One Week Together

 Due to all the camps and activities that all the kids have this summer, besides our trip up north, we only have one week all summer where everyone is home.  So, this week we have tried to make the most of it.  The zoo, Greenfield Village, trips to the movies, friends over, etc.  It's been a lot of fun.

Peter loves all of Bella's friends and calls them all "my best friends."  So he was in heaven when they all came over to play.

Peter and Christian have had a lot of time to play together.  Peter has a habit of hitting or otherwise hurting Christian to get this attention and to engage in play/test limits.  Christian is too nice to stand up for himself.  We've been working on kind ways to deal with that.  However, most of the time, they get along great.

We got a new tent and Bella is the tent set-up champion.  She and I got this set up, thanks to her, in record time.  She's excited to use it with her friends next week.

Final funny experience today.  We were waiting for Benjamin to finish drumline practice and so we spent a few minutes at a nearby playground.  Christian ran over to the swings followed closely by Peter.  When Christian began to swing, Peter immediately began to cry that Christian took the swing he wanted!!  He tried to pull him off and begged him to let him swing on that one. 

 Christian and I just looked at each other and laughed.  We couldn't believe he was being serious.  Look at this row of swings! 

 We were finally able to convince him to try another swing and he immediately concluded that, much to his relief, it was just as good as that other.  Only a two year old!

Up North

 How wonderful it was to spend time in Fife Lake again.  This time was different and even better because Jill and Z and their kids got to join us for a couple days.  I didn't get to be there for all of it because I was at home with Benjamin and Peter while Benjamin attended drum line camp in preparation for the upcoming marching band season.  Once that was over, we joined the rest of them and had a wonderful 36 hours until they drove on home to Utah and we stayed through the 4th of July holiday.  They claim its the "best fourth in the north" and while that's debatable, it was a lot of fun to celebrate the 4th in small town America.

The favorite time was while the family was still there, though.  Games inside, beach time, and out door made up games like "splits" (throw a sharp stick at people's feet and make them do the splits to touch it) made the time race by.

While we were there, we also celebrated Benjamin's 16th birthday.  Breakfast donuts, his favorite cereal, and lots of embarrassing singing were his only presents up there.  He got the rest at home.

  Then he got to spend his birthday afternoon driving himself and Bella to scout camp.  My favorite picture his scoutmaster has sent:

He seems to be having a lot of fun.

After the family and the scouts left, it was just us two boring parents with Peter and Christian.  That meant that Christian and Kelly spent most of the days motorcycling and I spent them playing at the library/playground/beach with Peter.  But let's not forget that we still had the 4th to celebrate!

Christian practiced the art of starting a fire and after many, many tries, figured out the secrets.

No 4th of July in Michigan is complete without and antique car show and an Elvis impersonator.  This guy was amazing.  An hour before Bella had to leave for camp, I bribed her with fries and ice cream if she'd take a picture with him.  This is how much my social anxiety, introverted child loves fries and ice cream.

He changed outfits, talked with people, sang, took pictures, and gave away scarves for 2 hours in the hot sun.  It was awesome.

Peter insisted she share her ice cream with him.  "You didn't have to take a picture with Elvis!" she protested, but she's a sweet sister and let him.

There were picnics, museum open houses, fire station open houses, marching band and other concerts, fireworks shows, and of course, the candy throwing parade.  Peter loved all of it.   We all did.

We even did a few fireworks of our own.

So, the question is simply, when do we go back?