really tired from the trip but they rallied for the party!
Opening presents at home!
A very tired Juliet after yet again another exciting day. This may be one of her last pictures with a pacifier, we finally took it away the final week of June. She could have kept it for longer if she hadn't loved it so much and it was such an ordeal to get it out of her mouth each morning. It also has already affected her teeth. It was time for it to be done! It actually was a far easier transition than I had feared, although I'm really glad she still had it while we were gone on our trip. She did complain to me at breakfast one morning, "I just want to be chewing on something!" and I encouraged her to chew on her banana bread and call it good. Now I've been telling her that big kids without pacifiers get to try gum and I'm wondering if I'm going to regret giving her this information.
These kids are so sweet but they cannot figure out what to do apart from each other. This is every day - they are always in the same room. It's cute but it does not come without its share of conflict.
A hilarious photo - Patrick and I were both so sure he was going to win this game and he was giving me the look of victory. Bradley won two moves after this.
Eleanor is an earring princess after her birthday and has so many new beautiful options. She's already lent me a pair once, I support all this fashion happening!
It was nice to be back to see my folks. My dad had taken care of our cats the entire time we were gone. They got a new air hockey table when we got back, it's a Patrick dreamland in their basement.
Eleanor was prepared to open family presents!
In proof that they younger two watch everything she does and take careful notes ...
I had forgotten that I had hidden a present in the basement bedroom closet and Eleanor reminded me. Oops. It's a good thing I have good help.
We dyed Eleanor's hair blue and you can barely see it in this photo. Eleanor and I went to get her bangs trimmed and my hair cut and the stylist informed us about something called color conditioner and it was clearly something we needed to try out!
More lake time. Nathan took a day trip down with just the boys.
Meanwhile, I was left with a little girl who was tired from too much summer fun. She smiled when Diana sent a video of some new baby guppies.
But then she remembered that she was supposed to be crabby. I often braid her hair so she'll look more angelic. She needs it.
Our response video. Juliet is beyond sweet when she wants to be.
And fun times, my second cousin Stephan's family visited on their way to see family in Nebraska! Juliet was beyond delighted to have a few kids her own age to play with, especially the girls! We had such a great time with them, we're hoping they go on a lot of Nebraska trips and use us as a stop every time.
I continue to demand that kids get lots of outside time but I also want them to play board games with me, so sometimes we sit in the driveway and play Railroad Ink. So fun!
And then we discover the sprinklers are on across the street and have to ditch everything to run over and play in them.
More Railroad Ink. Inside this time. Can you tell who won? He even helped me a bit. He was rather insufferably proud of his advanced strategy and how he was so much better than me. I love it so much.
Outside with my little champ!
She loves helping Daddy park the car.
And back to the climbing gym with Eleanor. Finally!
We end up taking a pack of kids to these climbing outings a fair percentage of the time so it was really fun to go just the two of us.
Please note the blue hair. And the awesome pose.
50 ft climb. She got really high!
Such a great sport for her, I love that she's doing this.
And I got to go solo shopping at Sprouts with this cool dude. It's never just the two of us for things like this, it was so fun. Please note his super awesome outfit, we picked it out at Target together. At the time I didn't really think he would wear the two items together but he likes to and honestly, he looks pretty legit. We're working on him not calling me "bruh" because someone taught him that and I would like to go have a chat with that person.
Golf date with Nathan at Top Golf! I really enjoyed it, although I think I got worse the more I hit.
Pool time with the kids! We've finally had some free afternoons now that most of the summer activities have ended for us and I love it when they get to have lazy hang out time.
Meanwhile, Juliet works on leftover chips from Eleanor's birthday party.
We got more games because we didn't have enough yet. This one is cooperative and Bradley and I have been loving playing it together.
And one last round of June activities for Patrick: basketball camp with two of his buddies. This kid and sports.
And finally - a Pop See Ko performance by my children! I told them they needed to sing this song (that they taught me) in order to get popsicles when we got home from the park and they politely obliged! It's pretty ridiculously cute.
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