What You Missed

Since it's officially Fall, my lofty goal of blogging about ALL of our summer fun is fading fast.  So here is a jumble of some of what you missed during our last days of summer...

We went to Legoland, on a budget I might add! I had a BOGO (buy one get one) coupon from my PTA membership for last year, and we stumbled across a deal at IKEA for a free kids admission to Legoland with the purchase of an Adult; we used 3 of those and essentially got half of our party in FREE, yee haw I love a deal!


Aurora & I



Kiarra, Sydney, Kody & Summer with Harry Potter and Hagrid

 

Summer & Maverick riding the train, can you tell it's HOT?


We did go to the Legoland Water park shortly after this picture was taken because it was a really hot day, even on the coast.  Sadly, I do not have any pics from the water park because they were taken with my now missing iPhone...


Sydney the Lion tamer



Personalized coffee mugs LOL!



Nana sent the kids a package (and my kids LOVE to get packages from Texas because they always have the best stuff in them) with some of Daddy's old books like Richard Scarry's Funniest Story Book Ever from 1979!  Nana also sent a bunch of fun charms for their Crocks.  They loved it!

You can tell these are my children by the tan and also bruised legs!

And of course there was arts & crafts time over the summer... 



Notice the state of the bathroom after the finger painting.



 We moved on to a less messy medium, the Color Wonder markers that only show up on the Color Wonder paper, genius!


No mess here :)



 I picked up a Power Wheels Barbie Jeep at a garage sale for 20 bucks, like I said I love a deal.  Only, I had to buy a battery for it that was $89.99 and then the kids only got to use it once before the battery stopped taking a charge.  Oh well, it was fun while it lasted!



He has to hold on tight while she's driving!





And of course we had a ton of fun at the lake.  Maverick and Summer both learned to water ski this summer and Sydney perfected her wake boarding skills and even got up on a single ski.  She may never slalom again but it was fun to see her try something that us "parents" enjoy so much.



Maverick in his jammies with his BIG  Blue Gill

The great epiphany that happened at the lake this summer is that Maverick realized his love for fish, fishing and anything fishy in nature.  We always knew this boy had the patience for fishing, even when he was a toddler but during our camping trip he caught a TON of fish and (pardon the pun) he was HOOKED!  He would wake up in the morning and run down to the dock in his PJ's with his tackle and pole and start fishing before breakfast.  He didn't even want to go out on the boat to ski because that would cut into his fishing time. 



His first Bass, it's just a baby but there are many more to come I'm sure.



Maverick would fish everyday if he could.  His favorite place to go is the Bass Pro Shop, he checks out books about fishing at the library,  and watches fishing shows on TV and every chance he gets he wants to search for videos of people fishing.  (I mean really the only thing more boring than fishing it's self is watching other people fish on TV, but what do I know!) His wish now is to go to Florida so he can catch a Mahi Mahi and a Tarpon, REALLY that's what my 7 year old wants to do! He's so funny and so lucky that he has a retired grandpa that also shares his love of fishiness and just happens to live on a lake.



All of the kids in Summer's class got to write sentences about her last week at school.  She told them that her favorite color is purple, she likes mac'n'cheese and she is 5.  I think her teacher did a great job on the portrait of Summer, the resemblance is uncanny!

Summer as the friend of the week.

We also took one very exciting trip to the drive-in movie theater.  It was so much fun for Shane and I because all 5 of the kiddos (Kiarra included) had never been to the drive in before!

My attempt to capture the whole gang, it didn't work.

The weather was perfect, it was one of those great, warm summer nights where it is perfectly comfortable outside even late into the night.  A summer trip to the drive-in will be a must for years to come in our family. 



Eager faces dressed in their PJ's ready for the movie