Summer Vacay Week 5 & 6

                  

When you're the youngest at daycare, you can talk anybody into reading to you at any time...and sit on their lap.

We're never lacking for entertainment at our house. Especially during daycare days. I decided to write two weeks together because I felt like we didn't do a lot, but as I look back on the past two weeks, I realize we did a lot. For some reason it just didn't feel like it at the time! What these two weeks brought was a whole lot of randomness as the kids get used to "the rules" with having a dog around. As with previous weeks, Zeus continues to be the source of most of the entertainment for the kids.

Here's what we did to keep minds and bodies moving:

We had to start closing the bathroom door at all times because a certain furry friend likes to chew toilet paper and paper towels. This has been an adjustment as half of the kids still don't shut the bathroom door when they go! Of course, while the kids got used to closing the door, Zeus discovered door stops. Apparently a good number of kids had never noticed them either!

Between hours and hours of cleaning now built into my days on top of you know, my actual days, seltzers have helped me. A lot. Apparently Zeus felt my stress too, which led to a big discussion on if dogs could have alcohol (just my kids, daycare kids had departed for the day--although this is totally a discussion the kids would have with me like it was nothing!). 

A daycare mom had an apple with her lunch and discovered the seeds were already growing inside! She dropped them off and we replanted them in a cup. We'll see what happens.

The cats are still here. They tend to spend much less time around daycare since the dog is.

The kids show me all kinds of "cool" things. From how to work an Ipad, to apps and games to play, to songs and slang. On this particular day, I watched the kids take turns planning their wedding and argue about which flowers should be in the wedding--I hid my laughter when I realized they weren't saying the flower's name correctly!

Two daycare friends helped Elizabeth pull her tooth out. It would have taken us forever to talk her into pulling it, but naturally, she did it with no problem with friends. 

The kids are learning to play with the toys they don't want the dog to get on table tops. Zeus sits and watches, hoping they'll include on the toy playing.

I have had to do very little baking this summer. Whenever the next day's breakfast is something that needs cooked or baked (such as these muffins), the big kids take over and do it. They've made a lot of muffins, pancake muffins, egg bakes, and more. It's been wonderful!

The 2nd of July fun with smoke balls and snakes for something simple. The kids LOVED the smoke bombs. The one year old clapped as I lit each one, "yay Ash-wee! Again! More! Yay!" 

The new game I bought. It was mildly entertaining. Not everyone wanted to play because they "didn't want to be hit with poop!" Ha!

Reading time continues to happen daily at 1 p.m. (or around there). After seeing the kids choose the same few books over and over, I got two kids started on the Sarah Plain and Tall book series, two more on Laura Ingalls Wilder collection, and two others on Roald Dahl books. All were building up dust on my basement bookshelves, so I'm happy to see them being enjoyed again!

Lots of pool and sprinkler fun! Notice how dirty the water is from all of the in and out playing they do. When pools are out, the kids tend to spend all day in their swimming suits running around the yard, playing in the water, coming in for breaks wrapped in towels. I love that this is their summer normal.

The kids had so much fun with the fruit battery! As with quite a few things these days (since they're older), I handed the kids the parts and instructions and made them follow it step by step. The result was a working fruit battery that they tried with a variety of things. This was such a hit that they've made a list of things they'd like from the grocery store to give it another go.

This was a fun art history lesson!

The minis got a dog treat cook book for their birthdays and the bigs made them one morning. Now they're in charge of making them weekly.

In case you were wondering if the toys still get played with despite having mostly big kids at daycare, yes. Yes, they're still very played with. The Cozy Coupes have become an intregal part of their Floor Is Lava game they play daily in the backyard.

Most of the kids fell asleep reading their books on this day.

Usually at this point in the summer we're experiencing down time, which is rare for us. The kids would have finished with their school year activities, swimming lessons would have been complete, and we have summer nights to enjoy together. Instead, due to Covid, the minis were just getting around to their dance recitals. We had a busy week with costume fittings, recitals, and pictures. It hit the minis too.

There's never a dull moment here. One kid was talking about "hackers" and another kid thought that meant someone came through a computer and killed you. After MUCH discussion, we had to watch a video on hackers (even I learned a few things!). YouTube has really come in handy. We've used it A LOT since homeschooling began in March. When used properly, it's a great resource for teaching and learning.

Fun story about the solar balloon. I sent the bigs up to the school field to fill the solar balloon up with air. The school security happened to be driving by just as this group of kids entered. They freaked out and asked if we could go back home. So we did. Instead, the kids tried running along the sidewalk and in the street to fill it up. It didn't fill up all the way because the kids were done running, however, when we went to fold the balloon up and it was tighter, the balloon took off! I cut the solar balloon in half so next time we have two smaller balloons to use. Once we saw it working, the solar balloon was awesome!

We had to prematurely pull some carrots because a certain puppy butt sat on them. Looks like they're growing well!

The kids held a wedding on the front porch. There were even Play Doh wedding figures for the mud cake topper.

Every day while the big kids do their reading and writing, younger kids rest. Zeus rests with them...or rather on them. Or sometimes he just steals their mats altogether.

No shortage of entertainment. This was just one small moment from one afternoon.

Trying different things this summer for art.

