Summer break weeks 3-4

 After we had our first Sunday Sundaes in March where we invited ward members over to get to know each other more, we decided we should do it more often. We managed another one that turned out to be fun, but I kind of lost count of who I had already invited, so it turned out bigger than I had anticipated, which made it all the better. 

Summer at its finest. Sitting around reading.

Ryan and Rachel are doing the swim team at purple heart this summer. It's a great way to stay in shape and make sure they're waking up and having a productive day (as Rachel realized after the first week of sleeping in, missing half the day). They had their first meet last week and both swam freestyle, breaststroke and butterfly. 

Part of the summer plan was list of cleaning chores that really needed to get done. Cleaning bedrooms and getting rid of junk was the top one. It took several days for each of the kids (over a week for one), but bedrooms are finally clean and less cluttered! I told them we'll do it again the week before school starts if needed, but so far they've managed to keep them pretty clean.

The older girls went to YW camp the third week of school. That left Megan and Ryan home with me. I thought they might get bored, but swim team and synchro keep them busy and they find time to fill the rest of the time easily. They wanted to go swimming at Clements one day, so we invited Ryan's friend Carter to join us, but then when I called I found out it was closed for maintenence, so instead we just hung out at grandma and grandpa's house jumping on the trampoline with the sprinkler on. Since we were close to home we could have Mason and Makenzie join us, too (we didn't have room in Grandma's car, since we switched for YW camp for them to go with us to Clements). Ryan had fun showing them how friendly Grandpa's lizards are even without the mealworms he feeds them. Then Grandpa went and restocked on meal worms and they had a good time feeding the lizards, too.

Megan has been really enjoying synchronized swimming. Makenzie Sanders rides with us every day and it's a good way to break up the day. While the older girls were at camp we were going to take our own camping trip until we found out that the Synchro Skills Meet was moved to that Friday. So Jacob took Ryan camping and Megan and I went to her skills meet. She did a great job and got 3rd place, earning a medal!

Meanwhile, Rachel and Annie and Grandma had a fun time up at camp. Memorable moments include: Annie pausing the skit to run to use the bathroom. Rachel hit 2 tomahawks in a row. Annie's tent blew over, spilling all their stuff all over. Rachel really enjoyed being a YCL. 

All reviews from camp were positive. 10/10 would recommend. 

Saturday morning Megan and I cleaned our house making it the cleanest it's been probably the whole year. Then Jacob and Ryan got back from camping, and Rachel and Annie got home a little while later. Laundry got started, camp and sleeping gear was scattered, and our house returned to it's natural state of mild/cleanish chaos. 

That night we went to the drama show Karolee put on with her drama camp she'd held that week. I had to leave early to go set up a bare bones stake dance. Rachel didn't want to come, but got pressured into it and ended up coming.

On the plus side, she got to drive home in the dark, which she did enjoy.

Last week Megan and Ryan did cooking camp with Sister Petty. They both loved it and came home with delicious concoctions every day. We got grandma to handle the synchro/cooking camp run on Wednesday so we could get the older girls to the temple. They invited the Palmer girls and we enjoyed a lunch out afterwards. 

Saturday Dad went in to work a few extra hours in preparation for our upcoming vacation and Ryan went to hang out at Derek's house. The girls agreed to come with me to do a little service at the house of someone in our ward who is moving. They helped clean the cupboards, and when they couldn't reach, they got creative. 

Rachel riding Megan's hoverboard the WRONG way:  😂

Summer break weeks 1-2

We kicked off summer break with Memorial day. The Allens invited us to join them up Mt. Lemmon so we went to enjoy the fresh pine air and some time with friends. It was lovely. The kids played Koob, volleyball, spikeball, the name game, and mafia while the adults mostly just sat around talking. 

I thought we would get into a summer routine, but every week has been different so we never really had time to get into one. The Milby family was moving and my kids love bossing little kids around (and playing with them) especially cute kids like Lucas and Ellie, so we had them over to our house a couple of times when the house was up for sale and when they were packing. Lucas and Ellie had all the attention poured out on them. 

We were invited to come swim at the Milby's pool, too, so we took advantage before they moved. The water was a little cold, but kids don't care. Or if they do, they stay in the hot tub. :)

For Mother's Day we took Grandma to the Gaslight Theater. Rachel had a YCL party she wanted to go to more than the Gaslight, so Grandpa came with us, too.

