The Scotts: Lake of the Ozarks 4th of July

This morning I surprised the kids with some store bought blueberry muffins. From Walmart. There was great enthusiasm and Bradley declared them the best muffins in the world, much better than the blueberry muffins I make. But to console me he said he was sure my muffins weren't the worst, there are people out there who haven't even tried to make muffins so I'm better than them. I feel much better now.

Here's another great Bradley quote. We were trying out a new game and we asked Bradley what the rules were. He said "It's written in a different language that I do not know how to say." "What language?" "Cursive."

The other morning at breakfast Patrick was speaking "Spanish" and Bradley was getting annoyed so I told him it was a chance to have him interpret for Patrick and basically make him say whatever he wanted. Like: Bradley is the best brother in the whole world. Patrick grinned and said "Blah blah not!" We all understood his Spanish and it got the desired reaction from Bradley.

We have a new museum membership to Wonderscope and it's pretty cute. Bradley was too busy running around for me to get any good pictures of him.

Grandpa Dan and Grandma Kati visited over the 4th and in a very proud moment, I remembered to get a group picture at the beginning of the trip.

The official photo bench has gotten a lot of use over the years.

Dan and Kati were only at our house for a day before we all headed out to the lake so we read a lot of books.

And went to see an Elephant and Piggie play at the Coterie Theatre! Everyone loved the play, Bradley and Eleanor were both fighting over the spot they wanted to stand in for this picture. Ah, children.

We headed straight to the lake after the play. Only one child stayed awake for the entire car ride.

And then we got to our condo at the lake. In happy news there were no trips to the emergency room this year, although we may have gone a little overboard in warning children to walk and be careful as we walked back and forth from our condo to Aunt Tami's.

Sometimes Patrick would get his energy out in his own Patrick way.

I love this picture of the girls. They're such good buddies.

Juliet was the star of the trip, here she is with Aunt Tami.

All the activity did tire her out a bit.

We didn't bother bringing Juliet's pack and play since she was just 5 months old at the time of the trip, we just brought the little mattress that goes with the pack n play. It turns out that was a mistake. We put the mattress on the floor of our room next to our bed and in the night Juliet would turn towards me and then scooch closer in her sleep. I fed her a couple times in the night and put her back in the center of her mattress and then she would do the exact same thing, turn and scooch. In the morning I had to pull her out from under the bed by her ankles. So we ended up blocking the sides of the mattress with extra pillows, which isn't exactly what you want to do in terms of a smothering risk for an infant. Crazy baby. Her love for me is quite intense these days. Even in her sleep.

She was a hit in the pool in her cute ruffle swimsuit.

As was the cute unicorn ring toss game we got for Eleanor for her birthday. Even the adults got in on it.

Cuddles with Auntie Nicole.

Bradley was a little obsessed with Micah during this trip. They played in the water together, played video games together, and Bradley couldn't remember his name so he just called him "that big guy" when he wanted one of us to find him for him.

Juliet got passed around a bit. Here she is with Aunt Angie.

So tired with her Nana.

And then back in the water with her fan club.

Bradley was so cute on this trip. It rained all day the day after the 4th so we couldn't really do anything and Bradley might have gotten 8 hours of video games on the Switch. I'm told it was the best day ever.

Family picture at the lake!

Playing Pokémon with "that big guy." Micah is a great kid, we're all fans.

Ava with her baby buddy.

And then video game time. Nathan even brought a stand for Bradley, this kid doesn't know how lucky he is that I'm not in charge of any of this stuff.

Patrick got a fair bit of tablet time on the rain day, but Juliet worried that he might be lonely.

She was very interested in the tablet and kept whacking at it. We're at the point that the kids think this behavior is beyond adorable, thank goodness.

We snuck in a boat ride on our last morning there.

A friend lent us an infant life jacket for Juliet. Check out how happy Bradley is driving this boat.

Patrick even got to drive, which was great until Jamie foolishly showed her where the button was to honk the horn. The button got pushed a fair bit.

Ava with Juliet again.

Patrick wanted to cuddle with me for the ride back and soon this happened. Sweet boy. Eleanor just hung off the back of the boat the whole time and didn't want to try to drive at all. She also didn't care when we managed to run into a big wave just right and we all got pretty wet. That ended Patrick's nap incidentally.

Juliet had her first trip to Steak 'n Shake on the way home. I would say she was a fan, but she was very tired and we had to tell the kids to hurry and eat their food and bring their shakes out to the car to eat on the road. Juliet cried for about 2 hours of the 3 hour drive out to the lake so we were hopeful to not repeat that experience on the drive home. A sleeping baby belongs in the car when you are on a long drive.

And we made it back in time for fireworks with our friends the Rutherfords. Juliet looked very fancy in her noise canceling headphones.

Both Nathan and Juliet were a little tired after such a long day.

Grandpa and Nana came back the next day.

Juliet is very fun to read books to, I don't remember any of the other kids whacking at the pages as hard as they could on repeat.

And then we took everyone to the Museum at Prairiefire the next day for a fun outing.

This is how tall the big kids are compared to a Brachiosaurus leg.

And this is what every trip to the Discovery Room looks like. Eleanor and Patrick have a tea party and Bradley reads books.

Juliet checked out butterflies with Nana.

