The end of Summer and the Beginning of School

You know... as much as my kids argued this Summer and fought and left my house in a perpetual state of chaos and disaster, I still wish Summer NEVER had to end.  I just love the freedom of our long, lazy Summer days.  No homework, no extra-curriculars to rush to, no early mornings fighting to get them up, dressed and ready to go.  Summer might be so LOUD and messy, but it's a reprieve from the stress of school life.  So yes- I'm very sad that it's over.  While I can appreciate that my house is a little quieter and I have a few more hours in my day to get things done, I don't love the busy-ness that the school year brings.  I don't like living in my car half the year while being a chauffeur to and from a zillion activities.  I don't like the homework fights, the getting-up-for-school-tears and the utter EXHAUSTION felt every. single. day.  Nope. I don't like that stuff at all.  I guess to appreciate Summer as much as I do, I must battle through the school year, though right?  It's all part of the plan.....

So anyway. Our last 3 weeks of Summer were spent watching a little more TV than the previous 2 months, just as many hours at the pool, some playdates and sleepovers, just as much sleeping in and a few activities here and there. Cheer started, dance started, Shawn had to travel 3 weeks in a row (one of the weeks he was gone I walked into my house and saw water dripping from my family room ceiling! UGH. That was a disaster! A/C probs while your husband is gone and it's 112 degrees outside is too much for me to handle!) but when he had a full Monday at home we took advantage and visited the water park we have here in Tulsa. 

"This is our 4th Summer here and we FINALLY made it to Safari Joe’s. I’ve never taken the kids there ‘cause bringing a baby to a water park just stinks. But Sully is now old enough to do some slides and watching him get pummeled by the waves in the wave pool over and over again (he LOVED it) made me *and him* laugh so hard!😂 Also, I’ve never been to a water park that had Emu’s welcome you in, and reptiles to hold on your way out😆🤣😆 But the kids loved it. (Except Lucy with the 🐍. Nope. She was terrified.) Anyway- I’m glad we got to squeeze in one more fun event before school starts! "

Look how cute he is, showing his muscles!! I could eat him up!

A few days later we had meet the Teacher. These were my sentiments: "Oh, my heart!💗 This is going to be a GREAT year. I feel it🤞🏼Lucy’s new teacher asked her for a big hug right away and made her feel like a million bucks when she got down to her level and asked her a bunch of questions about herself and paid her a few compliments as well😉 AND- her BFF, Camden, is in the same class- thank goodness!👯‍♀️Piper’s teacher (and whole class) is the same from last year so it felt like walking into a big family reunion when we got to her new classroom. Her sweet friends are all there with her and her teacher (who is just THE BEST) welcomed her back with open arms. I am excited for the year ahead! 3 more days!"#meettheteacher#hugsallaround #lastyearatcentral @ Central Elementary School

This is Mrs. Kinnamon. She is SOOOOO super duper nice!

Some of the gang from last year in Piper's class! It was so fun to be back with them and see how much they've all grown this Summer!

This is Mrs. Sumler.  She makes my heart happy because she loves my baby girl and Piper just adores her. I never, EVER worry about Piper at school because of this woman. There is a special place in heaven for people like this. 

As I mentioned, we have been indulging in our last pool days! Even with sunscreen put on every single day, this boy has the most gorgeous skin! Those floatie tan lines though! ;-)

And... a little story worth mentioning....I just think this is so nice! About 2 weeks ago, Sully was playing with another little boys boat here at the pool (I have never met this family). The little boy let him borrow it and Sully wouldn’t put it down for like an hour. The boy had to leave and so when we took the boat away, Sully started crying soooo hard. He didn’t seem to understand why someone was taking “his” boat. I kept telling him the boy had to take his boat home because it belonged to him, and Sully kept saying “but why???” Anyway. They offered to let him borrow it and said I could bring it to their house later when we were done swimming but I said no. It would be ok.

