What's Exciting?

Okay, that title is frankly, misleading. Since there really isn't a whole lot interesting or exciting going on. But nevertheless, the past few days have been good. 

We've been reading. And we got some bundt cake! (My favorite!!)

We've been watching Hamilton a lot. 

Husband and I had a date night fire. 

My kids made me breakfast in bed. (Which was very sweet. If not fancy or complicated.) 

We got our garbage and recycling bins cleaned. And you know what? It was amazing and 100% worth it! They have been sanitized and the deodorizer actually makes them smell good! 

I was ridiculously excited for them to be cleaned. 

They look so good now!

We met some friends at the park and had a really nice time! 

And the kids have started a new online math curriculum that they really love. I appreciate their brains aren't turning to mush. 

So sure, nothing really exciting at all. But it's all good. We're enjoying summer and hoping that our return to learn plan doesn't change. Fingers crossed! 

Hey Summer

I wish I had a lot to tell you. But I don't. 

We've been enjoying summer. 

Friend's pools. Playing outside. Playing inside. Reading. Ice cream. Watching Hamilton.

So, even though there's nothing interesting to report, I like it that way. Have a fantastic weekend! 

The Holiday Weekend

Our weekend was spent super low-key which was excellent. 

Friday night, like everyone else it seems we watched Hamilton. We did strategically serve our cookie pizza during "Say No To This" which was exactly as distracting as I wanted it to be. 

Ultimately... we appreciate it. Seeing it live is 100 times better of course, but this is a real gift to have the show on my television whenever I want. There are some shots I disagree with, but since Thomas Kail directed both the stage and the film I will just go with it and know that they're proud of it. 

I am consistently overwhelmed by the details of the show. It's just so well done. It's possible I have pretty much been watching it since Friday night. I am obsessed with the second act. 

Saturday we swam with some friends.  

For some reason, they were out of blueberries so our flag cake is pretty much a plague cake which somehow seems appropriate for 2020. 

We had our traditional Macy's fireworks and glowstick party! And it's still fun! 

Yesterday we finally got to go back to Mass and it was so good. A little weird. But good. 

I hope you spent your weekend well! 

A Few Things Before the Holiday Weekend

So swim lessons wrapped up today. 

This is the only one of my terrible pictures that captured them both. And even then, it's their backs in the water so not super helpful. 

I am 100% properly impressed by how these lessons went. My kids learned so much more than they ever have. We may never go back to regular lessons. 

Last night we (like Husband and I) wrapped up watching Alexa and Katie on Netflix. 

We came to this show kinda by fluke and super late. But the 4th part just dropped a few weeks ago. And I just loved this show. It's so wholesome and sweet and funny. I honestly laughed and cried many times. I really think that when M is a little older we will watch this show together. 

In other big news this kid right here, not only learned to swim but has finally crossed the bridge into actual reading. 

She can read the whole first box of Bob books. And for that, I am so very thankful. I just wanted her to have a running start on reading for school. We don't even know what that looks like yet, but I know that these early reading skills are so important. 

The other day C asked me a very important, impossible-to-answer question. So let me ask you... 

"What was the first color people named?" As is, as humans were developing language, which color was named first? 

I honestly didn't know how to answer that and I have no idea how his brain wrapped around that idea. But there it was. 

And with this mishmash of randoms we are kicking off our holiday weekend. Hamilton on Disney + tonight for family movie night and more fun tomorrow for the 4th! Yay! 

July Jumpers

Can you even believe it's July? No. Neither can I. 

This gal was so excited to try on some jumpers after swimming lessons. Some friends let us take two sizes to see which ones we will need. I am going to get a new jumper in the bigger size and look for used in the smaller. 

Well, we are just taking it one day at a time and I am going to keep believing that they will go to school and she will actually need a jumper. (It is the thing she is the MOST excited about.) 

A Busy Good Week

Is it just me or has June just completely flown by? I mean, after 70 days of March it seems reasonable that June with the possibility of actually doing things with no schooling responsibilities would seem to go much faster. But still, I am a little shocked that the 4th of July is already next weekend. 

This week has been full of good. This week started out exactly like the Carpenter's hit, Rainy Days and Mondays. (It was rainy on Monday.) So the first day of swim lessons was canceled, but I made jam so it turned out okay. 

Tuesday was the perfect day. After swim we played outside and M wore this buff and she seriously looked like she was on Survivor. Short shorts, (that are only for playing outside at home, I didn't realize they were so short when I bought them) a tank top, a buff over crazy hair. It made me laugh anyway. 

C has his lesson first, so each kid has time to kill. We've been reading, doing Extreme Dot to Dots, and riding our scooters in the neighborhood when it's not our turn in the pool. 

We are very thankful that our friend was offering swim lessons at her pool. With all the public pools closed, our choices were limited. We are very happy with how they are going, other friends have been disappointed by their "in-home" lesson opportunities. 

Wednesday we had a park playdate with friends. It was a lot of fun!

But it was hot so we got Jr. Frostys on the way home to cool off. 

Yesterday the long-awaited Baby Yoda arrived!

And we made the much-anticipated strawberry pie as well. It did not disappoint! 

My mom snapped this picture of M on Skype. She put the phone down to put her shoes on. It's just so funny to us. 

This morning I snagged some pictures of the very end of each lesson. It's during their free time so they aren't great, and I was far away. But it's still nice to see them succeed. Today was Friday Fun Day so the sprinklers were turned on. 

We also found out that our town is getting a Nothing Bundt Cakes! And I am SO excited! It's my favorite! I hope you have had a speedy June full of fun stuff. We certainly have! 

I also managed to process the bulk of the strawberries. Between eating fresh tasty ones, 9 jars of jam, a pie, 2 batches of strawberry sauce, and freezing 3 gallons we only have a few left to process up. (We will probably freeze more yet as well.) The kids did a nice job not picking bad ones so our waste has been minimal. Go us! 

Berry Good Father's Day

Our favorite strawberry patch opened last Monday. And every day they would post about noon how the field had had heavy picking and they were going to close until the next day or even 2 days away. 

We LOVE strawberries and our tradition so yesterday we all woke up early. We were in the car by 6:45 and after picking up a delicious (but really slow) and fancy Father's Day breakfast at McDonald's we got on the road. 

We pulled into the patch at about 8:05, just a few minutes after they opened and the parking lot was full.  

We had to wait behind 3 other groups for our golf cart ride to the patch.  And then we got a great two rows to pick! 

Apparently, 8 was/is the magic age for picking. Don't get me wrong, every year it gets better, but C was so helpful and picked a whole lot. Husband is our champion picker and I don't think that title will eve be relinquished, but C really did a nice job! (M was good too, but still needs encouragement and entertainment.) We had just under 25 pounds of berries picked in about an hour and were on the road home at 9:17. 

The early bird gets the worm and all that, because the line to get into the field was about 11 groups deep and the parking lot was not only full (in fact a car had basically blocked us in...) but there was a line of cars parked on the side of the road. 

I am so happy to have fresh strawberries in my house. There's something so magical about the drive home with the faint smell of strawberries in the car. And then there are tons of other good things to come. I actually made jam this morning and we promised Miss M we would make a strawberry pie this year!