August Fun

We have had all sorts of fun in August. Brutal heat this week, but earlier in the month, we had a "nice" day here and there. One of those days was a Saturday, and we decided to take Trooper to a dog park to make him feel special. He is very perceptive, and the minute he knew we were taking him somewhere, he jumped into the car. The driver's seat! I thought the kids were going to pass out from laughing so hard. I'm so glad we captured it on camera.

Silly dog. I had tongue marks on my window for a week!

Parker is my daredevil child. We NEVER go to the mall. But we had walked by this bungee thing when we went to Legoland for Miles' birthday and I told Parker he couldn't do the jumping then, but we actually had to go back to the mall a few days later (Build a Bear gift card burning a hole in Miles' pocket), so he got to jump. Almost hit the ceiling.

More silly dog-ness.

We hit our last regular season Rangers game. Free hats, to boot!

One day, we went to the local water park with some buddies. Here are Kaitlyn and Audrey.

Miles and Austin. And a water drop on my camera.

Parker has been watching Napoleon Dynamite this summer and decided it was high time that he, like Pedro, tried out some sweet jumps with his bike. He bought this ramp on Amazon with his own money, watched Neal attempt it once, took a deep breath, and totally owned it!

He was so proud.

Goodbye, August! Ok, now it can stop being hot.

Audrey has her arm back!

Just in time to go visit Mabel. She couldn't imagine not being able to draw at Mabel's house!

First Days of School

The kids started school this week. We are back to the grind, waking up at 6:30 and trying to get into bed by 8:30. Neal gave the kids some beautiful blessings on Sunday night. I've taken this same picture in this same spot every year. Always in pjs.

Audrey started school on Monday at her new school. She was so excited! Seventh grade at this school will be very different from what her peers at the middle school are experiencing. We are really feeling blessed that Audrey gets to have this great new adventure!

Parker and Miles started on Tuesday. Parker goes to the Intermediate School now. It is for fifth and sixth graders. He'll start riding the bus home next week. Three kids with three dismissal times all within 25 minutes of each other would be possible if the schools were close together. But they're not!

Miles is a big first grader now! He has a wonderful teacher and is already making some new friends. Neal walked him in to class the first day and snapped these photos at his desk. Sweet little dude! We are excited for a new year, new teachers and friends. I feel so blessed to live in a country where my kids are given an education! What a miracle that is.

Miles' birthday party

We grabbed a couple of Miles' best buddies, Collin and Benjamin, and took them to Legoland Discovery Center one night after burgers at the house. Good times were had by all! Gotta love toothless first graders!

One of Miles' gifts was this Minecraft head and sword. Weirdo.

In the 4D theater at Legoland.

On a ride with Mom.

Miles turns seven!

We had such a fun day with our birthday boy today. He woke up to $5 from the tooth fairy for the front tooth he lost last night. It was a traumatic experience; he REALLY wanted it to come out, but was SO afraid that it would hurt. I totally remember feeling the exact same way. We finally all calmed down enough for me and Neal and Miles to be on his bottom bunk bed. He hugged Bear, I hugged him, and Neal pulled the tooth. I wasn't sure it was out, then Miles turned up to look at me, and I exclaimed in sadness, "Oh bubs!"and shed a few tears.
I have been emotional about his birthday all day; it's been hard on me. It's kind of the final goodbye to our child-bearing years, I feel like. If we had another baby, seven years would be a really big age difference. Not that we ever talk about having another one, but I think we both miss the tiny ones every once in a while. I don't know; mixed feelings, but all bittersweet. Bitter that those days are past and that our baby is big, and sweet in that we are so happy with the three wonderful kids we have. I'm counting on babies in heaven, I tell you.

Lots of Miles' buddies are out of town, and we aren't big on parties anyway, so we went to a trampoline park today, where Audrey (broken arm) and I both read and the boys jumped. Then we went school shoe shopping, which Miles loves, out to lunch, and home to wait for Daddy. When Neal arrived, Miles opened his gifts and we went to dinner at Kobeya. Then home for cupcakes, because a cake goes to waste around here. We may do something with a couple buddies later in the week; we'll see if a cake appears then.

I did comb the dude's hair and take him outside for a mini photo shoot. I just love his little face so much. Miles is such a happy guy; he brings such a lightness to our house and family, and I am so grateful every day that he still lets me hug and mug on him.

This one just screams "Miles" to me. He is always giggling about something. 

