Summer Catch Up: June Edition

Well, hey there! Welcome back! I thought I'd take a moment and work on my summer update.  I won't post a ton because that would just be incredibly long.  But I thought I'd share a little bit from each month over the summer (mainly for when I print this bad boy into a book)!  I know I did a little bit from June with the boys' birthday parties, but I wanted to do a little bit more!

 

June brought the beginning of "summer school" for Jack!  He went to the preschool in our neighborhood 3 days/week for the summer.  It was amazing. :) Here is his first day!  Just looking at this (5 months later - wow!), he has changed so much!

We also had the beginnings of walking!  Ryan started walking behind push toys quite efficiently!

Katie and I got to enjoy a day of fun together.  I remember that day like it was yesterday.  I can't wait to do this again!

We ventured to Cheekwood for some fun!  Love Katie's side ponytail!  We will definitely be doing this again soon too.  It is so fun there and the kids love the treehouse and trains!

We celebrated Ryan's first birthday!  It was a rainy day, so Brad was picked up Jim n Nick's to bring home.  The main reason was that Ryan loves their cheesey muffins.  Well, Brad got home and they didn't put the order of muffins in the bag.  I called just to let them know AND SOMEONE DELIVERED TWO DOZEN OF THEM TO OUR HOUSE THIRTY MINUTES LATER.  I may have told them it was my son's birthday and he loves them. :)  It was so sweet.  And clearly Ryan was excited!

Katie had vacation bible school at our church!  I love that our church has such a great program for kiddos.  And VBS at our church is a big deal - including all of the volunteers, there were over 1300 people involved (including all of the kiddos attending)! Wow!

We ate some delicious BBQ at Edley's and followed it up with Jeni's ice cream to celebrate the birthday of a friend!  Such a fun night out.

And another VBS shot.  Katie and Hannah Jo have been friends since they were 15 months old.  Amazing!

At the end of the week, they have a family night and have a "family worship" where we learn what the kids talked about all week and sing all of their songs.  And there are bounce houses and Chick Fil A and food trucks and fun!

One more of Katie and HJ.  Sweet girls!

Brad and I went to a get together with his work folks - it was great to see some of them and meet others.  And a fun afternoon out!

And Jack turned THREE!  Sweet boy.

On his actual birthday, we had neighbor friends over to play and have cupcakes.  We got Jack this little bounce house for his birthday and all the friends made a tunnel for him to run through and be the first kiddo on there!  Fun memories!

The crew!  Ryan was there too, but I didn't trust all of them on the bounce house with him :) And all of them didn't end up bouncing at the same time.  We usually did three at a time, which ended up being girls and then boys!

Blowing out his "3" candle!

We took quite a few walks this summer too!  It just so happened that there was some construction on the other side of the neighborhood, so that was what I used to convince Jack it was a good idea to go!

And we celebrated Father's Day!  The crazy crew with Brad before he opened his goodies!

Then we walked to the pool, swam and played, and then walked home.  Whew!

We ate dinner with my Dad that night.  And I got a picture of just us!  Love it!

And then we got a picture of Daddy and the kiddos dressed cute.  Except Ryan wouldn't have any of the smiling :)

Katie and Jack did swim lessons!  And they did amazing!  Jack went from clinging onto me like a koala bear to, a week later, jumping off the diving board!  And Katie did well with learning strokes!

Here are a few more from that week - Jack finally relaxed in the water enough to float on his back!  And it was hard to get picture of Katie - she loves going under water and swimming there rather than staying on the surface for the strokes that need to be there. 

Katie learned all about Shopkins at Hanna Jo's birthday party.  And the obsession is still around now - 5 months later!

Brad and I celebrated 9 years of marriage!  Wow!  Here we are at dinner.  This is one of my favorite pictures of us in a while!

And we got to have an evening out with friends the day of Jack's birthday party!  It was so fun - I always love getting together with friends and having adult time!

We had a girls night at a local boutique - it was after hours and we brought wine and they supplied appetizers.  We got to shop and try on and laugh and then save some money on the things we decided to get!  Doesn't get much better than that!

And Katie lost another tooth to finish up the month!  She is still holding steady at 3 teeth, but the top two front teeth are super loose - I hope she loses them before Christmas so she can sing that song!

Check back to see what all we did in July and August!  And any other fun things I may have missed over the Fall -- including our Halloween!  I am going to get caught up by the end of the year for sure!

 

Dentist Day!

I knew it was coming.  And I wasn't looking forward to it.  But Katie? She would do it every day if she had the option!  Thankfully she and Jack have only had good reports at the dentist so far - hopefully that continues...especially during younger years! 

