Father's Day (Observed)

When your daddy goes out of town on the evening of Father's Day, you have to be adaptable.

We tried to make Sunday morning special, but we saved the big guns for when Dan returned from Canada last night.

I got the great idea to film the kids answering questions about Dan from a friend. Which led to me going through our ENTIRE digital photo collection (that is a ton of pictures, people) to add a photo montage onto the end of the video.  When I realized how long it was going to take me to put it together, I suddenly felt really lucky that our celebrating would be delayed.

We really love our daddy so much.

I was doing the dishes while he was gone (his usual daily contribution) and I don't know what got into me, but I started to cry as I thought about the way my life had turned out because of him.  I cry a lot, but I surprised myself enough that as the first tear fell, I actually thought, "Oh crap, am I pregnant?!"

The answer to that question would be a gigantic, NO.

I just have a really great man in my life who makes me feel like I can do anything as long as he's with me. And, apparently, like I could cry just thinking about him.

We made the best of his time away, taking advantage of the beautiful, not too hot weather.

Jack had his first swing on his 9 month birthday, which probably breaks some sort of  Maximum Age of First Swing law.

He may have had to wait his whole life, but he was too busy loving it to be disappointed.


And we had a nacho picnic with popsicles AND pudding for dessert. Which brought many accolades, including Best Mom Ever.

But the next day, we went to work.

I stayed up too late finishing the video, we shopped for some presents, and the kids worked on the banner, balloons, and cake.

I wish I could say that one of the kids wrote the message on this cake, but it was all me.  I have no future as a cake decorator.

The kids came up with a plan.  Upon our return from picking him up from the airport, they would go in the house first.  Then Dan would come in through the front door.  They would wait on the upstairs landing and throw balloons over the edge on him as he read the banner they'd hung up.

It worked perfectly.

Then we ate his requested taco dinner and watched the video together. (I'm posting the youtube link instead of the actual video here, because I'm pretty sure blogger wouldn't put up with a file so big. Also, the first part where the kids are talking is very quiet.  I added captions, but you may want to turn the volume up for the first 6 minutes.  The photo montage has normal volume, so you'll want to turn it down a bit when that part comes.)


He loved it all.  And we love him.

Happy Father's Day to the best dude in town!

I'm coming for you, Summer!

As long as I've had school age kids, I've worried about summer.  The break from school throws our status quo for a loop and all of the sudden, the activities that take up the majority of their day are gone and I just get a little nervous.  So I make a lot of plans. And then I don't use them for the most part, because after a little while we all find our new status quo and new activities to fill up the hours.  

So this year, I didn't go overboard with my activity planning.  Instead I hopped on the Summer Bucket List bandwagon, which would provide inspiration should we need it.

And I also revamped our chore system.  It seems like I always do this as well at the beginning of each summer because it takes about that long for whatever previous system was in place to breakdown completely.

So the kids had chores. Only Ava actually did them.  We cleaned our brains out on Saturdays.  The house looked like a tornado hit it most of the time.

But I got to thinking, there must be a better way.

Thus, the Zone System was born.

Each child is in charge of a zone on the main floor, which they rotate through weekly.  (3 zones = Family Room, Mud Room and Hall Bath, and Living and Dining Room + plus their respective bedroom). I try to keep up with the kitchen.

Each morning, they do a "run through"and put away everything on the main floor that belongs to them.  Then they clean their zone (plus their room). I've been a stickler about them doing a really good job and what they've found, is that since they clean it everyday, it practically takes no time each morning.  And for a good part of the day, the majority of where we spend our time, looks decent.

They also each have additional daily chores like, getting dressed, brushing teeth, making bed, unloading dishwasher, washing kitchen counters, setting the table, school work, practicing piano, always clearing their dishes, etc., though while they're not new, there has been renewed motivation to clean. 

They each have 2 snack passes to use throughout the day (because Max can literally eat the entire 13 hours he's awake) as well as 3 (30 min each) tech tickets, which includes using the tv, ipad, and wii.

The whole thing has worked wonders.  It's amazing how much better I feel (and I think the kids too) when the house is tidy. And our Saturday morning clean up is much less intense, which is nice when you're hoping to use that day for doing fun things.

Other than that and our recent travels, we've been hanging around the house,

And backing ourselves into corners, 

enjoying the pretty backyard and beautiful evenings, 

The soft grass is an especially nice spot to practice your clapping, 

Finn's been washing a lot of dishes (and even a library book, grrr.) which is a two year old rite of passage, if you didn't know.

And we all love siting on the front porch to watch for Dad to come home.

 We've even managed to mark a few things off the bucket list.

Like the Museum of Nature and Science,

Do you know what happens when you take a picture in front of a green screen and you're wearing a green shirt?  Luke can tell you...

We swam at the pool and had fun despite realizing how rusty some of our swimming skills have gotten.

And next week we'll be off on our next adventure and marking a few more items off of our list, I'm sure.