Poor Audrey

So Audrey broke her arm on July 29th. She was volunteering at a camp at her new school, playing on the playground with the kids, when she fell on a ropes section and landed on her right wrist in a bad way. I was called up to the school and quickly took her to the nearest emergency center. We got right in and had an x-ray, which showed that she had broken both her radius and her ulna, just below her wrist! Sadness. :(

She had to be in a sling for four days while it swelled and unswelled, and the cast was placed on Thursday. Our prayers were answered because they were able to give her a waterproof cast. We left for Grand Cayman on Saturday morning and we couldn't imagine how sad and difficult it would have been for Audrey to be left out of all the water activities for our big summer trip. Thank heavens for all the little details of this incident that came together and worked out for the best.

After we came home, Audrey had to have her arm evaluated again. They xrayed it on Monday after our trip and a tremendous amount of sand showed up in the xray, so they took off the blue cast and put on a fresh, new green one. Ahhh. So much better.

Some photos of the process . . .

Getting her splint and sling put on the day of the accident.

Broken bones. The radius is more obviously broken than the smaller ulna. There was only a crack in that one. Not too bad of breaks though. Lucky.

Blue cast on.

Having the blue cast removed.

Cast tan.

Sand embeddedness marks.

She'll have to wear the green one for a few more weeks; it's driving her crazy that she can't draw. Poor girl, it's her favorite thing to do after reading. And Minecraft. That darn game.

Grand Cayman, Part IV

A few more pictures from our amazing trip to Grand Cayman.

 We had a little snafu when we first arrived at our rental house on Saturday evening. The manager had failed to email us with the entry code, and we weren't even sure which house we had reserved. He was not a good communicator. But all's well that ends well, as they say, and after that first night, we tried to forget about it and enjoy the moment. The house was completely lovely and we were so grateful to be staying there instead of in a crowded resort. The blue house was in a small cluster with four other houses, all of which shared a pool and a beach. This part of the island is mostly rental homes, and so it is quieter and we really enjoyed that.

There were two hammocks on the porch; perfect for lounging. Or spinning your brother.

Our last afternoon of the trip, we set aside the packing and headed over to Starfish Point one more time. It was hard to leave!

We had to leave for the airport very early on Saturday morning, but we woke up to a beautiful sunset; it had stormed all night, and the skies were amazing!

Such a fun trip. I know I always say that we can't wait to go back, and I don't know if we ever actually will, but I like to think we will. That way it's not so difficult to let it go!

Grand Cayman, Part III

More fun around the island.

This is from the day that we spent at the East End. We like that Audrey looks like a dead body floating behind Parker. She was really just looking for cool stuff underwater.

Blue-eyed kids on Seven Mile Beach. This is the populated part of the island, and is where Neal and I went on our honeymoon. It was fun to revisit the Westin Resort and see what looked familiar!

We had come to the Seven Mile Beach area to board our Six Senses Eco Tour boat at the Yacht Club. Paul and Alice, two Irish folks, led our tour out through the Mangrove forests, to Starfish Point and Stingray City. It was an incredible day!

Audrey looking at the Mangroves, which are vital to the health of the island.

Miles holding a jellyfish that we learned about.

Starfish Point is a great little peninsula of sand not far from our rental house, where there is a constellation (real term) of starfish. They were huge and beautiful, and we had fun handling them and letting them attach to our selves. Check out the one above grabbing onto Parker's finger!

Next, we headed out to Stingray City, which is another sandbar, but far out in the ocean, about 20 minutes from the island. Here, the stingrays gather to greet tourists (and the squid they bring along with them). They were gentle and beautiful, but also a bit large and imposing, when it came down to it. This was a tremendously memorable experience. Above, Alice is educating us about the stingrays before we ventured into the water. The family on the tour with us was the Call family, Mormons from Colorado who we had met at church! That was great fun.

This is what we saw as the boat came to a stop.

Paul, showing us how to feed the stingrays. Yikes!

Parker saying hello.

Alice told us that the stingrays felt like portabello mushrooms. They did. The way Miles looks like he feels is the way I felt in there, too. I kept my hands out of the water, after Paul demonstrated how to hold our thumbs so they didn't get chomped off.

Parker making friends.

After Stingray City, we floated just a little bit further out to see a portion of the barrier reef, which surrounds most of the island and creates ideal scuba and snorkeling conditions. Neal and the kids swam out to see what they could see. They came back with reports of Moray Eel, lobsters, and amazing fish and coral species. The water here is about 84 degrees, and as we returned at sunset, we were so glad we had chosen this peaceful, small tour boat to show us these tremendous sites! What a beautiful day!