 

We were up and out the door in time for the 8am dentist appointment for both kids.  Yuck!  But we made it - I literally pulled into the parking place at 8:00 on the dot.  Unfortunately, Katie was still late to school - I was really hoping to get her there on time!  I guess 5 minutes late isn't too shabby though.

 

The kids love the toys in waiting room.  And they especially love the fact that they have televisions on the ceiling for watching cartoons (Daniel Tiger this morning) while they get their teeth cleaned!  Neither had cavities and got a glowing report!  And Katie actually has one of her 6 year molars coming in - who knew!  I do vaguely recall her complaining that her teeth or gums hurt a few weeks ago.  I guess I know why!

Both kids got tokens to get a new little toy from the machine since they were good - and put their name in the no cavity club for the month!  Ryan was less than thrilled to be sitting on the side.  The real excitement starts next time for him -- I went ahead and made all three of them appointments for 6 months from now...that way they are all on the same schedule!  Now that will be an adventure!

 

Thankful for a good report and happy kiddos!  And thankful that I don't have to be out of the house with all three kids in order to arrive somewhere at 8am everyday.  Whew!



 

The Rest of the Weekend (Fall Break)

This past weekend was also fall break for Katie - so it meant no lunches and no alarm clock on Friday or Monday!  I call that a win for sure.  She was disappointed we didn't go to the beach for fall break (I guess lots of people in class were talking about going to the beach?) - but I think she had a fun time anyway!

 

Friday we started off by getting up and ready to go to the Y for me to work out.  I took this quick picture of Katie to demonstrate the fact that her SIZE 8 pants are too short.  Good heavens.  Out with the old and in with the new, I guess!

And I got a great work out in before we headed home!  Rather than going to the older kid area, Katie wanted to stay with Jack - very sweet!

After leaving the Y, we went to a playdate with friends.  It was designed to be a Bible study/discussion for the mamas and then let the kids play.  Well - that didn't exactly work!  We were going to talk about our favorite Bible verses about fear (since we are close to Halloween) and the kids dressed up!  Great idea, right?  Considering we were heavily outnumbered by little kids, it was not so successful on the verse discussion - but we all had a great time visiting!  And we shared our favorite verses via group text...better than nothing!  This is my favorite and I found this on Pinterest!

And here is a picture of all of the kids there!  We didn't have time for costumes, but at least we made it!

That afternoon, Katie played outside with the neighbors for a long time!  The weather was perfect!  Jack wanted to jump in a picture with the girls before he headed upstairs for nap/quiet time.  Love it!

Brad got home a little early and we opted to go to the park with the neighbors (which also turned into dinner with them) - we were ready to go and figured Jack was just laying in his room.  Nope!  I went in to tell him to jump on up and this is what I found.  He was out!  So we let him sleep a little extra before going - waking him up makes for a grouchy Jack!

While he was finishing his snooze and Katie was playing outside, Ryan soaked up every minute of having both of us to himself!  He is so funny with Sadie - and Sadie is so very patient.  He likes to roll on her and sit on her and poke at her.  And I think she just sees it as attention!

He loves to sit in the little Pottery Barn chairs! 

He also loves to look at books - he will grab a book or two and just find a comfy spot on the floor (or even in one of the chairs or sitting on the bottom stair) and sit and look at a book for 5 or 10 minutes!  No complaints here - that is for sure!

And after a short time, we were park-bound!  We all had a blast running around and playing!  Brad showed Jack how to go down the fireman pole on the playground.  Hopefully Jack remembers that he needs some help to do that on his own!

And we played on the swings and all kinds of other things!  Jack had fun pushing Katie on the swing!

Saturday was spent having breakfast and going to the pumpkin patch (see yesterday's post)!  We got home from that outing and all THREE kids took a nap at the same time!  Which means that I layed on the couch and did nothing - it felt so good!  And we just hung out at home and ate leftovers for dinner and relaxed that evening, which felt amazing!

 

Sunday morning we were up and at 'em!  Jack thought he would get creative with his donuts :)

And Brad and Katie headed to the Titans game!  That means they went to the game two weeks in a row!

And Katie was happy with closer seats and some popcorn!  I think she got some delicious food at the tailgate - and then snacks never hurt either!

While they were gone, I got time with the boys...and we headed to Target!  Love this picture I got of the boys together before jumping in the car!

And of course I had to put together a collage of picture of each kiddo from Sunday - love these!

After the game, Brad dropped Katie off at my mom's house so she could have a sleepover!  What a day for a 6 year old!  And Katie really pays attention to football games and asks questions to help figure out what is going on!  While all of that was going on, I headed to my soccer game of the week.  Yes!  I am playing soccer in a women's league!  And I love it - the girls are great and I have fun (and it is great exercise)!

