Monday, July 16, 2018

Beginning of July

After looking and looking and debating, we finally bought a trampoline! There are no stores locally that sell them, so while we were in Orlando visiting the science center we stopped at a sporting goods store that had them in stock. I had to use the bathroom while they were ringing it up and when I got in the car, Anthony handed me the receipt and it was $50 more than what was listed on the shelf! I marched right back in there and had customer service check the tags and they gave me a refund (I guess it was on sale earlier and they hadn't taken the tags down yet). When I got back in the car, James asked, "Did your argue go well?" lol!

It is so hot out there during the day, so we rigged up a sprinkler and hose to spray water while the boys jump. It works great except Baymax chewed a hole in the hose after 1 day! Puppies are so destructive!!

Playing with my camera and taking pictures of our animals:

Anthony's friend we bought the bees from came over to go through the hives with Anthony. They were out there for hours, checking through everything and he was telling Anthony all these tricks and tips that he uses for taking care of them. He told Anthony that there is much more money in raising and selling bee colonies (that's what he does) than there is in raising bees for honey so it was interesting to hear how you do things differently if harvesting honey is your goal.

Close up of one of the frames, you can see some eggs in the cells towards the left and larvae in the cells towards the right.

Lily and Luna were out munching on tree branches:

Rett came inside the house sobbing and so upset and when we asked him what happened he said, "James said that I love him!!" We all started laughing because we totally didn't expect him to say that. He kept crying and then Anthony tried to tickle him and play with him to snap him out of it.

We volunteered to help some friends of ours take their family to the local fireworks on the 4th. They are a family of 8 that only has a 5 seater car, so they end of taking multiple trips whenever they go somewhere. Since they were right on our way, we picked up the older three kids and the boys loved it! On the way home they asked if the girls were going to spend the night at our house and they offered to share their beds with them if they wanted to. So sweet!

We tried heavy duty noise cancelling headphones for Rett this year, but he still hated it. I think it was mostly the vibrations that bothered him. Everyone else loved it!

We decided to check out the Police Hall of Fame in Titusville. I realized that we had explored a lot of places north of us, but hadn't really looked at what was south. This was an instant hit with the boys. The entire place is full of police vehicles, guns, and interesting exhibits.

They even have real pieces of rubble from the twin towers:

There was a drunk driver display and they had drunk goggles you could try on and try to walk a straight line.

Checking out the CSI exhibit:

They had a computer monitor where you could try to make your own composite sketch. We tried to do one of Rett, we looked at each facial feature and tried to pick the one that matched him the best. I think we did pretty good considering they didn't have child-like features!

Rett next to his sketch:

There was a children's dress up section where they could try on different uniforms and look at themselves in the mirror. Rett uses his entire hand when he does finger guns.

They had an example of a jail cell that you could go inside so see just how small and sparse it is. I had the boys pretend to be locked up:

James found a toy sewing machine at a thrift store on sale for $4, so I let him get it. He has been begging for a toy sewing machine for a few years now, but they are so expensive! We had fun figuring out how this one worked and testing it out on some scrap fabric. He decided that my real sewing machine is "way better" than his.

The closest trampoline park, Hangar 15, had a groupon for half off tickets, so I took the boys one morning. They loved every minute of it.

On the way home from Hangar 15, we passed by a Christmas in July event downtown. Every year they have bed races where teams get together to race beds on wheels down the street. I've always wanted to go, but never had the opportunity so we decided to check it out.

Playing a few games, waiting for the races to start:

We found a shady spot to watch, so I took a picture of the boys.

I asked Rett to make a more normal face and this is what I got. That is soooo Rett!

A lot of the spectators came prepared with water balloons to throw at the racers. Some of them didn't pop, so James ran out and grabbed them so he and Rett could throw them.

The water balloons were so tiny!

End of June

The boys love to play go fish all together as a family, they love it when they ask for a card we have and we have to hand it to them. It never gets old to them! So before bed we agreed to play one game.

But first Rett and James had to try to make me smell their stinky feet.

This is Anthony, reading about bee stuff on his phone while playing the game. It happens a lot.

We were brave and took the kids with us to Walmart (I usually try everything I can to avoid taking them with me) and they had to try these dinosaur heads on.

We spotted a soft shell turtle crossing the road! I don't think I had ever seen one up close out of the water before.

The library programs have been really cool this summer, so we have been spending a lot of time there. The larger library in New Smyrna has a great children's area with small puzzles and games for the kids to play with. It makes it soooo much easier to wait for things when they have those to play with.

This week the summer program was circus themed and they had a woman come to teach the kids how to juggle scarves and spin plastic plates. They loved it!

James has his tutoring at the library once a week for an hour, so while he was doing that, Rett and I did their "Lego Challenge" program. Each week they give the kids a theme and let them build whatever they want from a table full of legos. The theme was "things you find at a circus" so Rett picked out a bunch of gray legos for an elephant and I figured out how to put them together. I was so dang proud of how it turned out!

I recently got released from my calling in the stake primary and immediately (like a few hours later the same day at church) got called to be our ward's primary music leader. So I've been having a lot of fun planning games and gathering props for primary. I decided to make paper crowns for kids when we sing to them for their birthday, so of course the boys wanted to test drive them.

I also introduced the boys to playing battleship. It takes a million years to play, but they love it.

I has having one of those days where the kids are wired, acting crazy, not giving me a break and it was rough. I started texting my mom and my brothers asking them what is the age limit for dropping kids off at the fire station and they started texting back funny memes to help me feel better. So I decided that since I was hot and sweaty since Florida is THE SURFACE OF THE SUN in summer, that a relaxing bath would help me feel better. As soon as I got in, the boys followed me into the bathroom and begged to put their feet in the water. So this was my break from them after a day of driving me crazy:

It turns out my brother was only 45 minutes away since he had to drop my mom off at the airport, so he decided to take a detour and visit for a few hours and try to help me feel better. We ended up getting tacos for dinner while Anthony took the boys on an errand and it was HEAVEN! I have such an awesome family, I wish they lived closer!

Showing Anthony battleship:

My phone was limping along with a really bad battery that wouldn't stay charged and started doing this thing where the actual phone part wouldn't work, I couldn't hear anything when I was talking on the phone unless I had speaker phone turned on. So I finally upgraded my phone and I am loving the fancy camera options! I had to take lots of pictures just to try them out:

We tried out a library program advertised as a carnival. Using the word "carnival" was kind of a let down for the boys because it was really only a few little games in a room, but it was free and air conditioned so you can't complain too much! We also got to see Rett and my lego creation in the display case by the front door:

Potato sack race:

Hula hoops:

Rett colored a mask and wore it for the next couple of days: