Summer Stuff

Yesterday was the 4th of July.  We had a pretty laid back day.  And that was fine with us.  In the morning we went to the ward breakfast. The girls loved the slip and slide.  And decorating their bikes for the bike parade...which I didn't get a picture of. (typical)  Right after that Macie went to her swim lesson, she is making a lot of progress.  She went up a level in just two weeks, she was really excited to ring the bell again and get a new blue ribbon.  She used to be so afraid of her eyes and face going in the water, but she practices on her own now putting her eyes in the water, I love seeing her new found confidence.  Speaking of Macie, she is eating an ice cream bar for breakfast as I speak.  Wow. My kids could get away with murder at this point because of the effort it requires for me to do pretty much anything.  

Anyway, the rest of the afternoon we cleaned, then napped, and then took the kids to see Fireworks out at Shnepf farms.  But we were too late to get into Shnepf farms (that was a shocker) so we just parked our car close by and watched from a dirt turn off.  Which actually worked out pretty well. We got sundaes and powerade from McDonalds, so the kids were satisfied.  And then they fell asleep on the way home, but of course woke up as soon as we got home.  It was a nice day.

Last week was also my brother and my Dad's birthday, and Tyler had his missionary homecoming.  No pictures of any of that.  We had a good time visiting with family after attending church to hear Tyler speak.  Later that evening we went to my Dad's house to eat hot dogs and cake for Adam's birthday.  We played a couple games. Dad was still in Colorado.  I guess it was our chance to relive our lost youth and have a party at the house without any parental supervision.  It was a really wild party.  We even got the ice cream out.

Dad's birthday was July 2nd and the girls were really excited to decorate, so I took them to Party City where they picked out some balloons  (which more than half popped on Dad's stupid popcorn ceiling), and some streamers.  They picked out rainbow streamers and Chelsey and the girls put them up around his house in random and funny ways.  Then we ordered some take out Mexican food and we played some Wii Party games and had cake.  I don't know how my Dad felt about, he is usually content to let the day pass without any sort of celebration, but my girls are excited for any sort of party.

And Chloe is making a lot of progress with her swimming too.  And I really like that it is something that Don and her enjoy doing together.  And I just try to stay out of the sun as much as I can.

See that little weird puff ball Macie is holding? Best 5 dollars I've ever spent.  She saw it at Party City a few days ago and I told her we could come back and buy it if she used the potty.  And she actually did! So I drove a half hour back to the store to buy it the next day. And she used the potty the whole day the day we bought it! We might have turned a corner.  At least she doesn't seem scared of the potty anymore, which I think was her problem, she couldn't figure out how to relax so she could "go."  

I thought the girls were both asleep when I took this picture, but it looks like Chloe caught me.  It is sooo nice driving our new Ford Explorer with air conditioning in the back seats. The girls now complain of being cold, which is saying something when it is 105+ outside every day.  Although now that I look at this picture a little longer, I think this might be inside our Mazda, I just have to add that for journalistic accuracy.

 A couple weeks ago Macie had a tantrum and I banished her to her room.  When the gnashing of teeth stopped I went to go check on her, and I found her in the corner asleep.  Chloe then proceeded to build a fort around her, cover her with a blanket, and place some some books next to her, so when she woke up she would have something to do.  Chloe is like the Indian guy in "Little Princess."

In other news, I am still pregnant!! Hooray! Not. Really.  Having Macie at 37 weeks is making anything past that seem eternal.  I am officially 38 weeks and the way I get through the day is to say, "maybe today!"  I am trying to distract myself because if I have too much alone time to think, I want to rip my hair out and run around like a crazy person screaming, "take this out!!!!"  In fact, I had better stop talking about it because just felt that familiar claustrophobic feeling up in my throat.