almost august

We are coming to the end of summer. I am happy to report that it has actually been quite lovely. I have managed to keep a good mix of doing fun summer things and letting the kids sit in front of the TV so everyone is pretty happy and rested. Don't get me wrong. I'm ready for them to go back to school FOR SURE. I've just enjoyed the summer more than I have in the past. Math and reading have been thrown completely out the window, however, and no one cares about ice cream anymore. And there's TONS of fighting. I'm pretty much just a referee these days.

Addie: Mommy Winter poured water on my head without asking!

Winter: I wanted it to be a surprise!

Me: Laughing

Addie: IT'S NOT FUNNY!

Addie named our van Vannie. She named Dan's truck Truckie. I know, super original, but in her defense she was 3 when the names were given. We bought the van in 2013 when baby Addie was in my belly and we needed an upgrade from the Corolla. When we first got it I was afraid to park it anywhere. I kept a very safe distance from any car, bike, motorcycle or pedestrian. Three year old Winter handled that little obsession with her bike handle bar making a giant scratch on the side. Gold fish crackers, granola bars and milk quickly broke it in on the inside. Dan used to insist on keeping it really nice, taking it to the car wash frequently and making sure to keep trash from piling up in the back. He's let that go a bit.

Fast forward to 2019. Vannie is 6 years old. She is still in pretty good shape but I've noticed that she rattles a little bit in the back. The seat warmers only work for 30 seconds before they shut off. The passenger side sliding door shakes when it closes and doesn't work at all when it's raining. Someone shoved a penny in the CD slot. And then another someone tried to be helpful and pushed it all the way in with tweezers so we can't use the CD player at all anymore. And when I make a right hand turn the penny inside the CD player slides over just enough to switch it from blue tooth to CD mode and tries to load the penny until I hit the blue tooth button and switch it back to Kids Bop. I do it without thinking now. I make a right hand turn and reach over and smack the blue tooth button like its part of the turning process. And today her battery died. There's no story there. We just gave her a jump, took her to the mechanic and replaced it. I say we, but I have no idea how to jump a car. I'd probably electrocute myself but Dan has done it lots of times.

2 year old Angus and Vannie

3 year old Addie, 3 year old Vannie and 6 year old Winter.

This is an ad for Honda Odysseys.

I am super thankful for my Van. It holds our whole family and keeps the kids from opening doors into other cars like I did when I was a kid. Mom always left a note. Sorry mom.

We're in the home stretch of summer which means the kids have spent way too much time together, so I'm making sure the girls get some play dates with other kids. They're lucky to have some lovely young ladies to call friends.

Mya isn't allowed to go in the pool or to the beach yet because of her wart operation. So she's hanging out with my mom and aunt for a few days which she loves because she generally enjoys adults more than kids her age. 

We got to spend time with cousins because this angelic nephew of ours was baptized. 

  

I did some early back to school shopping at Walmart since I probably won't be able to until school starts with camping and Mya's birthday etc. I scored this fab unicorn binder for Mya. She's all about the unicorns.

This is Winter and Addie being lions. When Mya wants to bribe Winter she says, "Winter if you do this for me, I'll let you be my lion for 20 mins." And Winter always agrees because who wouldn't want to be someones lion?

These days, I don't really get woken up in the middle of the night. Maybe like once a week someone is scared or thinks they saw a spider or has a bad dream. But early in the morning, it's pretty often that I get to wake up to someone wetting their bed, or the dogs puking or one of the kids making noise or in this case someone having a bloody nose. Winter came in my room and said, "Mommy Addie's nose is bleeding. Aaaaaand it's all over the couch." Ugh. That's the cushion on the floor to the left of Angus.

Winter painted everyone's nails a few days ago. Angus loves having his nails painted. At least they match his shorts.

Angus: Oh no my nayo powish is tomin off!!

Airplanes need undies too.

All the chairs at the table and they choose to sit together on the bench and fight about their space being invaded.

Dan is such a loving dad. If it were me in this pic, I would be crying. But the kids know that I cannot handle this much love.

Every manly cabinet builder needs a manly notebook to take down measurements and stuff.

For my food items this week, I found half eaten things at Target today I had to share. Someone got hungry. But they didn't want to eat all of them so they put them back in the oatmeal section. 

Then they had a craving for funions. I can't blame them. They're pretty good. Again, they didn't want to eat the whole bag so they left it with the powdered lemonade.

So this isn't edible but I just found these and I'm excited about them. I usually get my Neutrogena make-up remover wipes at Costco but I saw these at Target and had to grab them. They're awesome little travel size wipes you can keep in your purse or car or travel bag etc. We're going camping next week so I'll be using them for sure.

