Painting, Skating, Dog Walking, and Chocolate

We repainted our dining room, and we just love it! It's so soft and soothing. The color is "Seacliff Heights", which is a sort of seafoamy blue with green. Yay!

Our creative Beau using our Hess trucks from Didi as roller skates!

This week we're walking our neighbor's dog to help our, since she just had surgery. Beau is in heaven doing it, and it's much needed dog therapy for David, who is still quite terrified of dogs.

Finally, we spent a few hours yesterday with our dear friends from Singapore, the Eckbergs. We took the kids to a bounce house/ gym place, out for lunch, and to a great, local chocolate shop. The guy there gave the kids a ton of samples and was so lovely and friendly to them.

There's Beau with his friend, Annie, all chocolate faced!

Lemonade sales and cute boys

Beau mainly spearheaded a lemonade stand the other weekend, assisted by Lewis (until Lewis had to leave for his call time pre-show), and by David who sat at the table for part of the time ringing a bell to advertise their lemonade. They were adorable and very self directed about the whole thing. And, they made $30! Not bad for 3 hours of work!!!

Also pics of two of my lovely, sweet boys at church, all dressed up!

Lars the Lemur

Lewis had the best time performing as Lars the Lemur in Madagascar this summer! He declared to me at one point during the rehearsal process,
"Mom, I just love HVCT (Hopewell Valley children's theater). They make kids into heroes!"

Here he is with his stage foundation on and man bun going, ready to go and be costumed and made up for showtime!

And the final product after his final performance!

Summer moments

A couple months ago, we were at the temple, and I bumped into the sister of one of my best friends from growing up in Atlanta. She lives in Maryland, and she let me know that my friend Emily would be visiting in July. So one Saturday, we drove down to Wilmington to the children's museum there and met up with Emily and her 6 kids plus 3 of her sister's kids. It was so, so fun to see Emily again! It had been so long, and we loved connecting about life and family. Love her!

Beau decided to use his hard earned money to buy a Fitbit. Well, cheaper brand. He's absolutely loved it and is taking great care of it.

Beau wanted to make "pretend soup" for dessert one night. It's a favorite from a kids' cookbook Gogo gave the boys a few years ago. It was so good, we asked him to make it again a few nights later when we had the missionaries to dinner.

This was a recent drawing David did of a man. I think it's Daddy. It's amazing to me to all of a sudden see real form and control come into little ones' drawings. He asked Beau to help him add the tongue, but the rest was his!

Mummy Party

This was the best!
Lewis organized a Mummy party for the family. Here were the boys' costumes.

There were activity options we could choose from. We selected one game where we had to keep a big balloon up on the air. If someone in the group dropped it, it would wake the pharaoh. So cute.

The second game we played was a mummy wrap competition. I was partnered with Beau and Mike with Lewis. We had 3 minutes and a roll of toilet paper each. Whoever made the best mummy won.

Then there were decorations and homemade confetti to throw at the end.

I love when my kids have just a little bit more free time. Within days, it always brings out the most amazing creativity.

Frenchtown Park and NYC

We spent the most lovely afternoon with a music friend of mine and her kids at Frenchtown Park. It has a great zip line and play equipment, but also a low little stream to explore. The kids had tons of fun trying to catch fish and build a dam. It was an idyllic summer day!

After that, Mike and I scooted into the city for a work dinner. Walking from the dinner afterwards, we came upon a Tim Ho Wan, a Hong Kong based restaurant that's also famous in Singapore. We had a couple favorites for old times sake.

SG swim party, bubble gum, and pirate treasure

We got together with four other Singapore families for a bbq and swim party. It was really fun! So great to catch up!

Beau has been working on his bubble blowing skills.

And, our pirate treasure. Our summer incentive system is one of my favorites. Each boy has a treasure chest. They have a list of about 10 things they can do to earn pirate treasure each day including things like
- morning responsibilities
- piano practice
- reading time
- summer workbook time
- reading to David
- exercise
- time playing on own without disturbing mom
- service or kind acts to others

When I put them to bed every night, they report back on what they've done and earn a treasure or coin for each thing. When they reach 50, they get a prize. Lewis and Beau are both going to as many Harry Potter chocolate frogs as they can, although Beau has a system of intermittently choosing a squishy as a prize instead. It's been great!

Farm bounty

Here's my cute little guy who had just potty trained heading off to pick at the farm with me!

Then David going in the porta potty at the farm after we picked some delicious blueberries. 😉

Finally Lewis and Beau loving our fresh carrots and carrot greens!

Celebrating the 4th & our 41 year old

Here's Beau with his huge cup of candy he collected from the parade.

Birthday man with his requested vegetable napoleons for dinner.

Lewis helping to light the peanut butter - honey rice krispy treats for dessert.

Beau showing his splint. Poor kid.
The day before he jammed his finger badly at basketball camp, adding to his list of injuries and ailments for the summer. Poor kid missed a day of camp and another swim meet. He dealt with it after that, but still needed ice and splinting for weeks afterwards!

And, everyone in pjs to light off our own fireworks & sparklers and then collect fireflies for the evening.

4th of July celebrations

We began the morning with a 4th of July breakfast in bed for our birthday boy! It was the first time we ever celebrated Mike's birthday on the 4th, rather than the 5th. But, the kids' schedule was chockablock full from morning to night, so the 4th made for a very festive birthday!

We spent most of the day at David's friend Sebastian's house. Their family lives on the river in Titusville, right on the parade route. We enjoyed a big bbq and party with lots of great food, many friends, and tons of fun on the slip n' slide and with water balloons for the kids.

Here's David and Sebastian sitting waiting for the parade to start. I joke that David only makes friends with curly haired kids, because it sure seems like the majority of his friends have great curls!

Then the two of them on the dock overlooking the river at their house.

Parade time!

David cheering on the parade!

Masks, stitches, cuteness, & laundry

Our Lewis is constantly crafting. Paper is his favorite medium, and masks are his specialty. He made a mask for each character in Madagascar, and here he is in King Julien's mask.

Beau had to get stitches in his eyebrow after an unfortunate encounter with a door at church. We went to a birthday party where the grandpa in residence was also a doctor. So, one less doctor's appointment to pay for and the stitches were out!

I could just eat this David and his curls and cute church clothes up!

Finally David bringing the laundry up the stairs from the basement without even having been asked to collect it! He's being inspired by his older brothers' new laundry routine.

Treat at Amish Market

After our train adventures, everyone got to pick out a treat at the Bird in Hand Amish Market - our regular stop. Beau was really into his Whoopie pie and David hit the jackpot with his homemade caramel apple!

Visiting the real Thomas!

This is our family's happy place! Out in Amish country in train heaven. We surprised David and took him to see the real Thomas. He was so thrilled and amazed, just like the other boys had been at that age! It was such a fun day!