A Little Picture Buffet

This is the smorgasbord that is our life.  Buckle up, we're going for a ride...

When Max isn't pushing people's buttons and making us crazy, he's a pretty fun brother to have around.

Finn likes yogurt.  And wearing his brother's soccer jersey.

Finn also enjoys shoes.  Especially when they're not his. Word to the wise, start looking for your shoes at least 10 minutes before you need to leave the house.

I had a horrible realization as I watched Luke walk into school on one of the last days.  The poor kid had unknowingly worn his little brothers jeans to school.  I prayed that the other little first graders would be just as oblivious as he was and not notice the skin hanging out between his pants and his sock.  When he got home, I broke the news.

"Luke, I think you accidentally wore Max's jeans to school today."  And then he walked over to me, pulled out the tag, and showed me the 8. The size jeans that he wears.  Er, wore.  

Poor Elise, had unknowingly watched her child grow right before her eyes.  

After realizing that Max had been in the bathroom for nearly 45 minutes, I called through the door asking if he was okay.  He assured me he was.  "What's the hold up then?" I said.  "Well, Mom. I just don't want to wipe my bottom because it's so gross."  I've seen a lot of procrastination in my days, just never about this.

I continue to have more laundry than seems humanly possible to produce.  I feel the upcoming purge in my bones.  This one's going to be big, folks.

The only good thing about it are the smiles it brings to Jack when we plop him in the middle of the laundry mountain.

Sometimes, Jack falls asleep touching my face and I want to freeze time.  The best I can do is take a picture.

Max's girlfriend, Anna moved away.  Yet, not two weeks later, Kamryn has stepped into her place.  And the funny thing is, that while he is worthy of the name "Ladies Man", he doesn't do the pursuing.  He's not running away though either, obviously.

I really like this kid.

 This dot to dot made Luke so happy.  All 1,476 dots.

I realized not long ago, that these two are the miniatures of two of my older brothers. 

 Luke is the brainy, analytical, rational, little Bret.  

Max is the talkative, charismatic, loveable, little Ian.  

With Bret and Ian as the pattern, I already know how this story turns out.  I hope they stay really great friends.

A poor little frog got stuck in our window well.  Ava surprised me by not batting an eye at picking him up for the rescue. 

Finally, after waiting through and endless winter and a May snowstorm, walking weather is back and we love it!

Birthday Blowout Bonanza

Two days after Ava's birthday was Memorial Day, the day set aside for Dan's birthday request--a visit to Royal Gorge Bridge, home to the tallest bridge in the United States.  It was the tallest in the world, until China one upped us.  

A couple of years ago, it fell victim to a horrible forest fire.  Many buildings were burned, but luckily only a few slats of the bridge.  Rebuilding has begun, but we were told it's not like it used to be.  

Hey, Everybody! Look right here!

Or not.

The Gondola is nice and new.

As the ride began, Finn reached over and intertwined our fingers all by himself.  I couldn't complain, it was a long way down!

Once we were safely on the other side of the gorge, we went to an aerial and magic show. 

It began with this lady dressed in her janitor costume, trying to get the silks down.  She chose Luke from the audience to assist her.  

Once they were successful, she handed him this Mr. VIP sign and told him he would get a special reward.  

She then came out dressed like Marilyn Monroe and sang him "Happy Birthday".  He was so, so embarrassed.  She performed the rest of her show on the silks and winked and pointed at him the whole time.  

It was too dark in there to get a picture to accurately illustrate the blush on that boy's cheeks.

After the show, we walked across the actual bridge.  It was less scary than I thought it would be.

We have state identity issues.  Without much thought we took our picture in front of the Texas flag.  

And then we remembered that we live in Colorado now.  Unfortunately, the Colorado flag was at the far end of the bridge and by the time we got there,

The kid's were too hungry to stop for another picture.

The cracks were a little creepy.

The three black dots in the sky, is the gondola we rode.

We stopped to eat our picnic lunch before heading home.

Jack maintained his usual position. 

Hey, Everybody! Look right here!

Friday I set up a birthday scavenger hunt for Dan.  The prize at the end was dinner that night at our favorite, Perry's.  

I think if I lightened this picture it could be a contender for his calendar.

And then, because you can never have too much birthday, the next day we hosted Luke's birthday party at the bowling alley again, a month early, in hopes of catching his friends before they went on summer vacation.  It back fired a little, because it was the last week of school and everyone was insanely busy.

But we still had a really fun time with the kids who could come.  

My kids are the ones laying down.

We'll celebrate again on his actual birthday at the end of June.

Of course we still hadn't had Dan's birthday dinner and cake with the family and since my parents were passing through that Sunday, the day after bowling, we did it with them.

And I don't know that there's anything to say about Dan that I haven't already said.  I feel like we both grew up a lot this year.  Life kind of kicked our booty's the last 12 months.  But Dan keeps on.  He does what he does, and then he does a little more.  Always conscientious about work and his family.  Always looking forward to something. And always my favorite!  Happy Birthday, Baby!