There was a lot of commotion at Sunday’s dinner.
Besides some “stiffies” from Pizza Pete…
…this girl took it upon herself to take on a lot of responsibility.
She became the cleaner for about 30 minutes.
She was obsessed with this spray bottle, and got everything within five feet wet.
When I shooed her away, all was calm.
And then I looked down the hallway to find that Navy had taken on another job.
Hair styling.
Poor, wet and sopping Dash.
When I shooed her away from drenching my baby, she left for .2 seconds
Probably to fill up her water bottle again.
Because she now took it upon herself to hydrate Dash.
-
Chaos…commotion…craziness.
Just the way our family thrives.
When Scout and Dash were matching in their grey and white church outfits, I made it a family affair.
Micah wore a grey suit also, but that guy was taking his sweet old time — and missed the photo opportunity.
For a long time, I have wanted to take my kids geo caching.
Kind of nerdy — yes.
Right up my alley — yes.
SO we got on a geo caching website and looked up some Dana Point locations and went to town.
First stop was the community center.
The clue was, “Once upon a time, I was a tree.”
We looked all over everything that was made of wood.
Including this bench that was full of a homeless persons garb.
How classic is Tristen.
What if there was someone sleeping in there?
that would have been the fright of a lifetime.
Tristend finally spotted it (although Micah claims he found all of them first but “let others get the satisfaction of finding them”), but let Scout and Navy retrieve it.
I had never found a cache before, and in time we found out that they com in all shapes and sizes.
Inside there is a log that you sign.
We designated ourselves as “Team Heart Love”.
Then we put it back, along with a little encouraging heart, and let the next people find them.
The next stop was at the “Pilgrim”.
The clue was “Missing Corks”.
Here is Navy signing her name to the heart.
Our final stop was the lookout in Dana Point.
The clue was “The Sky Is The Limit”.
Micah was like a monkey, and checked all over the place.
He searched for quite a while, and he found it — we knew why it took a while.
The cache was miniscule!
-
So the verdict goes like this….
I loved it.
The kids had a great time.
Tristen thought it was as cool as I did.
Micah thought it was okay.
(I guess it wouldn’t be as much fun if you were like a magnet to the caches and there was really no challenge!)
And this baby boy is the easiest geo-caching companion in the world!
-
Signing off.
Love,
Team Heart Love
minus Tristen
Thanks to Nate — my kids had a great morning full of scooting along.
Our Fourth of July started with this patriotic clan riding their bikes in the parade over in the Tacky’s neighborhood.
Then a stop off at bagels.
Then a drive by the water fight in Dana Point Harbor.
Then some quiet time and nap time while I ran to WalMart time.
Then a little creating time.
And proud children time.
Then four hours of swimming.
Then S’mores time.
Then baths and scriptures while we waited for it to get dark.
Then sitting on our backyard couch while Scout sang “God Bless America” for us time.
Then a salute by Scout and a love from Icka time.
Then Marco Forster’s fireworks display seen from our backyard time.
And then a quick hop in the car to catch the last half of Dana Point’s show from down the street time.
And the grand finale of it all—-
bed time!
-
Happy Birthday America
Until Next Year.
Doey came to our house for a few days, and my kids were loving every second of it! Amongst MANY other things (meeting the men and women’s Olympic water polo teams, having fun at the mall, swimming, movie parties, etc.), we spent some time in the kitchen whipping up masterpieces.
Our first undertaking was dehydrating anything we could think of.
We ended up with six types of fruit and four types of yogurt.
It stayed in the dehydrator over night, and we had a huge sampling in the morning.
The verdict — the mango and peach yogurts were great, and the dried bananas were by far the best.
While we cooked, I asked Doey to piece up some bread for Dash.
Then I looked over to see that she really went to town.
Obviously he loved it because he ate everything that didn’t land on his lap!
-
The kids love spending time in the kitchen with me, so I tried an easy version of cinnamon rolls. It was a creation straight out of my mind, and I am proud to say that it was insanely good!
Of course my kids helped.
Disclaimer — Although my kids are on the counter, they have washed hands, they can’t taste test, and their feet look closer than they really are.
And more importantly, these were just for our mouths.
Once we spruced them up and rolled/cut them, they were into the oven.
And the finished product tasted as good as they looked.
But the real test was if the kids liked them.
And in honor of a clean kitchen, I sent them to our picnic spot and delivered the rolls out to them.
Navy died over them.
Dash screamed for more.
Nad although I don’t have a picture, Chloe was on board — fully.
Now the real test was and is always with Scout.
He will happily turn away sweets if he isn’t in to them.
But these rolls passed.
-
Doey — come back.
My kids want you as their permanent older sister.
