Father's Day

He works hard to provide for his family.  He schedules his workouts and meetings early in the morning or after bedtime so that he can make sure his kids get as as much of his time as possible.  He fixes things for them.  He takes them fishing.  He reads bedtime stories, plans fun 'daddy days', and makes sure each of his kids gets his love and attention on a daily basis.  He teases them.  He teaches them.  He corrects them.  He makes them laugh.  He hugs them and tucks them in and always makes sure to end each day with an "I love you."  He shows them what a good, hard-working, patient, kind, loving, thoughtful, selfless man looks like.  He is an example for his daughters on the type of man to look for and an example for his son of the type of man to be.  They are his world and he is theirs.  

Happy (belated) Father's Day, Zach!

First Day of Summer

Today is officially the first day of summer.  And as we celebrate the beginning of this new season and prepare to leave on vacation tomorrow, it seems like a good time to reflect on the first few weeks of summer break that we've enjoyed.

We've spent lots of time just playing at home with each other, friends, and neighbors.

I don't know if it's the fact that we've had lots of rain and cooler days or just that my kids have so much fun playing at home, but our home days have outnumbered our head-out-for-an-activity days thus far.

We did find time to meet some friends at a local park for some play time and picnicking.  

And we replicated park time and picnic time in Springfield with a friend and her kids from the St. Louis area.

All 3 kids completed a week of swimming lessons with Ms. Lisa at her pool.  The girls did private lessons so as not to interfere with their Stage Kids and tumbling classes.  They both learned SO much!!  Next summer Staley will be in the most advanced class.  And Adelie can now swim and breath at the same time as well as roll onto her back and swim on her back across the pool.  So much progress in one short week.

This was Briggs's first time doing swimming lessons.  He was initially hesitant to even go under the water and there were some tears the first few days, but by the end of the week he was all smiles as he was jumping off the side by himself and willingly going underwater to get toys off the bottom of the pool.

Staley got to celebrate Lila's birthday with a pool party, dinner, and a trip to Elevate.  She had so much fun!  I love how their cousins remain some of my kids' closest friends.

We celebrated Uma's birthday with a girl's night out including a yummy dinner at a restaurant and a trip to the movies to see 'Aladdin.'  While we did that, Zach took Briggs to the Emergency Expo where they got to see and sit in a variety of emergency vehicles.  It was a fun night for everyone!

Zach and I enjoyed a fun and relaxing week-end trip to Chicago to see 'Hamilton' while the kids got to enjoy fun sleepovers with grandparents.  While with Uma and Papa the kids got to enjoy a birthday dinner out for Lila's birthday, and while with Grammie and Grandpa they got to celebrate with cousins at Caroline's birthday party.

When they aren't getting rained out, we've also been sprinkling in some of Staley's baseball games a few evenings a week.

So far our summer has been relaxing and fun and full of lots of play time.  Finishing off this great month of fun with a week of vacation will be the icing on the cake.

Planning Ahead

Briggs told me, "I'm not going to get married right away because I have to think about who I am going to marry, but it will probably be Dava."

It never hurts to plan ahead.

Things to Remember

There are so many things that I want to remember about my kids at each age since they are growing and changing so quickly.  I don't want to forget that:

1.  Staley has improved so much with her speed and ability to do things in a relatively timely manner.  She sets her alarm and gets up on her own each monring.  She is doing more and more without being  prompted or prodded along.  She set the bar really low, but there is definite and sustained improvement.

2.  On the other hand, Adelie seems to be getting slower and slower to get ready or get things done.  She's the one now who requires lots of reminders and prompts to keep moving and not get distracted.

3.  Staley still loves to play with her siblings, but she will also take time to go read by herself in her room.  Adelie and Briggs, however, have the best time playing together and generally get along really well...until it's time to clean up.  Then there is a lot of dissension about who got out how much and who is doing more or less of the work.

4.  Briggs and Adelie STILL call night-time "bed-night."

5.  Briggs still refers to Adelie and Staley as "the sisters."

6.  Briggs doesn't say "tomorrow."  He always says "after we sleep."  And he doesn't say "yesterday".  When talking about any time in the past, whether it was yesterday, last week, or last year, he refers to it as "the other day."

7.  Briggs still doesn't say "think."  He says "sink."  As in, "I sink so."  The "th" sound is hard, so he also refers to three as free, tooth as toof, and throw as frow.

8.  Each kid now has one consistent stuffed animal that they sleep with every night.  Staley sleeps with Teddy (Yellow Bear), Adelie sleeps with Fuzzington, and Briggs sleeps with Bear-Bear.  Adelie also often sleeps in her mermaid tail blanket in her bed.

9.  Adelie and Briggs are really into "making soap."'  They mix together water and soap and shampoo and conditioner in a tupperware container and then put it in the fridge or the freezer.  When I open the fridge and find tupperware full of foaming liquid, I know there has been some soap making going on.  After many, many trials they evidentally still haven't figured out that it is never going to firm up into a bar of soap.  I guess you have to admire their persistance.

10.  All 3 kids still enjoy putting on plays together.  We have an original production at our house at least once a week.  It's really cute how Briggs is getting more involved now, but still always looks to his sisters for guidance and direction.  I love how his sisters whisper his lines to him.

11.  There are several things we use up insanely quickly around here: plain white computer paper (for the many, many, many art projects), tape (for crafts, wrapping gifts, and taping together the many pieces of computer paper to make books), and AAA batteries (for Adelie's camera.)  And with the soap making, washing Barbies and figurines, foot baths, and hand washing, we go through more than our fair share of pump soap and shampoo too.