Happy Wednesday and happy almost August!

the real summer

Now it's summer with temps in the high 90's. I love seeing the back to school adds all over though. It reminds me that school is just around the corner. We didn't go out for ice cream yesterday because it would melt all over the place before it would be eaten. I opted for $1 mini shakes at Del Taco. Angus cried because he wanted all the flavors in one shake but they can't do complicated stuff like that. Winter complained about the smallness of the shake and Mya does not like milkshakes because they taste like milk. Addie was happy with her little strawberry shake. I reminded them that the ice cream agreement was good if they did 4 days of math and reading, and they only did two days of math and reading and that they should thank their nice mom for bending the rules for them. So then they all thanked me and drank their shakes. 

My thankful thing this week is our amazing AC we get to enjoy.

The girls take very good care of their dolls. They treat them like real babies. I occasionally throw them around and get a little lecture about how I've hurt the baby. 

Angus doesn't treat the dolls kindly either.

I'm sure he'll be a good dad one day...

This is a T-wex

Our church had a beach day at Corona Del Mar. Dan worked. I've been way more adventurous this summer with the kids. There's no way I would have gone to a beach I'd never been to before, not knowing what the parking looked like or bathroom situation looked like in the past. But this year, I've been to Santa Monica, Corona Del Mar and... well that's it. But both of those were unknown and I braved them both. It was a very fun day in Corona Del Mar. Thanks to Jackie and Harout for organizing! 

This is some very intense hole digging.

Watermelon eating contest.

Winter and friends started another hole. Or maybe she found an abandoned one. 

This is a neighbor's hole that was pretty much a swimming pool. Winter's not shy. She jumped right in. It's a public beach after all. 

"Mommy can we go to a beach with no sand next time?" He hates sand in his crocs and sand in his nether regions. 

 +

Addie is one with the sand and makes sand angels. Nobody likes the beach showers and waits till we get home to get rinsed off which makes for a pretty sandy car. But it's totally worth it. Mya couldn't come unfortunately because her foot wound is still healing. She got to spend the night at Grandma's house so she was happy. 

Winter is sweet. And honest. Later she told me she tried to give this Olaf lip gloss below to Mya and Addie but they didn't like it either. I was her third choice. Thanks sweetie.

Dan is in the process of replacing cabinets in the kitchen with brand new ones he built with his own two hands. Out with the old!

A couple of kids were grounded from TV and Angus has been begging me for play dough so we made some. It's nice having older kids that can read the instructions and make it themselves. They made Barbie dresses. 

Addie had her first official play date last week with her friend Jade. Jade told her all about how she was officially adopted into an awesome family recently. Addie told Jadie, "I want a new family!" Addie has always wanted to live with the Higerds. They have better toys and they do fun stuff. I've always told her she can't just go live with another family. Now she knows about adoption so her dream has become a little more real. 

Jade has a dog named Pepper. You can see him peaking into the window at the top of the first pic. Addie says he's part German Sheppard and part cat. 😊

These recommendations come from Costco since I just went there today. Haven't been to Trader Joe's this week unfortunately. 

This is a nice little pack of snacks to throw in the pool or beach bag. One egg, apples and sunflower butter, crackers and cheese. Two for $7.

This coffee is so good. I shopped around quite a bit and finally tried this at Mari's house and found my perfect coffee. It's bold and full of flavor but not bitter at all like Starbucks and other brands. They have a coffee grinder at Costco that you can use. People like to come up to me and ask me how it works while I'm using it. I love talking to random strangers so I don't mind at all.

I use this stuff like 10 times a day. It's so nice and convenient and I feel like it's healthier than the other sprays. It may not be.

dirty happy kids

I'm not sure if I've stated that summer is actually my favorite season. I love the beach, pools, barbecues, the 4th of July, warm summer evenings playing outside, ice cream, flip flops, camping and memories of summers as a kid. I love it all. I complain because perhaps my summers have been hijacked slightly by the children. However, I do get to experience summer as a kid all over again. So that's nice. I just wanted to clear that up for the record.

One good thing about old dogs is that you can put giant sunglasses on them and they don't move. Twitch is such a cranky old man who does not give one rip about anything anymore. He used to obey house rules like no eating off the table, counter or out of children's hands. Don't go out front unless given permission. He pretends like he can't hear or see anything but I think he can. 

And he does not care when there's something on his dog bed. It's like that baby doll isn't even there.

These complete any outfit.

Summer TV watching. How did their legs get so long?

More from last week's VBS

My thankful thing this week is getting to see my sister Stephanie! I have sisters all over the place. This pretty lady lives in Michigan so it's been quite a few years since we've been able to hang out. She's one of the sweetest people ever and so is her gorgeous daughter Lauren. I was only able to spend a few hours with them at the beach in Santa Monica which consisted mostly of trips to the bathroom with the littles, getting sand out of Angus's eyes, applying sunscreen, looking for lost toys in the sand and fetching snacks but we were able to hug and smile and catch up a little bit. It was fun to go to Santa Monica again too. I haven't been there in about 15 years.

Steph bought the kids ice cream so of course she's now a favorite. Not sure why this young stranger is staring at me taking pictures. Maybe he thinks I'm a cute mom. Maybe he thinks I'm going overboard with the pics. You never know. He patiently waited his turn to buy ice cream though. 

Angus refused to pee in the ocean so I had to take him all the way to the bathrooms far far away. It was like a 10 minute walk for a 4 year old. Two minutes after we got back to the water, he ran over and yelled, "Gotta poooops!" I rolled my eyes and started walking back to the bathrooms with him.

Mommy? I need a piggy back ride.

Ugh, fine.

You're gonna have to run mommy.

What?! No I can't buddy.

Yes you caaaan.

Ugh, fine.

So I did. Best workout of my life.

My mom's church had a VBS (Vacation Bible School) kickoff that involved creepy crawly things like lizards, spiders and snakes. I sent the middles since they're into that sort of thing. Winter wouldn't agree to it unless she was allowed to touch and hold things. Mom kept them for two nights. Another thankful thing of course. Love you mom!

When I dropped them off, I caught Addie spying on sleeping Auntie Debie with binoculars.

These adorable cousins are 4 months apart. Ethan got my bro Mike's height. Addie got Grandma Donna's lack of height. 😊 Thanks for the pics Auntie Haide! ❤️

Uncle Michael is so patient with the crazy middles. 

Mya wanted to have a girl's day (+ Angus) and go to the thrift store. She LOVES unicorn stuff so she was beyond excited to find this. 

Dan's been hard at work bringing home the bacon. Here's a couple pics he sent home recently. They rescued a hawk from a chimney, put out a house fire in San Gabriel (and rescued 3 cats, 1 dog and 3 lizards in the process) and extricated an older gentleman from a car. Oh and handled a bee situation. I've made peace with the fact that bees keep us alive and I hate them at the same time.

Mya had a procedure on her foot. A few months ago, we thought she had a very deep splinter. We took her to the doctor and he told us to give it time. Well it turned out to be a plantar wart that needed to be cut out. Mya was super brave and handled everything like a rockstar. Dan took her in because he's incharge of everything medical, especially stuff that may make me pass out like someone cutting into my 9 year old's foot.

It's Dan's birthday today!

Our conversation last night:

Me: How old are you going to be tomorrow honey?

Dan: Ummm 43 or 44.

Me: I was thinking 44 or 45.

Dan: So probably 44.

Me: Well you were born in 75 and it's 2019 so it has to end with a 4. So yeah, 44.

Mya likes to change the screen saver when it's his birthday. Last year it said "Happy Birthday!" This year she did this. 

Dan loves Mexican food and since I really only know how to make enchiladas that he's had a hundred times, I recruited my friend Elizabeth to make a Mexican feast for him. She's his new favorite person. 

We filled our bellies and Dan took a little nap with a toothpick in his mouth.

Happy birthday honey!! 

This stuff is okay but it doesn't taste like avocados. Like at all. It is green though... It tastes like regular tzatziki dip, which I like. So I'll eat it. Tzatziki dip is good with pita crackers or pita bread. Or in a pita pocket with meat and lettuce. It's also good with anything Mediterranean. It's like the Mediterranean sour cream?

This beer is pretty good if you're looking for a light summer beer. The Trader Joe's employee told me it tastes like Corona but it doesn't at all. It's sorta sweet and not at all skunky like Corona. Not that there's anything wrong with that. I happen to like that weird Corona taste. Just wanted to inform you fully. Mom, you probably won't like this beer. 😆

These are known at our house as egg thingies. They're $2.29. I love them. The kids actually like them too. They used to have a good mushroom spinach one but they replaced it with a different kind that is quite disgusting so make sure you don't get that one. I cook them a bit longer than the directions tell you to. They're better in the toaster oven than the microwave but we are microwave-less so we have no choice.

These are a tasty treat. But I can only eat one bite at a time followed by a glass of ice water. They cross that boarder into spicy town for me. But they're SO good.