What We Have Been Up To

Sometimes being a brother is even better than being a superhero. ~Marc Brown

I really wish that i could blog ALL the time as there is so much that i want to write down for my own memory's sake and also to share.

We have been swimming a whole bunch. We've been to my mom's a lot and enjoyed her pool. We swam with my friend Suzzi and her 2 kiddos. We have also spent an afternoon at the Santa Clarita Pool which all the kids loved. Kienan completely swims on his own and Mackenzie is pretty darn close. Kiera wants her face in the water and doesn't care how wrinkly she gets, she DOES NOT want to get out!

We spent an afternoon at the beach with daddy. He rarely gets to go with us so this was a GREAT treat! He attempted to teach Kienan how to boogie board who kinda caught a small wave. Since my son has no meat on his body the cold water temperature was too distracting for him. i think they will try again another day.

We've been to the library to check out books and see some shows. Kienan got to go up on stage at the "Balloon Man Show" which is one of my favorites. i guess you know you're a mom when you can say you've seen the "Balloon Man" 3 summers in a row :) Anyways..... the kids love the Used Book Store at the library. They bring their coins and pick one or two items and off we go to check out some others. Even Kiera digs the library. She sits and flips through the books and no i am NOT just saying that cuz i was a teacher. She REALLY does! Kenzie picked a children's Hymn Book today. I know she's gunna sing some day :) Kienan picked a skateboard and a guitar magazine. i really, really, REALLY love the crinkly sound of the library book covers. Nostalgic for me i suppose, in regards to my own childhood.

K, we went to the movies and saw "Wall-E" and WOW that was a FANTASTIC movie!

MUST GO SEE!

We finally painted Kienan's bedroom with a skateboard theme. i took some photos to hang in frames as bedroom decor. He loves performing "tricks." In his mind he IS Tony Hawk tearin' it up. In reality and in mommy's mind we are still in the learning phase.

My garden was dilapidated by the Very Hungry Caterpillar!!!!! During my normal morning garden walk i almost passed out from the 4 inch long, 1 inch in diameter caterpillar loudly munching on my tomato plant leaves. i gasped and called for the kids to come see, of course. Kienan thought they were the COOLEST ever!!! i ran inside and called my mom and she said to lock all the doors! :) Needless to say i was in wonder at this phenomenon and had to research this peculiar garden dweller. WELL....... the "Tomato Horned Worm" (not a cute caterpillar), i found out can DESTROY your tomato plants. So i planned to rid of these creatures once we got home later that day. By the time i was able to revisit my garden it was 10:00pm. I almost cried when i discovered that while we were gone for those 5 hours THEY COMPLETELY ATE THE TOP OF MY PLANT!!!!! GONE!!! i was determined to find those suckers with my flashlight, metal kitchen tongs, scissors, and garbage bag. Yep, i collected 26 of those darn worms. TWENTY-SIX!!!! The better news is that they cycle TWICE in a season! Oh JOY! The BEST news is that the parasitic wasps DID NOT burrow their eggs and feed off of these menacing pests. Soooo... my poor poor plant is hanging on for dear life :( Everything else in the garden decided it was time to grow and now i will have to weed out some plants as we are getting over crowded with green beans, peas, squash, cucumbers, onions, peppers, strawberries, and corn. There is so much to learn about gardening and i am LOVIN it!!!! FYI, the caterpillar transforms into the FIVE SPOTTED HAWK MOTH. "HAWK" sounds scary for a moth.

A bee chillin' in my Sunflower Garden~

We went to the lake with our neighbors and had a BLAST on their boat. Thank you for inviting us :) I believe my son will some day participate in extreme sports. He had the time of his life on the inner tube! AND I SKIED! i got up first try after 5 years! Kyle skied and tubed too... What a hottie he is ;) Mackenzie even did the inner tube with our neighbor. She mostly enjoyed swimming around the boat when we stopped in the coves.

Kyle showing his stuff! I promise that i was up and skiing :)

That's Kienan in the yellow life vest hanging on and laughing most of the time~

We hung out at the park and hit some balls with my brothers and friends.

Yesterday she officially banned crawling and became a walker. :) This is where i will get my exercise chasing her ALL OVER THE PLACE! She is almost 1 going on 4 and won't be left behind.

Josh stayed in Denver for awhile but has been back a few weeks. He is working, surfing, and doing an internship for HGTV. Just so happened they were filming in our neighborhood and so he took advantage of the opportunity!

Overall, summer has been really good to us. Kyle and I celebrated being together 11 years this past friday. Not married, but our first date was 11 years ago. And YES, we remember the date just because we have celebrated it for so long. That first date that he claims i was late to was at Baja Fresh :) Well, we were able to go on an actual DATE on Friday without kids. We believe it was the first time in a year. We spent the evening in Ventura with Suzzi (it was also for her birthday), Cameron, and some other friends. We laughed, ate, drank, walked, listen to a Johnny Cash tribute band and had a great time! We also went to a kid birthday party this past weekend and spent some time with friends we hadn't seen in awhile. Amongst all the activities we are attempting to complete a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle which is sprawled out on the kitchen table. The sooner we get it done the sooner we can stop eating on the picnic table outside :) It's a comical picture of Noah's Ark and all the animals. It will hang in the kid's bathroom when completed.

Now i know why i have not had time to blog! ;)

While we try to teach our children all about life.

Our children teach us what life is all about.

~Angela Schwindt