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Jungle Jack's and Good vs Evil

There are no slow weekends in our household.  This one was no exception.  It's Monday - time to relax! I'm exaggerating a bit, but we did have our fair share of fun.

We spent some time at Jungle Jack's landing and let the kids ride rides on Saturday.  I can't stand and walk that much yet, so I was confined to one of those electric scooters, which turned out to be quite fun.  They rode just about everything, from the little kiddie rides, to the bumper cars, all the way to the old wooden coaster.  They rode the coaster about 6 or 7 times!  Go figure that Emma loved that thing.  She and Matt rode in the front car!  I didn't take any pictures or video of that, mostly because I just wanted to watch them and enjoy their faces.  Laura and Hannah rode in a car together too, but they never put their arms up.  They kept riding it though!  We went over to the camel rides and the pony rides too.  The kids particularly liked the camel rides.  When we were leaving Laura asked me if I had fun.  I think she was asking since I didn't ride anything.  Of course I had fun.  There's nothing better than watching your kids exude joy!

They're in pirate territory!

Daddy's getting wet again!

Emma wanted control of the spinning wheel...haha!

What Daddy's will do for their daughters

Ever since last week when Mom and I taught Laura how to play Monopoly, she has been asking Matt to play.  So Sunday morning Laura, Hannah, Matt, and I launched into a rousing game of Star Wars Monopoly.  You can guess who Matt was - Lord Vader, of course.  Hannah was Princess Leia.  Laura was the Emperor, and I was Luke Skywalker.  It was an epic battle, and unfortunately due to Lord Vader's questionable tactics, the dark side won this battle.  Lord Vader convinced Princess Leia to join him, and she and he eventually conquered the Emperor and Luke.  But fear not.  Good will come back and conquer Evil!

They won the battle but not the war!!

Only a couple more weeks and school will be here!  We got the kids' new tennis shoes this weekend and a couple of uniforms.  They are pretty much ready for school.  Laura is excited for the start of school.  She can't wait to see her friends again.  I think Hannah is excited too, but she is naturally just a little nervous.  The girls will really be pumped when class lists come out, which is next week.  They are anxious to see what teachers they got and what friends are in each class.  Ahhhh...another summer almost in the books.

So now that Matt and I are done with Stranger Things, do any of you have any show suggestions to get us through until kickoff?

These are some bonus shots of E singing to the radio in the car on the way home from church Sunday night.  That hair do is an Emma original too.

Rocker Emma

Just look at that hair!

Games, Games, Games

What? Back to back posts, two days in a row???!  I know.  I must have too much time on my hands.  It's really procrastination.  I rationalize that I should blog before starting something productive.  ha ha! 

Really, I just had to write about our fun afternoon yesterday.  It was games, games, games.  We've been playing a lot of games this summer, but yesterday, I thought that Laura is probably old enough for some of the "adult" games.  So I dug out Monopoly, and she loved it!  Laura, Grammy, and I played for 4, yes I said 4 hours!  And after dinner she wanted to play again.  I told her maybe on the weekend.  Ours, of course, is a Star Wars edition.  So she hasn't played on a traditional board yet, but she did a great job.  She was the banker too.  Grammy won, and Laura was second.  I went bankrupt first :(  Laura was Luke Skywalker, I was Princess Lea, and Mom was a robed character that I can't remember.  I'll google it later.  Did you know that putting the money in the "middle" as the pot is a house rule?  I didn't.  I read the whole rule book looking for it, and it's not there!  So we didn't play that way this time.  We played by the official rules.  But who knew?!  Anyway, I think we have many a game night in our future. 

As a compromise, after dinner, we played Sequence, another one of my favorite games.  Desiree, my college roommate, and I used to play this game all the time in college....when we weren't partying of course.  (I swear we weren't lame :)...)  I taught Laura and Hannah how to play, and Laura won!  Both girls seemed to enjoy it, which makes me so excited.  I finally have someone to play that game with again. 

Emma was not very interested in games; she tried Monopoly for about one time around the board.  And she was done and sold her two properties back to the bank or abandoned them.  And we sold them back to the bank...foreclosure I guess.  So she enjoyed her some screen time. 

May the Force be with you

Little Miss got to spend her afternoon with Aidan and had a blast

The crazies have corn on the cob - it's flowing out of Papa's garden!

The little card sharks

Uninterested

One note as a follow up to yesterday - Matt and I finished Stranger Things last night.  I really liked it and am excited for the 2nd season.  The flashback scenes of Hopper's daughter were super sad, but I was so happy they were able to find Will.  Matt and I think that Elle is still alive, and Hopper is helping her or the lab or something like that.  It was a good one!

Shows and Movies

Let's try something different today.  If you're not into TV shows and movies, you can skip this post.  :)

Because it's summer and there are 29 days until kickoff, Matt and I are watching various shows to occupy our time.  And of course since I'm stuck doing nothing while I recup from surgery, I am pretty much binging shows and reading books.  Makes for a good summer actually!  Let's chat about the shows we're watching.

First, Matt watched Breaking Bad a while ago when it was on TV I think. Well, I watched the first couple of episodes back then and just couldn't get into it.  But everyone seems to love it, so I decided to give it another try.   I'm on Season 5!  It's so good! 

My favorite character is a toss up between Saul and Hank.  Hank you just have to love because he's such a classic nice guy and a cheeseball.  The answer to his mystery is right in front of his face, but he can't see it because he believes in the good in people too much.  You can't help but love him.  Of course his good nature is the only reason he can put up with his crazy wife, Marie.  She's nuttier than a fruitcake.  There's been a couple times that I'm thinking, "you need to just sedate her and put her in a bedroom."  She just keeps yapping like an annoying chihuahua.  Saul is just hilarious in every sense of the word.  He straddles the ethics line and cracks me up how he rationalizes the "right" thing to do.  It's so wrong, it's funny.  I am definitely going to check out the spinoff show about Saul after I'm done with Breaking Bad. 

My least favorite character is without doubt Skylar.  Ugh!!!!  I just keep hoping the cartel or Gus or someone will knock her off!  She's horrible!  She gets on Walt for cooking meth, but she's perfectly willing to spend the money.  In fact she spends it to clean up her illegal mess at Beneke's.  Really??  She's such a hypocrite!  Another example of her yuckiness, Walt buys Jr a car, and she throws a royal fit and makes him return it, and then she turns around and buys him a car of her choice, which was Horrible.  A PT Cruiser....really??   I absolutely cannot stand her.  My luck, someone will knock off Hank and not her.  Ugh and more Ugh. 

Anyway, I just finished Season 4, so it appears that Gus is dead.  But I don't believe it.  And we know that Mike is still alive.  So obviously, things aren't going to be over for Walt and Pinkman.  I am so excited to watch Season 5.  Matt says the final episode is perfect, which makes me very happy.  I like all loose ends to be tied up in a nice little bow at the end of a show.

Next show - Stranger Things.  Again I wasn't sure about it during the first couple episodes, but I'm hooked now.  It's set in the 80's, which is fun for Matt and me, since that's the era we grew up.  There are a ton of fun artifacts that are a blast from our past.  The bikes the kids are riding are banana seat bikes.  My first bike was one of those.  I have fond memories of riding my bike all over the neighborhood.  It was freedom!  It is for these kids too.  They ride their bikes all over the little town. 

Another interesting point is the houses.  It seems that in the 80's everyone's house was pretty much the same.  Not the same in shape and size, but nobody cared all that much about the interior.  Everyone had an average living room with a normal couch and chair and TV.  Everyone's kitchen had laminate counter tops and average appliances.  When Karen goes over to visit Joyce and comfort her after her son went missing and was thought dead, she doesn't appear to care that there was clutter around the house and how it was decorated or other features.  That is refreshing.  Today it seems like everyone is always judging everything.  Regarding homes, how many square feet do you have?  Is your basement finished?  What kind of counter tops do you have? Are your appliances high end or stainless steel?  How big is your TV?  Do you have a nice sound system?  Etc Etc Etc.  It goes on and on and on.  I'm not sure if that is due to more awareness, via social media and the internet, or if it is because people have become so obsessed with material possessions, or both.  Either way, I don't remember it being like that in the 80's.  Everyone had generally the same house on the interior.  Some people decorated with different color schemes or styles or wallpapers.  But beyond that, people appeared to focus more on the social interaction with people, rather than the material aspect of decor.  Oh, the Good Old Days!!

Beyond the retro features, I like the story line too so far.  At first I wasn't interested because I thought it was just going to be some sort of alien invasion show.  But now that it appears to have some sort of government conspiracy and testing, I am more interested.  Everyone loves a good conspiracy show!

All in a Summer Afternoon

The kids made me take a million videos at their last gymnastics session, and they wanted me to put them on the blog.  I may later, but I will spare you all for now!!

They are having a perfect summer day today.  The older two were riding bikes.  Laura loves to ride her bike, but she much prefers at this age to ride on the street.  It makes me a nervous wreck.  I know at her age, I was riding the neighborhood.  In fact, I was sneaking out early in the morning before my parents were awake on weekends to ride my bike around the neighborhood.  We lived in a small village of about 200 people at the time, which I suppose made it a bit safer.  Either way, I only let her ride on the street during non-busy times and when I'm watching.  Call me helicopter, but I've watched too many episodes of Criminal Minds....and the daily news.  I digress.  Hannah is still riding with training wheels, trying to gain confidence and get the ever-elusive balance.  She'll get it soon and then be able to ride with the big kids, which are Laura and the neighbor girl, Aidan.  They are so cute.  The three of them like to ride to the end of the street, which dead ends into the Metro Park.  They hang out along the fence and chat and talk about whatever eight and six year olds talk about these days.  My girls are growing up too fast!!!

