Summer adventures!

All of the kids are on summer vacation now, which means that while my progress on course planning and house projects has slowed considerably, we are having fun doing lots of other things.  Mariel's last day of first grade was on Thursday, and she is already quick to remind everyone that she is now a SECOND grader, and a BROWNIE (in Girl Scouts).  Of course her siblings would not let her pose for a picture on her own:

 With just the little ones at home before Thursday, I had all sorts of ambitious plans of things to do with "only" two kids to deal with (its funny how that works).  One of those was an extended bike ride; while they actually were having fun at the time the photo reveals that perhaps the trailer is running out of space.  The more I look at it, the more they look like angry caged animals.

As promised, aside from the photo above they did seem to be enjoying themselves that day- we stopped for a trip to Grant's Farm with its zoo and tram ride and all sorts of fun.  

 This weekend I took them to their first Renaissance Faire.  Mariel had declared that the ad in the paper looked "BORING" but upon arriving she decided it might not be so bad.  By the time we left, she is pretty sure that she will be working there as soon as she is old enough.  One of the first things that we saw was the fire juggler; Holden may also have some future plans in mind.  He spent quite a bit of time after the show waiting and asking for "more fire?"

 They enjoyed some other shows as well- it was sort of amazing to see them all sitting happily- and it was even raining on us!

 Of course the girls hit the dress up area for some "real" princess attire.  The prince was more interested in the musical instruments and the worker's dog.

And soon we will be off on our next adventure... I just hope that I can keep up!

Happy Birthday Holden!

We had  great time celebrating Holden's second birthday with family and friends.  He was very appreciative of all of his gifts.  He unwrapped each thing and carefully inspected it, wanting to play with/ read/ look at it for a while before moving on to the next.  It took three days to get through them all, and I can honestly say that if you sent him a gift, he has enjoyed it.  

He also (clearly) enjoyed the idea of the celebration- and the cake!

Miss us?

Did you miss us?  It may not be surprising to hear that it has been a busy two months.  Now we are gearing up for Holden's birthday celebration this weekend.  I am also on summer "vacation," which will predictably entail me adding way too much to my to-do list, including teaching an on-line course for the first time.  The summer break started off with a bang, as Holden had a double ear infection, Noella has battled a stomach bug on and off for two weeks, and Mariel has another case of lice.  We thank our lucky stars for a working washing machine several times a day here.
Updates in a few photos:

Mariel's (rescheduled) Birthday Party

 A few perks of the "rain date"- we got to celebrate with Grampy and Babci and the Irish themed party got to take place on St. Patrick's Day!

 Mariel's gift from Babci and Grampy: Disney on Ice!

 Easter!

 And we helped host a baby shower for a friend.  The girls (and their dolls) did not do much with the planning or food prep, but they still came early to help out.

 I got to share in the dessert table creation and frosted many dozen baby face cupcakes.

Dancing Away

Poor Mariel spent Sunday, her birthday, sick in bed with a fever.  We had to cancel her party and she also could not go to her big celebration.  Sunday was a fundraising event for a non-profit that I work with, complete with an Irish Band.  Mariel was pretty sure that the band was really there for her birthday, so it was quite devastating when she could not go.  I took Noella as my replacement helper.  A few lessons learned:  it is much easier to sell raffle tickets when you have a sweet 4 year old charming people; Noella can hang out independently at a bar with suprising (maybe alarming?) ease; and Noella has not yet outgrown her wild dancing phase.  She was quite entertaining for all involved.

Hopefully we can re-schedule Mariel's birthday celebration for next week.  She went with an Irish theme, so St. Patrick's day weekend will work well.

Too much information?

We were all home on Monday for the Presidents Day holiday.  This worked out well, as we discovered that Mariel had lice and spent much of the evening trying to clean/ heat/ freeze everything possible to kill our new louse friends.   The kids were fully treated and safe to return to school this morning.  Far from being embarrassed about her situation, Mariel walked to school with a friend discussing what life would be like if the world was overrun with lice.  I fully expected her to spend the day discussing it with her classmates.  I was not prepared for  Mariel to come home with this lovely self-confidence building worksheet on "What makes you different."

I was pretty relieved that I had already spoken with her teacher this morning.