The show was Robin Hood, and they had these special touches added in the hall outside the bathrooms. 😂

The next night Rachel was invited to a mystery dinner at Maryanne's house. She was a jockey trainer so she stole grandma's jacket to complete her look. She had a good time, and (luckily) she was NOT the murderer. 😉

Annie decided in April or May that she wanted to host a summer camp as a way to make some money and hang out with little kids. I posted her flier on our ward facebook page and a couple other places on Facebook and she got 12 people signed up, though 3 of them were just for one day. She planned it all out and it turned out great, thought she learned a few things she'll do different if she does this again in the future.

Day 1: Duct tape wallets

Day 2: cookie art (an orange soda drink, kids in innertubes in a lake, and a free style cookie) and marshmallow buildings

Day 3: Picture frames and water day (on the only cloudy day of the week).

Thursday I ended up going up to Mica Mountain's YW camp because the stake YW presidency divvied up the wards so each ward could have one of us stop by for a day. I ended up with the one on Mt Graham that has the road I hate so much. Thankfully Jacob mentioned on Wednesday night that he felt uncomfortable about us both being out of town on Friday (him for work, me for camp), so I changed my plans and went on Thursday and thus ended up missing all the traffic that would have been driving up the mountain on Friday evening, making the drive down even scarier than it was on Thursday with only 2 cars going up while I was coming down on that terrifying road with the steep drops. The camp itself was great and the girls were fun. When I got there the girls were doing toe paintings. It was so funny!

While I was gone on Thursday Annie got her braces off! To celebrate we had corn on the cob on Friday night.

Friday and Saturday I was at home missing the AZ PTA convention. Missing as in not there, not missing as in longing to be there. At the convention our crew was recognized as the local unit of the year! A pretty exciting recognition. It felt good to be recognized for all the work our team contributed to make it a successful year.

 

Last week of school

 Mrs. Chamberlain was Rachel's 3rd and 5th grade teacher and Ryan and Annie's 5th grade teacher, so when I found out she was retiring I thought I should do something special for her. I got Derek's mom to help me email everyone, since she works at DWE, and had them fill out a form giving 3 words that describe her, and answering what should she do with her free time and a favorite memory. I used their responses to make a poster, and used the words to make a word cloud that I put on the mirror of a shadow box with pictures of the kids. They turned out pretty good and she liked them.

Mrs. Duncan helped me put together a little retirement party for her where we presented these to her and brought ice cream and cake to celebrate. Since Rachel had a half day because of finals she came, too. 

I went to Annie's quarter 4 awards ceremony, where she kept rocking it with being responsible and getting good grades. She did NOT want to smile for the camera, however. 😂

The next day we went to the Principal's breakfast recognizing all the straight A students for the whole school year. It's a pretty awesome group to be a part of and we're proud of Annie for being part of it.

Laura, Drew, Annie, and Courtney at the Principal's breakfast:

Ryan is done with elementary school! We were able to attend his promotion and cheer for his awesome self.

Ryan with Mrs. Edris, his advanced math teacher. She has told me about how good he was to have in class because of his enthusiasm for learning, and because he's so good at helping other people feel good about himself. When others get something wrong he would say, "Oh, yeah, I can see how you could get that," or "Yeah, I thought that at first, too," instead of making them feel bad for not getting it right. And he was really good at explaining things in a way others could understand. 

Anthony, Ryan, Jayden:

Ryan, Derek, Noah:

Donovan and Ryan:

The two best friends:

Mrs. Chamberlain has been such a blessing to us. We're grateful she got to teach Rachel, Annie and Ryan.

I told Ryan that he could invite a few friends over for a promotion party after his promotion since most kids leave school for the rest of the day. He decided to invite his WHOLE class. Not everyone came, but more than half did. They all had fun, though. We had a slip n slide, sprinklers, water squirters and water balloons, plus hot dogs and Eegees to for lunch.

I tried to turn on a show inside on the big screen so the kids could stop playing in the water and be dry by the time their parents came to pick them up, but no one besides Rachel was interested. They had a lot of fun out there.

Megan had a great year with Ms. Montagu. She was a great teacher and made this special set of ears for Megan with Perry the Platypus on them, since that's the stuffy Megan would bring to school every time it was PJ day.

Finally we made it to the last day of school! They did a 5th grade parade for the 5th graders to have something to do the last day of school. They walked the halls with a poster they made (or in Ryan's case a piece of paper he wrote on real quick when he realized he forgot to make the poster) that said what they want to be when they grow up, while the younger kids cheered for them and high fived them. They are officially off to middle school.

And back at our house after school Annie and Megan hosted their own end of year parties. Annie had her friends over to play games and watch a movie.

And outside Megan and her friends played in the water with the limbo and slip n slide and sprinklers. 

It was a great way to wrap up a great year and jump into summer break.