playing outside

now that the tree house is done the kids play in it all the time. they love it. i love our summer days at home. the kids play outside and i sit in a beach chair and read a book. today was perfect. the kids were so good and played together all day. we had swimming lessons in the morning and the rest of day was dedicated to relaxing. a perfect way to start our weekend.

swimming lessons

the kids are back in swimming lessons again. dahlia is in preschool 4 and mason is in school age 2. they are both doing great. i really like their teachers this year. they are super nice. the kids both love to swim and are pretty confident in the water.

i thought i would sign connor up for lessons this year but he doesn't seem ready. i don't think he would be comfortable in the water without me. when i asked him if he would like to take swimming lessons he said "not in THAT pool, i'll drown." so funny. next year he will take lessons for sure.

high heels

can you believe this five year old? dahlia begged me to buy her some high heels last month so of course i did. i told her they are just for playing dress up at home. she loves them and is always trying to wear them places where she shouldn't like grocery shopping or to summer camp.

today she asked me to put her hair up in a bun. she then put on a cute skirt, a bratz t-shirt from her cousin, and her high heels. wow, she does not look like my sweet little five year old. sigh. why are they always in such a hurry to grow up?

pretend city

we had a fun outing today. i took the kids to pretend city. it is a kids museum that looks like a little city with shopping places, restaurant, theater, police station, doctors office, art studio and tons more. it has been a while since we have been there. we of course got discounted tickets. jen went with her kids,one of bodhi's friend, and his mom. we also met christina, zena, and my mom there. we had a huge crowd.

we ended up splitting up because the kids wanted to go to different parts. mason and connor loved the fishing pools, and dahlia wanted to go to the farm. christina took dahlia and i stayed with the boys. they were so cute and dressed up at all the stations. it was super crowded but we stayed until they were closing.

after pretend city we drove over to the irvine spectrum and had dinner at corner bakery. it was so fun to go out. the kids were pretty good too. they didn't even mind the super long drive home.

movie night

miles bought a new projector so we could watch movies outside. it is so cool. we brought it with us to the river and the kids had fun watching movies on the side of the motorhome.

we decided to test it out at our house tonight. the kids wanted to watch arrietty. they loved watching the movie outside but it was a bit cold and miles ended up with some mosquito bites. not exactly ideal but i think it would be fun for a party.

river trip

we just got home from another fun filled river trip. i am always sad to come home. the week goes by so fast. i love to just sit in the sun and play in the water with the kids all day. our trip this year was also cut short by one day because miles had to work on sunday. we didn't get there until monday evening. at least miles got to go with us though. we were not sure if he was going to get the time off or not. i would have been so sad to go without him.

it was a nice trip. nothing went wrong this year. i did run out of gas while driving the sea-doo with dahlia and had to be towed back to camp but that was it. no drama. hurray. we were pretty relaxed this year. we spent our days sitting by the water, going on boat rides, and swimming. the evenings were all about cooking outside, playing board games, and staring at the stars. miles brought a movie projector and the kids got to watch movies projected on the side of the motorhome.

dahlia and mason were in the water with me all day long. they loved it. connor was funny. he would come out of the trailer and play in the water for a little bit and then say he wanted to go back inside. he must take after miles. miles was in the trailer for most of day. i don't think i saw him play in the water at all. connor did like to come out once the day started to cool off and then he would practice fishing.

the weather was very mild this year. it is usually scorching but this year was great. on thursday morning it rained for a bit. after the rain stopped the river was so calm and still. it was gorgeous. i really loved the trip. it is nice to feel connected to nature again. i want to keep that feeling with me always.

4th of july

poor 4th of july this year was overshadowed by the fact that we are leaving on vacation in three days. there were no fancy decorations or desserts decorated with red, white, and blue this year. we did get together though. we went to jen and ray's house. we usually do a sleepover but we skipped that and just drove to their house early in the morning. i already have too much packing to do to even think about a sleepover.

we usually walk to the beach with all our gear and strollers but this year jen and ray had the excellent idea of dropping the cars off early in the morning with all our beach gear in the trunk and then later we could all walk to the beach without all the stuff. the best part of the plan is when it is time to leave the beach and all the kids are tired we could just drive back to jen and ray's house.

the plan pretty much worked except for two things. 1) jen and christina forgot to put their beach gear in the trunk before dropping the car off and 2) the drive back to the house after our beach day was insane with all the holiday traffic. i still think it was better than walking back carrying a kid and big beach bag though. the kids loved the beach. we had fun playing in the waves and they were all excited to have uncle ray take them "deep" in the ocean. miles and i always stay in the shallow part. back by the towels the kids and their aunties built this big sand castle. it was pretty cool.

we had a yummy taco dinner and then the kids did poppers outside on the sidewalk. we didn't go to see fireworks. that was a bummer. it was late and miles and i were really tired. dahlia wanted to see fireworks this year though so miles drove them to the top of our block and they got to see some from there. it was a fun holiday and nice to spend the day together.