12.  My kids get the giggles about singing silly songs together.  They love "The Song that Never Ends" and "I Know a Song That Gets on Everybody's Nerves."  However, they have also made up an original song that they often sing at breakfast that makes me laugh called "We are Kids."  They sing a short stanza and then follow it up with some kind of action or additional words.  For example, "We are kids.  Kids are loud. " (insert screaming)  "We are kids.  Kids are crazy. " (insert silly faces). " We are kids.  Kids are rockin'. "(insert air guitar)  "We are kids.  Kids don't always speak English." ("espanol", "merci", "scusi")  "We are kids.  Kids speak whale."  ("Helloooo, Whale.")  It's quite clever and they keep adding verses to it.

13.  Staley has discovered the printed books that I have of my blog.  She loves to pour over them and especially enjoys the blog posts about funny things that she and her siblings have said.  I love that I'm already seeing one of the main reasons for doing this blog in the first place come to fruition.

14.  Staley loves to read and reads all the time.  She generally has several different chapter books going at the same time.  She reads to herself, reads to her siblings, and still loves to have us read to her.  But one of her favorite things to read are the scripts from her current and previous plays that she's been in.

15.  My favorite thing ever is just watching my kids together and the love they have for each other.  We still have sibling arguments, of course, but for the most part they get along really well.  They play really well together.  They include each other when friends come over.  They support each other and help each other, like how the girls were actively cheering Briggs on during swim lessons and how Staley has offered to help Adelie learn her lines for their summer Stage Kids play.  Even at the end of the school year, Staley would hold Adelie's hand as they walked into school and would walk Adelie to her classroom.  I love their love for each other...and that's something I always want to remember.

Briggs and Adelie making his new train carrier into a house for figurines.

Staley and Briggs riding the El train in Chicago (and holding hands)

The girls on their last day of school

Question of the Day

Question:  After diligently working to help your child learn to read, what moment makes you begin to regret that decision?

Answer:  When they are sounding out the words etched into the wall of a bathroom stall at the movie theater.

Perspective

For the past month or so, the girls have been asking to have a "Briggy sleep-over" where they can build a blanket fort and they can all sleep in it together in their room.  I wasn't sure how it would go, but we decided to give it a try last night.  We spent 30 minutes or so making a really cool blanket fort and making a cozy place for them to sleep.  The kids were SO excited.  We got them all tucked in and Zach and I headed downstairs.  About 15 minutes later, Staley came downstairs a little teary to let us know that she didn't want to sleep in the fort and just wanted to sleep in her bed.  I went up and tucked her into her own bed.  About 10 minutes after that, Adelie came downstairs and said the blanket fort was too dark and she, too, wanted to just sleep in her own bed.  Zach took her upstairs and tucked her into her own bed.  Just a few minutes later, Briggs came down asking if he could sleep in bed with Adelie.  We said sure.  That lasted all of about 5 minutes before Briggs was crying about Adelie kicking him in the bed.  I went back upstairs and told Briggs that Adelie's bed was probably just too small for two people.  He could either get back in the fort or sleep in his own bed.  He decided that he was just going to sleep in his own bed too.  I walked Briggs back to his room thinking that this whole Briggy sleep-over thing turned out to be a big bust.  But as I was tucking him into his bed, Briggs told me, "That was a REALLY fun sleep-over."

Bust or success?

I guess it's all about perspective.

They Say...

Briggs was really taken with the El (train) in Chicago.  The other morning he was playing with his Busy Book trains.  He told me, "I'm pretending that James is the red line, Thomas is the blue line, and Percy is the green line."  #sodormeetschicago

Uma and Papa watched Briggs after pre-school on Tuesdays this year while I worked.  A few weeks ago, Uma fell on her way to pick up Briggs and hurt her knee.  That day she told Briggs that she needed to rest her knee so he could just watch television shows at her house after school.  The following week as they were getting in the car after pre-school, Briggs asked, "How is your leg, Uma?  Is your leg all better?"  Uma was touched by Briggs's concern and assured him that her leg was feeling much better.  He asked, "But it's not all better right?"  When Uma told him that it did still hurt a little, he replied, "Then I will just watch Paw Patrol and Blaze at your house so you can rest your leg."  #sothoughtful

Briggs and Adelie play school together quite often.  The other day, Briggs very seriously told Grammie, "Everytime I play school with Adelie, she calls me (long pause) Class."  He thought that was the pretend name she was calling him.  #notaname

The other day, Briggs told me, "Adelie said that when we marry each other, we will be cousins."  Adelie quickly interjected, "That's not what I said!  We can't marry each other.  But when we grow up, we will marry other people and THEN we will be cousins."  Ummmm...nope.  #siblingsforlife

While in Chicago over the week-end, the sidewalk we were walking down as sparkling in the sun.  Adelie exclaimed, "Chicago is SO clean.  Look at how sparkly the streets are!"  maybe the cleanliness of the city was what made her feel confident in putting her mouth on public sculptures.

Staley is very interested in participating in a wide variety of activities and sports.  She has often talked about taking classes for ballet and gymnastics.  However she explained to me that she wanted to wait until she's a little older because she just wants to do the advanced moves.   Oh, I wish that was how it worked in life...that as you get older, you automatically just get better at everything.

These kids of mine always keep me laughing.