We also hunted frogs and cicada shells.  We were much more successful finding cicada shells.  Emma found one little frog.  She let it swim in her pool  before turning it loose.  And we found a bird nest in our apple tree, and the mama bird was sitting on it.  The kids are hoping to be able to see baby birds at some point.  We shall see.  Hopefully the cats don't get them!  We have some pretty avid hunters in the neighborhood.  The baby bunnies earlier in the summer didn't stand a chance.

Hannah and Emma played in the pool this afternoon.  It was fun watching them play "lifeguard."  Hannah had the whistle and would blow it when it was time for break or when Emma was misbehaving, which was like every other second.  Hannah even pretended to rescue Emma a few times.  They also were pretending some imaginary thing with their mermaids.  They were so cute!

Emma's cleaning the pool first

The lifeguard is scolding a "bad" swimmer

The lifeguard is watching a swimmer who is getting ready to run and jump in the pool.

Lunchtime is ferocious!

Last night we got icecream, and Emma has finally graduated from banilla (vanilla).  She now likes strawberry too!

Hannah wants a loom set, like Laura and Aidan.  We went to three stores yesterday looking for the rainbow loom.  We found others but didn't find that one.  I thought she should have the same one as Laura and Aidan so that they could teach her more easily.  So of course Amazon came through, and it will be delivered tomorrow!  She had to pay for part of it herself.  In the meantime, Hannah has been making bracelets with her fingers.  Matt and I are being inundated with rubber band jewelry.  I currently have two bracelets, earrings, and a key chain charm - all in one day!

Laura showing off her earrings

Ja - Nah - Stix

Since I was having surgery this summer, a summer vacation and many of our summer activities couldn't happen.  The girls have been asking for some time to do gymnastics.  So this summer, we signed them up for 11 weeks of gymnastics at a local gym.  I will admit that I have never been too excited about the prospect of them doing gymnastics, mostly because I feared that it would turn into weekends of traveling to meets and start to consume our lives, which is not something to which I am willing to commit.  That said, I have been completely proven wrong.  Gymnastics has been AWESOME for them.  I am completely impressed with the instruction, the strength building, and flexibility they are gaining.  It's been a great thing for our kids, and the icing on the cake is that they LOVE it.

Hannah's cart wheels are getting so much better, and she is really good at the balance beam.  Laura's cart wheels leave something to be desired, but she is improving.  She loves to do things on the trampoline.  Little E is hilarious in her class.  They have her hanging on bars, walking on little balance beams, climbing walls with her legs, bouncing on trampolines and summer-saulting on wedges.  She is about as cute as she can be.

When we first started classes in the beginning of June, Emma called in Shanastix.  And she would correct us when we said it the "traditional way."  Somehow she figured out that it began with a "Ja" sound, and now whenever we say gymnastics, she quickly says, "No, it's Ja-Nah-Stix."  Ok Emma.  Nobody messes with Honeybadger.

I don't have very many pictures yet, so I'll post more pictures and videos in a later post.  :)

 

Raising Money for Cancer and...Ghostbusters

The girls, along with the neighbor kids, had a lemonade and art sale yesterday to benefit the James and Cancer Research.  I am so proud of them.  Laura first cooked up the idea of an art sale.  As usual, she draws and creates pieces feverishly and non-stop.  Laura would rather draw than do anything else.  Sometimes we have to stop her to have her do other things, like read or play outside.  So, it's not a surprise that she wanted to come up with a way to sell her artwork.  She also has the entreprenurial  spririt of her father.  She talked to her friend, Aidan, about it, and she talked to Matt about it.  I'm not sure how the conversations went, but eventually they decided that they would host a lemonade sale with the art sale.  Of course Laura and Aidan's sibs were included, and they all did a fantastic job.  They soared above my expectations!  Anyone who knows me, knows it would have had lemonade, a few pieces of art and would have been short and sweet.  These things are not my cup of tea.  So I give all credit to Matt, our neighbor (who's also a Matt), and the kids!

Enjoy the pictures.

Even E got in on the creation action.

The whole gang

Of course, Mom, got to purchase a piece and pose with the artist.

The kids had a big weekend.  In addition to the art and lemonade sale, they went to movie night at the Keith's.  This is the second time the Keith's have hosted this event.  They had some activities in the early evening, and then when it got dark, they projected a movie.  Last year they projected The Wizard of Oz.  This year it was the original, Ghostbusters.  I didn't go this year, since I just had surgery a little over a week ago.  The kids had a great time!  Apparently, they were a little scared during certain parts of the movie.  But the next morning, they wanted to watch it again.  So they weren't too scared!    

The next morning, Emma kept singing the song, and it sounded like a Russian singing it!  It was hilarious.  "When their something's strange in your neighbor-hoood, who are you going to call?  Ghostabusters!"  It's funny.  She just doesn't use the slang words like "gonna".   Matt and I were cracking up!

Who ya gonna call?