So, like 3 days later they came back to the pool and the little boy ran in holding 2 boats and said “Sully! My mommy and daddy bought you a boat!” They even wrote “Sully’s boat” on the bottom of it. They said they couldn’t find anymore at Walmart (where they bought the original one), but they found the exact same one online somewhere and ordered it for him so that he could have one for himself because they felt so bad that he was sad that he couldn’t keep it.

Isn’t that the nicest thing EVER???

And finally- school began YESTERDAY August 20th, 2019. 

"I need allllll the pictures!📸🙈 I officially have a 1st and 3rd grader! What!? Sad Summer is over, but they were SO excited for today and got off to a great start. Lucy’s teacher brought muffins for everyone and Piper’s teacher is just our favorite so there were no tears this morning❤️. Happy first day of school!" #1stand3rdgrade #BixbySpartans

I bought the girls and I matching heart necklaces.  That way, when they think of me in their hearts at school, they'll know my heart at home is thinking of them too.  I love these babies of mine!

It was too hot for outside recess yesterday🥵 (it’s scorching here right now🔥) so Icees at pick-up was the least I could do for these cuties. They said they had the BEST first days EVER!! I loved hearing them dish allllllll about it!💗💗

 And, as tradition goes... here are the comparisons of me vs. the girls in our respective grades (1993 and 1995).  They are MUCH cuter than I was, hahaha!

After school "screen time" with their new glasses that block out UV rays from screens! Don't they just look adorable?!

And FINALLY.  God was shining down on us last night.  Look at this GORGEOUS sky that was happening right outside my front door.  It was almost sunset and it just looked spectacular!  There was lightning sparking up the cloud inside (not pictured) and I was in awe.  Oklahoma, your skies never cease to amaze me. A perfect end to a perfect day. 

 Today was the 2nd day of school, and just because I'm a nervous Mama, I wanted to walk them to their classes one last time.  Lucy wouldn't let me take a picture of her today.... Grrrr. But Piper did :)

This is Sadie.  She is Sully's age, so next year they will be starting school together.  She's at almost every event I am at with her Mom AND they live around the corner from us so we see them often.  Sully and Sadie are SO adorable but they NEVER will let me take pictures of them together! Today Piper kinda shoved them together so I could snap one and even though Sully isn't flashing me his famous smile, I still think this one is pretty cute.  These are the cutest little siblings EVER!

And now I'll leave you with a few more last-days-of-Summer pictures. 

*For the record- Piper is 49 pounds and 47 inches tall.  Lucy is 46 pounds and 47.5 inches tall. And Sully is 39 pounds and 39 inches!* He was so bummed that he couldn't be in school with his sisters.  He keeps asking "but why?" when I tell him he can't stay.  This is good though! It's getting him prepared for next year when he starts school 5 days a week as a Pre-K'er! This is my LAST year home with him full-time.  It's definitely bitter-sweet!

Idahome

Oh man. How do I even blog about the 2 most perfect weeks of Summer? We squeezed in SO much in a short time. Sometimes it’s hard to summarize everything fun that you did unless you take it day by day so I think that’s what I’m gonna have to do here.

We overpacked like crazy (I’m so annoyed with myself) and had an early morning flight out of Tulsa on July 18th. We landed in Boise on Thursday afternoon and the first thing we did was go out to my parents yard (the river) and let the kids swim and play after a long day of travel. It’s the only day I took my phone out on the water, so even though we did that more than once I only have 1 set of pictures there. Also that day was the first time I met Colette, AKA "Coco." My heart exploded with love for her. Almost like she was my own baby. I could not put her down; I love her beyond comprehension. She’s literally the sweetest baby in the entire universe. She let me snuggle her forever. Sweet, sweet baby love. I miss her so much already.

Friday Ninny and Baba treated our family to a day floating the Boise river! They rented rafts for us and Baba and Ninny took Piper while Shawn and I took Lucy and Sully down the river. It was so much fun! The icing on the cake was that we floated right behind the BSU stadium while Garth Brooks was doing a sound check for his concert later that night! We heard 3 whole songs while we floated. We were so close to him, without being able to see him. I haven’t floated that river since college so it was fun to get to do it again. And since half of Boise was going to the concert, it wasn’t busy at all! It was such a fun afternoon. Later that night Piper snuck away and pulled her tooth out (I didn't even know it was loose!) and then... S'MORES!

