Summer Days Drifting Away....

 Bailey has 10 days of summer left. : ( I just can't believe how quickly the summer has gone by. This is my post that will hit the highlights of what we have been up to so far. I confess that before Beau was born I was nervous about having a baby and entertaining the big kids with how hot it has been the last few summers, which ended up meaning that the summer has been busy due to activities. Almost too busy, but everything has been very fun and I just know for next year to allow for some lazy days.

We started off the summer with getting Blair potty trained!!! Next we did 7 days of swim lessons from Ms. Barbara, which were amazing! Then it was off to Weird Animals VBS. All of these were back-to-back and sometimes overlapping before leaving for Trail West.

 Father's Day 

 Father's Day was somewhere in the mix of all of that and we grabbed take-out lunch and went to one of our favorite parks after church. I tried to get pictures of the kids with Luke, but ended up just getting some of them playing. Ali & I also coordinated dinner with the other Mezgers & Franny for a Father's day dinner at Waterloo. We sure do love our daddy!

We can officially fill up an entire swingset.

 Ali & I call these two Gen 3 and they were having fun copying each other.

Backyard Camping & Fishing at the Dock

This was probably before Father's Day, but our family sure missed camping this Spring. So much so that Luke volunteered to camp out in the yard with the older 3. We combined this with fishing at the dock to knock two things off our summer bucket list.

 Fishing is one of those things that takes patience & luck. We were as patient as we could & tried really hard, but didn't have alot of luck. We did catch one fish & Luke had brought an empty tote so we could observe him. Eventually we left the poles to swim & paddleboat. We love Uncle Doug's dock.

This is literally how Blair would fish. The tip of the pole had to be in the water.

 

Doves 

After we got unpacked from the 4th of July at Gigi & Pa's we went on a family bike ride and Bailey caught a dove. Luke & I were pulling of the rear of the bike train with Blair and Blake comes running at us that Bailey had a caught a bird. It did have a hurt wing, but still. That Bailey girl and the things she has caught.

We left that dove in a safe place near where we found him, but literally the next morning Blair found this baby dove in our backyard. We made him a nest, put him in the playhouse, and kept an eye on him for 3-4 days before he flew away. Poor guy got lots of lovin' and we probably scared the mother to death as she watched us at a safe distance.

The Tooth Fairy Has Been Busy

Bailey keeps losing teeth and now reminds me of a jack-o-lantern. She has lost 5 so far and the 6th is loose. 

 Swimming, Swiming, Swiming

The pool has felt like a second home. Ms. Barbara's swim lessons + fins gave me two confident swimmers and the pool has not been as bad as I had thought. Especially since Beau is so content in his carseat.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are back and Blake has enjoyed having matching suits with some of his friends.

This is one of my favorite places in Austin- the Quarries.

 The Quarries again.

Bailey with school friends.

The Y pool with Mia.We really do love this pool.

We had to take Nana to the Y pool and show her what we had been talking about.

Impromptu Lemonade Stand

I had promised Bailey a lemonade stand and needed to make good on my promise. She sold original artwork and lemonade. She probably only covered her costs, so not our most successful lemonade stand, but a fun reason to see neighbors and pass an afternoon.

 
Pine Cove Camp in the City 

Bailey got to do Pine Cove Day camp this year! This was on wear-your-team-colors day and she showed the Aggies some love! Reveille even got to go help decorate Moolaba's tent. (Moolaba was the group Bailey was in.)

 

Here is one story that I think will always stick out in my mind about this camp. Bailey snuck my old iphone to camp. It had been dropped a day or two before and had a shattered screen. 

This was my conversations when picking Bailey up the first day, "Soooo, Bailey brought a phone to camp with her and if it is okay with you we would like to ask you not to send it again". "Really??? (Me not remembering the broken phone at first) Ohhhhhhh.........of course", pausing to look at the girl's name tag, "Yes, Glass Slipper, I had no idea. I just got a new phone and Bailey has been excited to have my old one. I'm so sorry! I hope it didn't cause any problems." I then turn and giving Bailey big eyes, "It will not go to camp the rest of the week". 

Y'all I even checked her bag before she left. She claims that she just wanted to take pictures to show me what camp was like, but there sure was a mischevious look on her face.

