Summer Activities Post #4

 The best part of our summer was our trip to Arkansas and Missouri. Ryan had to be in Arkansas for his job, so we joined him.

 

It was really great hanging out at my parents' pool,

 

and it was made even greater sharing the fun with aunts and cousins.

 We felt like we were staying at a resort.

 

 

Meanwhile, the kids each got to attend a camp during one of the weeks we were there. Sis attended Around the World Art Camp and...

 

Triple Threat Camp, which culminated in their performance of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. We love Blackbird Academy.

Dash spent his mornings at Lego Robotics Camp. So cool!

 

I don't have a photo to use of Tornado at Camp Connect, but here are a few of his crafts he made. This is a camp for special needs (mainly autism and related) kids. He attended two years ago and had talked about it ever since. I was really happy he got to go again, and so was he. He won the "Happy-Go-Camper Award" for always being "cheerful and happy, even when he hurt his leg." It's the exact award I would have wanted him to win.

 

Sis and her BFF were so happy to be reunited. Her friend brought her this Build-a-Bear shirt from her recent trip to England, and it fit Sadie quite nicely. The girls got to play with each other a few times, making up for lost time. Dash has also gotten to know her older brother, and now the two of them are able to join in on the playdates, too.

 

We got to hang out with a few of our other Arkansas friends - definitely not enough of them, though. It's so hard to see everybody we want to see during our visits. :( We had a great time hanging out at the pool with these guys.

Ryan had to leave Arkansas to head to Georgia for a few days. While he was there, we were in Missouri, staying with my brother and his family. My aunt joined us for our visit, which was great. We also met up with my uncle, grandma, and family friends, so we were able to squeeze in as much as possible. At my brother's, there was a lot of this kind of stuff going on.

And a lot of this. O is one patient older cousin. He's one of the greatest kids I've ever met. All of my nieces and nephews are!

We even experienced an early morning fire alarm incident which resulted in a lot of laughs (after the all clear was given) and...

...turns sitting in the fire truck!

While we were in Missouri, we finally got to experience the Askinosie Chocolate Tour in Springfield. We love factory tours! This is Tornado, tasting cocoa nibs.

We really enjoyed it!

We also had a great day at Crane Park with some of my best friends from highschool and some of their kids.

It was just the kind of day I had been needing, and I was so happy to share a little of my old world with my kids.

 

I was also thrilled to get to watch two of my nephews play ball.

I HATE missing out on their lives,

being so far away.

I got to soak in as much delight as I could while I was there.

 These girls got a hold of my phone.

 And one particular almost-teenage girl wouldn't let me get her photo here.

 

During our stay in MO, somehow Little Brother developed a bad case of hives. I still have no idea what caused this. It looked so bad, poor guy; none of my kids have ever done this before. We made a quick trip to urgent care to rule out any possible bad causes.

 

Then it was back to Googie and Papaw's house for a day or two more of fun,

before heading back to Florida until next time.

We can't wait to visit again.



4th of July Summer Activities Post #3

This summer post is going to be out of order, but these photos were easiest to access so I'm posting these first. It has been fairly rainy in Florida lately. I think maybe there has been a tropical storm somewhere in the distance? I haven't been watching the weather, but we seem to get hit with showers almost every day at some point. (This was what we experienced last summer, too.On the 4th, it did rain on and off.

 

 That didn't stop Sissy and Dash from getting spending a couple of hours in our neighbor's pool. It sprinkled on them a lot of the time, but they didn't care.

 

 Dash was actually in the pool for about 5 hours, I think. We are fortunate to live on a street with many boys for him to play with. This particular family has 3 boys.

 

We enjoyed our festive meal (of veggie burgers, chili, and Smileys) out on our screened lanai on our new(ish) patio table.

dessert: layered "cheese"cake, blueberries,

Rice Dream (icecream), strawberries, and whipped "cream

 

 We met up with the same neighbors to have a poppers (those little snappers that pop when you throw them on the ground, etc.) war. This guy got his first experience with them.

This was his reaction to the pops.
He obviously was impressed.

It took us about 2 seconds to realize we couldn't trust Little Man with a sparkler. He was waving it all around, and I just knew he was going to catch me or him on fire before I was able to retrieve it from him.

I was happy to see Tornado right in the middle of things. Sometimes in physical activities such as these he tends to hold back or want to go inside.

It was boy heaven all night.

 We talked about how different C's life is than the other kids'. Look at him running right after all of them. He is constantly surrounded in big kids and activities. I don't know if he realizes how much smaller he is.

 

 

 

The kids voted they would rather shoot off smaller fireworks in the driveway and play with the neighbors rather than going to a big fireworks show. That was fine for Ryan's and my tired selves. It was a happy 4th!



List of Summer Activities Post #1

I told the kids we were going to discuss and make our "Summer Bucket List." One or more of them vaguely knew what a "bucket list" was - they'd heard of it before. But they wanted further explanation. I explained that a bucket list includes the things you want to do before you die. It was met with reactions such as, "What?! We're going to die?! What do you mean?" Ultimately, I said, "Let's just call it our List of Summer Activities."

Rather than post our list, I'll post the activities as we complete them.

The middle kids were out of school a full week before their oldest brother (who got to celebrate his June birthday at school the day before school was out).

The day after those two were out of school, I gave them their first summer reading bag which contained an assortment of books I'd been finding cheaply here and there and putting away. And they started their summer reading logs. My kids like books, but they need a little motivation and encouragement to follow through.

 

After we picked Tornado up from school, we headed for lunch at Kaleisia Tea Lounge, one of my favorite places in Tampa. We brought our books and sat in the quiet room where you take off your shoes and sit on the floor. We were only able to do this because Baby (Toddler) Brother was at his preschool (which he attends a day or two a week) at the time. I wish we could sip tea and read books at Kaleisia Tea Lounge every day.



Finally, summer for all officially began on Monday the 9th when Tornado was dismissed at 11:30 a.m. I was ready for a break from being on the road every day picking up kids at designated times.

 

We chose another lunch date to celebrate summer, this time at Fresh, Healthy Café at The Shops at Wiregrass, a fun spot to eat, shop, sit, or walk around. The kids hadn't eaten there before, and it was a huge hit.

 





We joined in on a local homeschool group's park day one day this week. It was hot out! That's Little One carrying a large stick like it's a weapon. He is all about making "q, q" (gun?) sounds while attacking us with his stick or toy of the day.

 

Sis made a friend, and I caught this glimpse of them playing princess (Sis was Anna, and her friend was Elsa.) under this tree.

We also joined the group for a Pokémon party one day, which consisted of a couple of hours of Pokémon games and card trading. Tornado enjoyed making deals with people even though he really isn't that interested in Pokémon.

The whole Pokémon thing is beyond my comprehension, but it was nice for them to share their interest with other kids (who had huge binders full of cards versus my kids' measly sandwich baggies full). They had been looking forward to this play date for weeks.