Kids don't think twice about many things, including doing disgusting things. The kids were pretty sure the dog was farting, so they checked it out. Close up sniffing. I'm used to shaking my head and looking the other way.

Friday's are donut days apparently. We either order donuts for delivery Friday mornings or the boys make homemade donuts. It takes them about an hour each time they make them, but they're so worth it!

The kids got to watch the movie Sarah Plain and Tall Friday afternoon in the living room. This is a big deal because I have closed off the living room for play and TV watching so I have one less room to deep clean three times a day. I figured since it was Friday that would give me more time to do that cleaning. Of course, the dog was in the middle of it all.

A neighbor brought a sack FULL of coloring books and pages. The kids spent half of the day coloring! I rarely buy coloring books for the kids, so this was a treat for them.

4th of July Weekend

Fourth of July weekend turned into a long weekend thanks to a Covid scare at daycare. Hubs had the day off as a holiday and felt it was best not to tempt fate since he has yet to be sick (thank you mask wearing through this entire pandemic!), so I requested daycare not be open that day. I'm forever thankful for the amazing, understanding families I have. Naturally, we couldn't just sit around the house, but we did (and still do) find it important to socially distance ourselves. 

It was a perfect day for exploring and having fun! First, we took my grandparents donuts from our favorite donut shop that just re-opened from being closed since the middle of March. Due to rehearsals and dance schedules, we had missed out on my grandparent's and grandpa's celebrations the evening before. My grandparent's celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary and my grandpa his 84th birthday--that can't go without celebrating! It was a quick stop by, but we got to see them as much as we can right now. Seeing them put us all in a great mood as we made our way to our second stop of the day: Newton, Iowa.

We stopped by Maytag Park to get some energy out. It was hot and humid, so we didn't last long. The previous weekend, after the drive in, I drove the minis around Colfax, Iowa. My aunt lived there for all of my childhood and I remember these places fondly when I spent days with her each summer. I LOVED to dance on the bowl stage each summer when we came with friends. There's now a sign asking people to stay off of the stage so we obeyed it (actually, truth be told, I encouraged my kids to hop up there for a quick pic, but my kids are rule followers and wouldn't do it). The kids played on the playground for a bit and Zeus was disappointed there was a 'no dogs on playground' sign.

On our way out of Newton, we picked up Moo's BBQ to take to our adventure for the day: Rock Creek State Park. We found a covered picnic area overlooking the lake and ate our food (quickly, because there were wasps around). Then, we went to the beach area to swim. There were a few short trails we could have hiked but due to a puppy who can't go far and the hot temperatures, we found it best to skip any trails and just go to the water. 

The beach is small here, but it wasn't very crowded. This was a unique State Park because we could see neighborhoods and cornfields from the beach. We didn't exactly feel like we were in a State Park area. We still had fun though and enjoyed talking with the locals about the lake and our dog (Zeus draws a lot of attention). 

We got a family dinner (that feeds 4-5) plus one brisket meal and extra Texas toast all for under $60. It was great and we had so much leftover that we ate it for dinner too!

Zeus instantly ran for the water, then the shade provided by chairs and umbrellas. He couldn't get comfortable for a nap until I wrapped him in a towel and held him. He's a big baby.

Zeus couldn't figure out the bubbles coming from Max's mouth.

Another stop in Newton on the way home, this time for Gezellig Brewing. The minis, dog, and I waited in the car while Hubs grabbed a variety six pack for us to try out.

Much like the previous weekend (in between Dolliver State Park and the drive-in), we had just enough time to shower and then get a spot for fireworks in Altoona. We took advantage of the empty movie theater parking lot and set up. Zeus was so excited about all of the people around us and insisted on walking around to visit. As usual, people loved him and his friendly personality.

Not bothered by fireworks, but bothered by the humidity.Poor Zeus.

After fireworks, we got stuck in the parking lot due to traffic for an additional hour afterwards. We got home VERY late and everyone fell into bed (or kennel if you're furry).

Last year for the 4th of July we were in Washington DC. It was memorable and amazing. This year's celebration seemed a little too laid back for us, but we did what we could. We had a socially distanced picnic in my aunt's front yard, Harrison caught a toad, we caught up with family we haven't seen since March, we played in the our inflatable pool in the backyard, we did a few (tame) fireworks of our own, and we watched the neighbor's show late into the night. Not the Independence Day's we're used to, but it was good. Since we had had several late nights, we chose to keep Sunday chill at home. The kids got to destroy a broken lamp, they played in the sprinkler, the house was cleaned. Typical Sunday stuff.

Harrison's toad he caught. I made him let it go later that day. He released it on our backayrd. We now have a toad living in our backyard.

Cake and toads. The kids were in heaven.

While the kids rested, I went to visit a friend and introduce Zeus and "meet" her baby bump. It was a fun, quick, socially distanced visit. Zeus crashed in the front seat of the car on the way home because it was a big day for a little pup!

We did fun quiet fireworks, while everyone around us put on a full show. I was positive we wouldn't be seeing fireworks this year and as it turns out, we got numerous shows!

Sunday morning snack of Honeycrisp apples and corn on the cob.

I love our weekends exploring. We're gearing up for a lot more adventures the next few weekends and I can't wait!