Hi.

It's been a month since my last post.  I don't have a great explanation, other than that my evening blog time has transformed into my reading-trash-on-the-internet time.  You know, instead of creating more trash on the internet.

I got really far behind earlier in the year on documenting what we've been up to.  And honestly, the more I tried to catch up, the more stale everything felt.  I couldn't remember the funny stories that went with the pictures, and I felt mostly like I was just posting "here's pictures of something we did."  It just wasn't what I wanted to be doing with my time.

I've also been going back on forth on whether to password protect this blog or not.  Or whether to split it into two blogs.  I really didn't want to do two blogs, but it's really the way I'm leaning right now.  I'll probably password protect the one with all of our day-to-day craziness, and then have a public one for recipes, crafts, and other random stuff.  It's not by any means that I want to exclude anyone from reading about our day-to-day stuff.  It's more that I don't feel comfortable putting a lot of details out there - I've been intentionally vague about a few things (location, work, when we're going to be out of town, etc) that I'd like to document.  Plus, as the girls are getting older, I want to make sure that I respect their privacy.  You know, when I'm not embarrassing them.

Give me a few days to sort out some details, and I'll keep you posted.  Or, at least I'll keep my brother posted because I'm pretty sure he's the only one still reading this.

Here's my bullet list of the summer so far:

• In full on panic mode about organizing photos after I watched iPhoto eat a picture.  It had been my go to for organizing and quick lighting fixes.  But I don't trust it anymore.  I'm using Adobe Organize that came with Photoshop Elements 11, but I'm not loving it so far.  It's clunky.  I think I'm waiting for tax free weekend to buy Lightroom.
• Had a pretty good trip up to see family for the first two weeks of July.  It rained a lot though, or was miserably hot and sticky.  Oh, and in true awesome fashion, I broke out in a horrible rash that I would call hives but the two, yes two, doctors that I had to see insist is an allergic reaction.  And then the prednisone made me crazy and I had to stop it, so now, 2 weeks later, I still itch but without the bumps.  
• The girls are doing gymnastics once a week for the summer and are LOVING it.  And are going to make me pay for dance AND gymnastics once school starts again.  
• Hoping to catch up on my Project Life album.  I'm currently working on week 48 from 2012 and week 9 from 2013.  I'm trying to keep it simple in order to catch up.  It's really the only scrapbooking I'm doing at the moment.
• I was doing really well with going to the gym in the morning before work back before we went on vacation.  And I did pretty well the first week of vacation ... but then the hives broke out and I was pretty sure the heat and sweat was only going to make it worse.  And then I gave myself the week off when we got back from vacation.  And now I still haven't gone back now, two weeks later.  Sigh.

Splish Splash

Through some sort of summer reading program (which somehow includes "being read to"), the girls had free water park passes that expired this season, and Labor Day weekend was technically the end of season.  We decided to try a water park on the other side of the county that we'd never been to before, and it was pretty much awesome.

They had this giant water slide that was a blast.  The girls insisted on going down on our laps, but I'll take it.

They also had a splash pad area that kept the ladies entertained.

We like to test the water with our heinies...

before we get brave enough to go through.

Emma was cracking me up.  I think she thought she was bending down far enough to go under all the water spouts, but in reality, she was sticking her head right where all of the water spouts were hitting her.

They also loved the zero entry pool.  It was nice to have a huge area of 1.5 ft or so of water that they could play and splash and swim around in.  Julie was dancing, even in the pool.

When we went back to the splash pad, the water gun was finally free, and they took control.

Becca and daddy

Becca got herself in the face pretty good.

We stayed there much longer than we normally would have stayed, but we were all having so much fun.  The only downside was that Greg and I ended up with some sunburn.  The girls were fine - somehow - but I think we learned not to skimp on our own sunscreen.

4th of July

We didn't really have anything planned for the 4th of July.  We woke up and had one of those, "I don't know, what do you want to do?" mornings.  We decided to use some Living Social vouchers I'd bought for a water park that's in the next town over.

 They still don't like even the little kid water slides.  They mostly like to lay on their bellies in the shallow pool and pretend to swim (read: scrape their bathing suits along the bottom of the pool until they pill...).  They like to sit on the edge of the pool (like the pic of Em, just above, at "0 Ft 0 In") and jump in, and climb back out again.  Julie has recently started to like laying on her back and floating.  She's also been swimming in the tub lately - Emma and Becca are usually in a hurry to get out of the tub when I do baths, so I always save Julie for last.  She loves having the whole tub to herself, and I let her "swim" while I start cleaning up.

The girls had been begging to go see fireworks all week.  We used it as a bargaining chip for most of the week.  On the 4th, we told them that they all had to take a nap, or we wouldn't go see fireworks.  I guess the water park wore them out sufficiently, because they all did take a nap.  At that point, Greg and I figured we'd have to come up with a plan for fireworks after all.  Naps are so hard to come by these days that we were counting on staying home.

We had about 3 options, and considering traffic, cost, and crowds, we decided to go a few towns over. They were having a carnival in addition to fireworks, so after dinner, we headed over.  There were only a couple of rides that they were big enough for.  Here, they're contemplating the ferris wheel.

They went on this thing first.  It was definitely small town carnival, complete with a spare bolt laying on the platform.

They all wanted to go on the little ferris wheel, too.  While we were waiting in line, I overheard a boy tell his mother that it looked like a dog cage.  Yeah, pretty much.

They really wanted to go on the bigger ferris wheel with us, but the line was ridiculous, and it was going to cost us $20 to all go.  Instead, we spent that $20 on some Italian ices.

Love this one.

At that point, we were just stalling until the fireworks.  There was a concert going on, so we checked that out for a bit.  Finally, we decided to get some drinks and kettle corn, and go get the chairs from the car to settle in for some fireworks.