Watermelons!!! 

One of the things the kids wanted to grow in their garden this year were watermelons. We didn't see much going on until we got back from Trail West, but this is how big they are now and we have 5!!!

Gymnastics Showcase

Bailey, Emmy, & Boone's group showed off a dance and what they have been learning in class, plus got their medals. 

Showing off on the bar.

 So, I am that mom who lets her girl wear a swimsuit to the Showcase, but Bailey's friend Mia was with us that day and Bailey let her wear her leotard. I admired Bailey's sharing heart so much that I didn't make her change, but we were told that she could not wear a two piece in the future-Oops.

I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE these kids.

Re-capping all of this I just feel like the days of this summer slipped through my fingers and I wish I would have some of them back. I know I feel this way about most seasons and you have probably noticed that I do posts like this, but time just goes so fast and I want to remember life. 

Here's where we are: Bailey is about to start 1st grade and be 7. I can't tell you how many times I have been so confused in conversations because I still think she is going into K. Blake is about to be top dog at preschool and will go 4 days. Blair is not my baby anymore and my baby is almost 5 months old. All the kids are sleeping through the night and we only have one in diapers.

 One another note, one thing I will remember about this summer is that it really just got hot. If there have been some really hot (think-you-are-going-to-die) days we must have been out-of-town because this summer has been awesome as far as the temperature. Maybe that's why it still feels like June in my mind. 

Summer 2014

The ER

We were bound to end up at the ER again at some point and this time it was with Blair. 

My sister Tori is moving to Austin for pharmacy school and after spending the night with us she accidently left her toiletry bag in our bathroom when she went to move into her apartment. She had no idea she left it. When Blair was washing her hands after going potty she must have found the pill bottle in the toiletry bag, opened the child-proof lid, and ate some amount of them. What complicated this is that she could have eaten between 14-30 of the pills. I wasn't nearby because Blair had ask for privacy in going potty. When Blair came out completely naked I went in to check on things and immediately saw the empty pill bottle. After determining that she did eat them, I made some phone calls to see how serious this was and we were quickly on our way to Dell Children's Hospital. Eating A Cup of Charcoal (mixed with apple juice) + 6 Hours of Being Monitored + an EKG + Blood Draws= a very long day, but thankfully all is well and Blair is fine. She probably only ate a very small amount.

This is how Blair felt about all of it.

The Beach

It was that time again to make the 4 hour trek down to the coast. Each trip has a little different look and this time we stayed in a little community called Pirates Cove & brought Franny with us. The big things that made this trip different were all the seaweed and the crowds. On the first day we only had about 2 feet on either side before you were encroaching on your neighbor's space. The seaweed was so bad by day 3 that on day 4 we opted to go the the Aquarium in Corpus instead. Don't get me wrong, we did get in the water and although we thought it was gross we made the best of it and had fun, but looking at the pictures I took it does look more like a big play in the sand with your swimsuits on trip.

 The making of sand castle #1

This guy's temperament is such a blessing! Here he is just hanging on sucking on his fingers. 

Crab hunting after more sand castle building on day 2.

I am not sure the final count, but all of them were pretty small.

This was the biggest crab we caught and this was taken after we released him. The kids followed him for awhile.

We usually build the kids one of these sea baths, but we did it this time trying to keep out the seaweed.

Thanks to Nana we had this kite. 

I promise she was on the trip despite the fact that I didn't get many pictures of her. : (

Sweet naps.

This is castle #3. (I didn't bring the camera to the beach on day 2.) This was the kid's sand dribbles.

This was what the other side looked like.

It kinda looked like a wedding cake with a castle top.

The Aquarium

This was the all around favorite part- the dolphin show.

If you have seen Planes then you will understand how much Bailey & Blake wanted to go see the "Jollywrenchers boat" in the background. Maybe next time we will head there.

Feeding the seagulls.

Late afternoon shadows- right to left: Franny, Luke, Mel, Bailey, Blake, Blair, and Beau (in carseat).

It was a great trip and all things considered I still think the beach is the best trip you can take with kids. The kids hardly even noticed the seaweed and they were content for hours just playing. We might look into going to a different beach next time, but you can't beat the drive. We will see. Thanks Port A!