I think the late afternoon is the hardest time for me. The kids are getting tired, they are a bit bored of the activities of the day, they are tired, and it is too hot to send them outside! I hope we survive another hot summer. The last couple of days it has heated up a lot. It is definitely summer time. The kids seem to be attracted to water and mud. It has been frustrating to me that they keep getting into it. We have been doing our summer school time after lunch. They seem to like doing things with me. We have already read one short chapter book together and are working on keeping everyone up on their math skills. Caleb is working on learning his alphabet. This week I have started teaching him the “Days of the week” song I know. He will come up to me and ask me to “sing Sunday.” He is trying really hard to learn it. Maybe it will be his favorite soon!
Our garden is getting hot and slowing down in production. We are starting to get tomatoes and cucumbers that have been tasty. We have had so much yellow squash this year. We have enjoyed sharing it with some older members of our ward. I have enjoyed going for walks first thing in the morning, like I did last summer. I usually am back home before all the kids are awake. It works well because it isn’t too hot outside at that time either. I had to close up all the windows with the double panes yesterday, we are past the open window weather.
Last Thursday was our 11th anniversary. On Wednesday Neal came home with a dozen red roses. They have been so pretty to look at.
Friday I took the kids to the spray pad to play. We brought a Little Caesars pizza with us to eat and had fun playing in the water with friends.
We signed up for the library summer reading program. The kids have all been excited about reading books. Andrew sat on his bed one day for over an hour reading! Spencer has been working hard at reading beginner books and is doing a great job. They were happy to turn in their first completed reading logs today at the library and receive donut and ice cream coupons. I hope they can keep their excitement for reading going. Ruth has decided that Nancy Drew books are wonderful. I bet she will read all 60 something books this summer. This morning we went to the park for a library summer party. They had lots of carnival type games the kids enjoyed. I could tell it was hot and humid because I was dripping in sweat just watching them play.
Friday evening we went to the park for dinner. The group that Neal works with were gathered together with their families for a dinner together. It was nice to meet the men that Neal works with. The kids had fun playing at the park too. The weather that day was so nice too, a storm system had been around and the weather was cooler and drier than normal. Andrew had brought his basket ball so we could shoot some baskets at the hoop there. He had fun with that. It made me wish we had a basket on our drive way for him to play at.
Caleb has been having bad dreams that wake up him between 1-3 in the night most nights. He cries and has a hard time falling back to sleep. So sometimes he will come wake me up 3 or 4 times and I hug him and send him back to bed. Then once in a while it is bad enough that I let him sleep by me, that way we can both get back to sleep. I hope this phase passes soon and we can get back to sound sleep at night.
Sunday was a nice day. It rained in the morning, which actually cooled things down. It felt nice all day. In the afternoon Ruth wanted to make cookies. She did all the measuring and most the work. I just helped run the mixer and do the oven for her. It is fun that she is wanting to learn more about cooking. That evening we went outside and let the kids chase fireflies. They had so much fun watching them light up and catching them. They were putting them into a little plastic container to watch. It was fun to watch the kids, laughing squealing with delight and being so excited.
Sunday I also found out my cousin died. It was a bit of a shock to me for some reason. It isn’t like I have been close to her in recent years though. I haven’t seen her since our grandpa’s funeral in 1986. But for some reason it really affected me that day. She was only 18 months older than me and I have many memories of us playing together as children. I guess it was hard to think that someone my age had passed on. I am so thankful for family and the blessings we have when living the gospel. I can feel peace and know that all will be right.
Neal has been busy this week with work. Monday evening he decided to lay down on the couch after we put the kids to bed. I think he was just planning on resting a bit before working on some things around the house before going to bed. Well, he slept until 5:30 the next morning. I guess he was tired. He works hard trying to keep up with everything. I appreciate all that he does.
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