Summer Summary

Today is the first day of school (technically, the FIRST, first day of school) for Eli - more on that later - and I realized that there are still some pictures and stories from summer fun that I had meant to add to the blog. So...here is a little bit of a summer summary...not to say that we are done with summer fun, as we will likely try to pack more summer fun in before we fully settle in to fall.


Devil's Lake

One of our favorite summer spots on a hot day...unfortunately (or fortunately?), we did not have many hot days this summer. We still made it to the beach a few times to play in the sand, picnic, and splash around a bit.

Beach babies

Lunch always tastes better when on a picnic blanket

Bundled up

Post-beach milkshake while Mommy is unloading the car. Ah, the good life!

Daddy joined us to build in the sand

Not sure what she is building, but I'm sure it will be great!

County Fair

The kids and I joined some friends at kids' day at the county fair. Everyone enjoyed seeing (and petting) the animals, doing arts/crafts projects, and tasting samples (freshly-made butter, apple cider, yum, yum). Eli got to choose his first ride to go on by himself...although he ended up with a buddy on board since his brave shadow, the little lady, wanted to join in the fun. Who knows, maybe they will be thrill-seekers and Daddy will finally have someone to ride with on roller coasters!

Cluck, cluck!

Ready for the open road (in a blue car, of course)

The perfect end to a trip to the fair - ice cream! 

(PS - Evelyn had to ride home in just her diaper from this one after a little incident involving a bowl of melted ice cream being dumped down the front of her shirt. A self-inflicted sticky waterfall, so no hard feelings.)

The Butterfly Release

One of Eli's buddies gave him a butterfly habitat for his birthday. Real, live caterpillars came in the mail, and survived one of the few hot days of the summer as Mommy forgot to get them out of the mailbox, and then formed cocoons and turned into butterflies right before our very eyes. Super cool gift, and it made for some fun conversations at the breakfast and dinner table each day. There was only one incident of the cats knocking the habitat over, and after a brief scare due to the fact that we had red flowers that left blood-like streaks on the side of the habitat at the time of said knocking-over (Do butterflies bleed? Thankfully, we did not find out.), we confirmed that all ten butterflies survived and were ready to be released. We set them free at the edge of the yard so that they could hopefully find a new home amongst the wildflowers. They must have forgiven us for the cat drama, as they stayed around the area as we released them, and one even hung out for awhile on Eli's shorts.

Ready for the release

Eli's butterfly pal

Hello, little hitchhiker

Here Comes the Sun(Flowers)

This year we finally were able to check out one of the places that has been on my summer list for a couple years: the sunflower fields at Pope Farms. We were there slightly past the prime time (at least we were there...next year I'll try for being more punctual. Baby steps.), but still saw many beautiful flowers on a beautiful summer day. The kids were troopers and hiked the whole time, which was pretty super of them considering Mommy parked in the farthest parking lot (Oops. Again, next year we'll have our act together. Or not.), and so we had a hike up and over a hill to get to the fields. They had fun collecting sticks (and leaving them in a neat pile when Mommy said only one stick per person could come in the minivan), and ran from sunflower to sunflower to find and loudly identify their "favorite one".

Starting our hike. Between Eli's hat choice, the stone fence, and the rolling hills, it seems we could have been hiking in western Ireland.

Finding sticks. And did I mention that the kids each brought a bunny along?

Finally some sunflowers

Eli finds his favorite one (of this moment)

Beautiful summer day

Those eyelashes and that sweet face

Evelyn finds her favorite one

Sports and the Arts...We Love it all

Our busy (and fun!) July continued with an old favorite (Concerts on the Square) and new adventures for Eli (t-ball and soccer camp).

Ah, Concerts...eating yummy treats while sitting outside in perfect summer twilight on the comfy capitol lawn and listening to talented musicians...what more could you ask for in a summer evening? The crazy element of doing this with two (or more) active, often noisy, kids adds that element of excitement/danger to round things out.

After you turn four, your smile for a camera becomes a bit exaggerated

Full tummy, cards to play with, and cuddles with Daddy makes for a happy little lady

Building a maze for his giraffe to navigate

Very focused on her building project

Working together happily - a moment of parental bliss!

The sticks keep us entertained...

...as do the trees

Is there anything more wonderful than a toddler snuggle?

Happy ladies

Eli and Daddy teamed up for parent-child t-ball classes this summer. At this age, it is mostly practicing hitting, throwing, catching, and base running, although there was a parents versus children mini-game at the last class (for the record, a parent sent a line-drive, or as much of a line-drive as one can hit with a plastic ball, right into Eli's cheek. Luckily, Daddy was on base at the time, so Eli ran the remaining bases with Daddy to shake off the injury). Eli seemed to enjoy playing, and Daddy got to remember back to his playing and coaching days.

Batter up!

Time for some throwing and catching

Daddy has his game face on

Swing batter!

The little fan, watching the two boys in her life

And, of course, Evelyn was ready to jump right in, too

Eli was a two-sport athlete for part of the month, as he tried out a week-long soccer camp. He had a lot of fun, and it was the perfect first introduction to soccer. It helped that one of his good buddies was also in the class, and his coach was great with the preschoolers. Evelyn (and Mommy) were ready to join in the fun, but managed to stay on the sidelines to cheer on Eli throughout the week. Eli must have enjoyed his new adventures into organized sports - this week he asked if he and Daddy could sign up for basketball.

Soccer players and their fans

Start of practice team meeting

Dribbling toward the goal

GOOOOOOOOAAAAAALLLLL!!!