And I want your amazing helping hands!
(A random picture from them taking a bath — but this is pretty typically their personalities!)
–
Here is a little peak into typical conversations between Smarty-pants Scout and Precocious Navy.
I had told Navy that she needed to finish her food if she wanted her yogurt.
She replied with, “Are you kidding myself….Are you kidding myself?!”
Then Scout interrupted her in disgust with, “Navy, that doesn’t even make sense.”
So she showed him with, “Scout, are you kidding myself!?”
-
It’s amazing to think that when I was quizzing Scout on math today and asked him, “If Nonnie brought five soybeans to a party, but I got hungry and ate three of them, how many are left?”, Navy yelled “TWO” before he did. (And Scout is way ahead of his time in math.)
-
So an airhead, she is not.
A three year old who thinks she runs the show — and every show, she is.
Forget teething rings!
A new and soft toothbrush is always my kid’s first choice when it comes to teething.
And when I put a dab of toothpaste on it — they are beyond sold!
And they get a jump start on excellent dental hygiene.
I was working pretty quickly to get out the door this morning. So I got Scout and Navy ready and then told them to “babysit” Dash. That means make sure there are no small objects around, and make sure he doesn’t go anywhere near the stairs while I quickly got ready.
When I heard crying, I realized that the my sweet boy had fallen down the first part of our stairs!
So sad — although I think it has happened with all of my kids about once.
I don’t condone it, but it keeps them away from the edge after that.
When I saw him, I grabbed him and sang/rocked him for a bit, and he was as good as new.
When I looked around for my uber-responsible son, and my slightly flighty daughter, they were in the toy room.
Apparently, counting Scout’s money was way more interesting than protecting their younger brother’s life.
So important that when they saw I had the camera, they climbed to the top of the counter and posed for a picture.
-
I told them to run and get their shoes and head to the car while I got Dash finished up. And just as I walked out, I was glad to see Scout had already left to the car, and Navy had grabbed a pair of…
monster shoes.
When I objected, she objected to my objection.
Good thing that my objection to her objecting my objection trumped all.
One of Scout’s favorite things he put in our jar was to “Sleep In Th Fort”. The “fort” would be the awesome tree house in the Brockbank’s backyard. And this jar-pull didn’t disappoint!
-
But before we get to the sleeping arrangements — let’s get to the day at the beach with our cousins.
Doey and Navy and Scout are best buds, and could play together all day long.
And in my opinion, Doey is the most helpful and sweet cousin for my kids to hang around.
(Trey is also in this bunch — but he is a water dude at the beach.)
But when he gets out of the water, he lets my kids bury him.
He lets them every time, and I think that is awesome!
For me not being a beach person AT ALL, my kids LOVE it.
Navy is pretty brave and will get into the water to her ankles.
(At 3 years old, I feel like that is kind of bold.)
I adore this picture of Scout.
He is super into sports things lately, so of course he was throwing the football back and forth.
I love the wind up he’s got going!
I guess Scout found this fish, but Icka was the one who would pick it up.
This girl is crazy about bugs and animals and would probably try to pick up a rattlesnake if she saw one.
While we were at the river, she made some crazy-huge and scary-looking bug her “pet”.
Another “lately” is Scout’s constant eating.
He never stops.
He must be going through a growth spurt, because even after a full dinner, he asks when we are going to have dinner. When I tell him we just did, he complains he is still hungry. So my rule between meals is “Fruit is a Freebie”, and he runs to grab himself 10 apricots!
One of his favorite things to eat — besides fruit — is nuts.
And here he is breaking open some peanuts for the guys.
Don’t you love the chilled out Icka playing in the sand while she rests her head on her hand?
-
After the beach, my kids were wiped and headed to the fort in sleeping bags.
I was SO glad I didn’t have to sleep in there and that their cousins were all game!
My kids had SO much fun, and slept in like crazy.
My guess is that the combo of the cold night and a day at the beach put them into a coma that night.
-
Then in honor of having the cousins over, of course Auggie planned some more fun events.
Scout’s favorite food before — at the Original House of Pancakes.
And after!
Then it was to the bowling lanes.
Where four decently tired cousins competed.
And Icka did snow angels on the floor and then laid on it to watch the bowling show.
-
During the cousin extravaganza, Scout and Navy both accomplished a few more swimming fetes at their pool. Scout swam down to the bottom of their 11 ft. pool — which was amazing! And Navy jumped off the meter high diving board a gazillion times and swam to the edge.
-
All I have to say is that my kids could not be luckier on their cousins whom they adore, and who adore them. And on top of that — they get the ultimate aunts in the world. Lucky kids, and a lucky few days.
| DESIGN BY