That is a foot in of all of the players...and I burned OVER 1000 CALORIES!  Whoa.  That's a lot.  I went with my neighbor to an event that had yummy appetizers and wine and champagne...and then we split a dinner before heading home - I was thankful I had burned that many once I entered everything into MyFitnessPal!  We cleaned up pretty good, huh! The pic on the left was after the game, and the one on the right was before heading to the event!

 

On Monday, I did a spin class and then took the boys to my mom's house for a Halloween party!  Katie had helped prep the food and decorate and was so proud!  We had a good time, but we had to leave in time to get home for nap.  Let me just say keeping Ryan awake on the way home was a challenge!

And then Monday night, Katie had soccer practice...and she was on fire!  She scored 3 goals during practice and was aggressive and fast and proud!  I can't wait to see that energy translate to real life during a game...I know she will love it if she puts that energy into a game as well!

 

What a weekend!  And that makes for a shorter school week, which is always nice.   I do have to get all the kids up and out the door in the morning in time for the big kids' 8am dentist appointment.  Yuck.  It's always something!

 

I'm hoping to get a summer catch up post done soon - maybe broken down into a couple parts.  We will see!  But yay for keeping it up TWO DAYS IN A ROW! :)

Seventh Annual Pancakes + Pumpkins Outing

Testing, testing.  Why, hello! It has been a while, no?  I always have good intentions to catch up from our summer fun and even some of the fun things we have done since school started.  But man...by the end of the day, I am done for!  But I didn't want to miss out on a post about our annual fall outing - Puckett's and Gentry's Farm!

 

We have been doing this fun activity since Katie was a teeny baby.  Amazing!  I really look forward to it every year!

 

So we got up and headed out for breakfast.  It was pretty chilly to start the day, but in the sun it felt so good!  So we ended up eating outside (especially since that meant we didn't have to wait for the table).

As always, the food was delicious!  And Brad took this cute picture of me with the kiddos!  They were super excited to be heading to the pumpkin patch!

And then we headed to the farm.  Of course the first stop had to be the old truck for the annual picture!  I got this amazing one on my phone!  I can't believe I got one of all of them looking and smiling!

 

And then we did the corn maze!  Katie did most of the deciding on which way we would go, and she actually did a really good job getting us through it! 

 They even SORT OF cooperated for a picture in the corn!  There were only minimal amounts of complaining (mainly from Katie - Jack actually likes having his picture taken these days)!

 And then they were off!  Time to find out way out!

 Next we headed into the activity area and the kids did the barn maze once or twice before heading to the wheat and corn to play!  Even Ryan got in on that fun!

 Ryan was so excited to run around - he really got excited about all of the animals!  This was as good of a picture as I could get with him and Brad...so much to see!

 He was so excited for rocks that fit in his hand perfectly - see?  He wanted to show me!

Then it was time for the hay ride!  It was such a gorgeous day and I think everyone in the area had the same idea!  Luckily the line moved quickly!

 And a quick shot of Daddy with the kids before the hayride took off!

Jack was so excited to see the tractors and cows!

 Katie wanted to do the tire swing next, and Jack actually sat calmly on this rock while we waited in line!  Amazing!

 And these two are complainers-extraordinaire when it comes to pictures and they are both involved.  But they did let me attempt a picture of them...the light is bouncing off their heads, but it is still a cute one!

 And it was finally her turn!  So much fun.

 I think her smile said it all! If there hadn't been a line, I definitely would have wanted a turn!

 Jack didn't want a turn on the tire swing, so Brad let him have a potty break and I sat down with Katie and Ryan.  Love this of sweet Katie!  She has informed me that she wants to wear bows again.  I guess I need to get a few more so we have more than just a dirty white one (I sold all of hers when she told me she didn't want to wear them anymore).

 And a Mommy Katie selfie!  Not too shabby!

Ryan found some more rocks and was loving life!

 Love this!  I think Brad and Jack were walking back up and trying to get Ryan to smile for me.  So silly!

 Which of course meant I needed to try one more time for a cute one of the three ring circus!

And this.  I cannot believe we got this with my cell phone and asking a random stranger to take our family picture.  I can't get over it - and I love it!

 Ryan got a turn swinging and loved it - it went pretty high!

But poor buddy.  He just couldn't hang!  He fell asleep as I pushed the stroller to the car on the bumpy gravel...and he stayed asleep in the car too!

I call that a success!  I had already bought pumpkins, so we didn't buy any more while we were there.  But we had a big time for sure!

 

If you want to see our previous outings, here are the links:

2009 ~ 2010 ~ 2011 ~ 2012 ~ 2013 ~ 2014