Patrick's tea party pose.

More reading with Grandpa.

And this is what it looks like every time we leave the museum. There's a ledge that must be walked on. No one has fallen so far.

Eleanor birthday slime was a bit hit in the afternoon, although all the glitter gave their Daddy a bit of a heart attack.

More sweet Juliet cuddles.

Eleanor hasn't been falling asleep until about 10 most nights this summer so we got her out of her room after putting the exhausted boys in bed and fed her some berry cobbler.

And then she got to play a Scooby-Doo game with both parents and both Grandpa and Nana all to herself. She was a very happy girl and we might not be doing a good job convincing her to go to bed a little earlier.

Cuddles on the couch the next morning after the grandparents left for the airport. Juliet watched an entire episode of PJ Masks and I am so grateful that this allows me to get things done, as opposed to Patrick who showed zero interest in any shows until he was 2.

Bradley's friend Caroline came over this same morning and she had a fabulous time being the center of attention. She particularly liked it when Bradley opened up the door to the back deck and said "After you madam!" and made a fancy gesture indicating that she was to go ahead of him. The look on her face was a mixture of joy and satisfaction. Bradley is such a sweet little boy.

We ran an errand over to my parents' house and Juliet got in a little reading time there too.

Then we had a playdate with some friends and they happened to spy Pie Face in the basement so we got it out. We hadn't played it in ages. Still a great game.

I've been a little tired with Juliet waking up a bit more at night but I'm so lucky to have sweet boys to cuddle me in the morning (Eleanor is generally sleeping in).

Patrick reads to Juliet now whenever he can and she's the best audience because she doesn't care too much if he gets all the words just right. Incidentally, he told me the other day "I like Dogman now. I don't like Captain Underpants anymore. I grew out of those." Such advanced tastes at 4 years old.

Me with baby! She has a bit of cradle cap so her hair is a little greasy most days from all the oil we're scrubbing onto her head at bathtime. Having hair as a baby is very fun but it also has its downsides.

Typical Bradley face while holding Juliet.

One of the best things about having a game website is having Bradley help me try out new games. He also comes up with new rules and I have to say, they improve the games dramatically just about every time.

I think Bradley took this picture of me and Juliet.

She loves her exersaucer these days!

Tired Patrick at quiet time.

I've really been into naked baby time in the mornings and mostly she's just in her diaper before we have to go somewhere. I put on ruffle bloomers one morning and Patrick happened to find some of Eleanor's necklaces that he wanted to put on Juliet and she ended up being very fancy indeed.

She still loves the swing. I still haven't gotten to push her because there are so many siblings who want to.

Dinner on the deck while Nathan was on a work trip!

And then Eleanor and I stayed up late and watched shows together and ate chips … oh my. She's never going to go to bed at the right time again. I give the boys tablet time in the mornings when we do this so they get a good thing too. They're too tired at night for shows.

So so tired.

Bradley finally stopped picking at his nails long enough for me to be able to trim them (this has been going on for about two years) so I took him out for celebration ice cream at Unforked. Patrick and Eleanor were happy to celebrate his achievement with him.

And then Eleanor was very cold and this is how she had to get warm when we got home. These kids are so lucky they have such a cuddly big brother.

The other morning Eleanor slept till 9 and we are trying to keep her on some sort of semi-reasonable schedule so Juliet helped me wake her up.

And then demanded that her big sister help her play at her cool activity table.

This baby is not short on sibling attention.

She's into everything they do.

I took a bunch of photos of Juliet in all the "nerd shirts" that my mom made for her. And I decided to pose her on all the baby quilts my grandma made! So many wonderful things for this baby.

We went back to the dinosaur museum. Please note Patrick's gecko shirt. It's from PJ Masks and he is super obsessed.

More sister cuddles.

Hanging out at the pool with Daddy. This is what happens when Daddy takes the pictures.

The look on Juliet's face here is amazing.

As is this. She's finally discovered the kitties.

She is a fan.

Reading a kitty book together.

Oh Patrick. Friends wanted to meet at a park, which I usually avoid because of the creek feature. My children immediately go in but Patrick is the only one who insisted on ditching his shoes. This meant he immediately slipped and fell in the water. But not to worry! One only has to ditch his shorts and he's good to go again. I really look forward to when my children are clothed in public on a regular basis.

Nathan has been doing a bunch of water balloon fights with the kids lately.

And here are some pictures from what is probably going to be our last Green Meadows park outing of the summer.

So much fun!

Everything seemed fine. We went home and watched shows. Lovely day.

Juliet is a little naughty when it comes to popcorn.

The video is AMAZING. Eleanor is a very good sport.

And she's more than a little clingy with me in the evening. I took this picture after I walked away from her. Instant tears.

We found out the next day that Patrick had walked in some grass at the park after taking off his shoes. Chiggers. 10 chigger bites. One was even on his belly button. He was a miserable little boy and I just wrapped him in a towel to wear for the day because all the other bites were on his underwear line.

He did make it to the pool for a bit in the afternoon.

But then it was back to towel time.

Or, you know, whatever. Towels are difficult to keep on. That's my bed. Oh well.

He felt loads better after about a day and has hopefully learned his lesson about where he chooses to go bare foot. We also got a new bath floatie for Juliet and everyone likes it!