Well, July is over and that means the bulk of our summer has passed. Although the thought of sending all the kids to school in just a few short weeks makes me super sad, I can't complain because we've had a GREAT summer! Here are some of the fun things that filled our month of July.
The kids love to get snocones, but we don't make time for it very often. Early in the month, we tried a new snocone place called Frosty Bites. It was a hit! I really think it would be hard to disappoint my crew with snocones, though!
Brenson, Brooke, Brecklyn, Brianna
I'm not a big snocone fan, but I do enjoy about one per season.
Brecklyn, Brooke, and Daddy
Brianna, Brenson, and Momma
This girl loves her sweets!
Snocone tongue!
Early in the month my kids also completed all the requirements for the summer reading program we participate in through our local library. Yay! They each got a certificate and a little prize.
I have slept with a body pillow since I was 15 years old. At some point while I was pregnant, I discovered the joy of a Snoogle, and was still using one until a few months ago. When I finally decided to give that up (because it was massive and unnecessary), I teased Bren a few times because he had taken over my regular body pillow a few years ago. One day, I walked in my room to find he had put the body pillow on my bed with a sticky note that said "Spesell Dilivry". Love that boy!
My Aunt Suzie who lives in New Mexico sent my kids a package this month with aprons and tutus for the girls and some bath paint for Bren. Brooke immediately put on her loot and went for a bike ride. Because of course!
All my girls looked precious in their new aprons. Ready to hit the kitchen!
My Mom and my sister, Lisa, are both very talented seamstresses. They came up with the idea to give Brianna and Chloe sewing lessons this summer, and I thought it was great. I don't like to sew, but I know the basics about it because my mom gave me sewing lessons as a kid. G-Jo came by and picked Brianna up three or four times this month to go to Lisa's house for a lesson.
Brianna and G-Jo
G-Jo, Brianna, Chloe
Brianna and Chloe
Not surprisingly, Brianna really enjoyed her lessons! She loves to be creative - and reminds me in many ways of my sister - so I thought she would probably enjoy sewing!
Each of the girls made a reversible Japanese knot bag. They turned out so great!
Side one:
Side two:
One of the values that are important to Chris and me is that our children have servant hearts. We want them to learn to be good helpers and have good attitudes while helping. This definitely comes more naturally for some of our children than for others, but it's something they all have to learn to a degree. Brecklyn and Brooke have really started to learn how to help around the house (and actually be helpful), and it's so cute!
My laundry helpers - Brecklyn and Brooke
On July 13th, we had our friends over for dinner, playtime, and fireworks. They have two boys that are about Bren's age, and the three of them had a blast playing outside.
Really, the whole crew had a great time with each other.
Haha!
They brought lots of fireworks for us to enjoy because Jesse's uncle has a fireworks stand and gifted them some of the leftovers. The men put on a pretty good little show for us, and we all kept saying, "Happy July 13th!" Lol!
My friend, Angie, is so precious to me. I'm so very grateful for her friendship!
One weekend, Tia and I went to a Kickee Pants sample sale. She had purchased tickets for us to go months ago, and we truly had no idea what we were getting into or how crazy people would be at this sale! It was held in a huge ballroom at a local hotel, and groups of shoppers were let into the ballroom according to the number on their ticket. People were so serious about this mess . . . pushing, shoving, yelling, etc . . . I had never seen such shopping craziness! Once in the ballroom, people were grabbing ENTIRE racks of clothing in the size they needed, taking it to an empty spot in the room, and sorting through it on the floor. Then, they'd just leave what they didn't want in huge piles all around the room!
I never thought I'd see the day when Tia would be down on the ground digging through piles of clothes to purchase!
We had fun (mostly being shocked by how others were behaving) and both got some good purchases, but that's not something I think I ever want to experience again!
At the beginning of the summer, I saw on FB that the local dairy was offering group tours. I organized a group from church to go, but by the time I got us signed up the only dates left open for a group our size were a few afternoons in July. We knew it would be HOT, but we all wanted to go bad enough that we committed anyway.
Our dairy tour group . . . minus Caroline who wanted nothing to do with pics :-)
To begin, we were taken into a room to watch cheese being made, cut, and packaged.
Then, they gave everyone a sample of their fresh, raw milk and cookies!
Sadie and Brooke
Brecklyn
Cute little triplets :-)
After our snack, they let the kids feed a few of the calves. Mine loved this!
Brecklyn
Brianna
Brenson
Brooke
Finally, they allowed us to watch the milking process.
Brecklyn, Brooke
The tour was about an hour long and so worth it in my opinion! The summer heat just made the whole experience more authentic to me, haha. I really hope we'll be able to do that again in the future.
The day that swimming lessons ended for us, we had a play date with Zack and Jordyn at their house. They have a large above ground pool, so the kids swam for several hours before jumping on the trampoline to dry off.
This was our first time to go to their house for a play date (Bren had been before, but the rest of us had not), and really my first time to be able to visit at length with Shana. I wasn't nervous, but I did want to make a good impression because we really like them. However, we were a hot mess this day! Everyone had their swim stuff in the van from swim lessons that morning, but Bren took his out and left it at home during a brief pit stop we made at the house the use the bathroom. He had to borrow trunks from Zack, and they wouldn't stay up so he kept mooning everyone. Then, he {accidentally} broke one of Z's waterguns. When we were getting ready to leave, Brooke stripped down completely naked in their living room, then couldn't find her flip-flops for anything. As we were driving away, Brianna realized she had a pair of their goggles, and I had to go back to return them. I know sometimes we are a MESS, but I hate feeling like it!
Speaking of being a mess, last month I wrote about how I don't have too many "mom moments". I should have never said that because I had another big one this month! While I was helping Bri get packed for her week at camp, we had to run to Wal-mart to pick up a few supplies she needed. Walking in, I looked down and noticed I was wearing two different flip-flops! Ack!
I spend a lot of my time chauffeuring my kids around. I'm sure why I took the photo below, but I was driving {at least} Brooke around. I hope I always remember what it feels like to look in my mirror and see the faces of my sweet babies.
Finally, this month there was a big trend going around FB where people were using an app to age their profile photos, then comparing them to their current photos. At first I thought it was kind of dumb, but then {for whatever reason} I jumped on the bandwagon.
Ummm, I'm not sure how I feel about this!
This is a photo of Chris and me that I put the age filter on . . . we look like my parents!!!
I wanted to do a photo of Chris by himself, so I texted him while he was at work and asked him to send me a pic. This is the one he sent me:
And this is how it looked after I put the age filter on it, haha!
I couldn't resist aging this photo of Ross, Chris, and Russ. I'm determined to keep this photo for thirty years so I can compare it to how they really look as old men, heehee!
Happy August, Everyone!
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