We settled in.  Found a spot.  Cracked open the kettle corn.

One firework went up.  It was pretty.

And then, it went BOOM.

And they freaked.

"Iwannagetinthecar.  I'mscared.  Daddy!  Idon'twannaseefireworks!  Iwannagohome!"

They were yelling and crying, so much that the people in front of us got up and moved.

We packed up.  Watched fireworks from 3 or 4 different displays from the car on the way home.

I can't say I was terribly disappointed.  I'm not crazy about fireworks myself.  But after how much they wanted to go, I felt bad for them.

Maybe next year.

Beating the Heat

Greg was cat-sitting for some friends of ours who are out of town for a little while.  They bought an inflatable water slide earlier this season, and let us borrow it while they were out of town.  We surprised the girls with it on Saturday morning.

We still were back in the house before 10am, because it was so darn hot, but it helped beat the heat for a little while.

On Sunday, we let Greg sleep in.  Becca went upstairs by herself to get some clothes, and apparently (even though I told her not to) woke up Greg saying, "Daddy, can we go on the waterslide?"

We also went to the mall for a while, because I'd bought some vouchers for a train they've added and they expire soon (which reminds me we still have some to use in the next week...).

The ladies rode with daddy.

They were in car #3, ha.

We stayed for a little longer, and went to the play area.  Julie became obsessed with this thing.  I think she even pushed Emma away when she got too close.

Our schedule got totally off that Saturday.  The girls fell asleep at dinner time, and we tried to just put them straight to bed.  Did.  not.  work.  Greg was trying to put them to bed, and I could hear how bad it was going.  So, awesome mom that I am, I went up and asked if they wanted to go get ice cream in their pajamas.  They think I'm so cool now.

Ah, summer.

Corn on the cob.

Burgers on the grill.

Does summer food get any better?

I'm not sure how long it's been since we've had corn on the cob... certainly since last summer.  Emma picked hers up and tried to bite the end off.  But they picked it up pretty quickly.

Rainbows

The light was just right to catch some rainbows when we pulled the sprinkler out last week.  

Ladies and the Animals

It had been a rough week at work...  One of those where it just seemed like everyone was driving me crazy.  In hind sight, of course, it wasn't really that bad.  But by the time Thursday rolled around, and I had no meetings scheduled for Friday, so I decided enough was enough.  I took a vacation day on Friday, and surprised the girls with a trip to the "big" zoo.

One of my other deciding factors was the weather.  It was supposed to be perfect.  And I have been here long enough to know that there aren't many "perfect" (meaning bearable) weekends once summer finally hits.  It's been so nice spending time outside the past few weeks, so I really wanted to take advantage of it.

 We made it out without buying this guy.

I was trying to get a picture of them on the elephant statue, but they were too busy looking at the real elephants.  You know how they like animal statues.

I almost think we could have skipped the animal entirely and just played in this rock garden for hours on end.

It was feeding time at the giraffe exhibit.  They've got a feeding platform, and you can buy (of course) giraffe food.  I believe giraffe food was lettuce.  The giraffes come right up to the platform, which was pretty awesome for taking pictures.  But not awesome if you prefer animal statues (and stuffed animals) to real ones.

Julie checking out the turtles.

The zoo is right along the river, and immediately on the other side of the river is the botanical gardens.  They're connected by this bridge, and a free tram runs between the two.  (It's a deceptively short distance on the zoo map, but oh my goodness, I'm so glad we didn't walk.  Huge hills.)  Anyhow, they loved riding the tram.  We got up to the botanical gardens and I asked if they wanted to walk around; no, they wanted to get right back on the tram and go back to the zoo.

Earlier in the day, we had passed the pony rides.  I asked if anyone wanted to go on a pony ride; Julie and Becca piped up.  I gave them a little while to think about it, and we came back.

I should preface this all by saying that there's a horse farm on the way into our neighborhood, so they see the horses all the time.  And when we go by, they're always saying "When I grow up, I'm going to ride on a horse!"  or "I want a horse at my house."

So, Julie and Becca still wanted to ride.  Emma was a no-go.  We got up to the front of the line, and they put the helmets on.  All of a sudden, Emma wanted to ride.  She put a helmet on.

Becca got on the pony with no fear at all.  Started going.

When it was their turn to get on, Julie and Emma said "I don't want to ride a pony!"  Even after Becca got back safe and sound, I was still giving them a chance to change their minds.  But no.  Just Becca rode the pony, and she loved it!

They were all also kinda infatuated with the milking-the-fake-cow thing.  Should I admit that I was kind of relieved when other kids came up and I told them they couldn't have any more turns?

More statues.

Oh, the smirk.

They were itching to get on the carousel all day.

Ice cream, of course.  And then a little playing on the playground.  And I know that it's sacrilege to complain about ice cream, but by this point, it's HOT out.  All the tables out the ice cream shop are full.  And they really overfilled the ice cream cups.  So, we had to walk for a while to find somewhere to sit, and by then, everything's melted so much that it's already running over the (overfilled) cups.  Sigh.  I'd be happier with less ice cream and fewer clothes to try to get stains out of.  Well, this time.

 

I told them we had to leave once they had ice cream, but I'm soft.  They talked me into one more ride on this little train.  Crazy girls.  But you'll notice the big chocolate ice cream stain on Emma's shirt.

Our last stop was supposed to be the flamingoes, but somehow in our wanderings, we had missed the penguins.  We walked in there right at feeding time, which was pretty cool to watch.  The girls loved it, too.  On the way out of the penguin house, there was this little dinosaur statue.  I didn't get a chance to figure out its relevance to penguins, since my kids were fighting with each other to get on it.

A long, but fun, ladies' 'venture day.