 Saturday I woke up and was scrolling through my social media, seeing that a lot of my Boise friends went to the concert the night before and I was so bummed I wasn't there. I LOVE Garth Brooks sooooo so much and he was singing INSIDE the BSU stadium. That’s my school! I wanted to go to his concert more than anything. So, thinking it wasn't going to amount to anything I posted “I know this is a super, super long shot, but do any of my Boise friends have or know of someone selling Garth tix for tonight’s concert?” Well, Tiff saw my post and asked if any of her friends knew of anything and one of her friends did! She had a friend who didn’t want to go anymore, and she was willing to sell her tickets to us for $40 EACH. DO YOU KNOW HOW CHEAP THAT IS??? She paid $260 for her tickets and practically just gave them away! Shawn was not super into going because he was tired and said he would rather wait until Garth comes back to his “hometown” (Tulsa) to see him again. So Ninny suggested I take Coley. Best idea ever. 

"Last night was one for the books! Coley and I used to be INSEPARABLE ‘til the Summer we got married and she moved out of the apartment we shared. Girls-night-out with her used to be every weekend and we’ve been to a thousand concerts together so going all these years without it all has been tough for us sisters! But last night was one of the best. I can’t tell you how much we both needed it! Seeing Garth on the Blue with her (even though the turf was covered up), being part of his new Dive Bar music video, running into one of my favorite people on earth (@mrs_boom_g how many times have we been to that stadium before 😂😂) and watching Buster and the cheerleaders present Garth with BSU gear made last night THE BEST NIGHT EVER. I wish I could re-live it all a hundred times."🧡⛰💙#Idahome #GarthBrooksStadiumTour #BSUAlum @ Albertsons Stadium

Sunday we packed up and headed for the Oregon Coast. My Dad rented a 12 person van and drove Lucy, Piper, Tiff, KJ, Jack, Liv, Evvy and him and my mom. Shawn rented a little Toyota RAV4 and we drove alone with Sully. Brittany and Jesse and their 2 baby girls drove in their minivan. So we had 16 people caravanning to Bandon, Oregon. We split the drive in half and stopped in Bend on Sunday night. It’s just under 5 hours away. We ate at Roberto’s (YUM- something I refused to not do while visiting either Boise or Bend) and stayed in a hotel for a night. The next day we walked around Bend for a little bit then met up with everyone for lunch at Cibellis. Their pizza is amazing! It was Jesse’s choice and it did not disappoint :) We drove the second leg (another 5 hours) to the coast and the scenery on the way down was absolutely stunning. It made the drive so much more enjoyable. Just gorgeous! The kids splashed in the cold ocean water that night but no one cared about the temps. It was beautiful and we had finally made it!!

The next day we “hired” Brittany and Jess and took some family photos on the beach in the morning. Those 2 are so talented at what they do! They took amazing pictures! I’m so thankful for them! We just played around in the tide pools the rest of the day and kind of just relaxed. It was heavenly!! Seriously. Before bed we played some heated (hilarious) rounds of Catch Phrase and called it a night.

 

 SNEAK PEEK OF OUR FAMILY PICTURES. These are just the cell phone ones.  The REAL ones are really cute :)

Wednesday was Dunes Day. We drove an hour out to the big sand dunes and jump, jumped to our hearts delight. I LOVE the sand dunes. I could stay there for EVER but we had some babies that weren’t too happy so we didn’t last very long. It’s ok though. I’m just glad we got to go! And we got some super cool pics while we were there!

Another thing I want to write about is something really special to Shawn. Bandon has a golf course called Bandon Dunes that is famous. It’s one of the top 20 golf courses in the entire world. It’s very expensive but it’s one that is on his bucket list. Well, it was on my Dad's bucket list too. There is no way Shawn could have afforded to play there, but my Dad said “this is a once in a lifetime opportunity. We HAVE to play there. I will buy you a round of golf.” —> insert jaw drop here <— Shawn was in heaven. Playing at a prestigious course with my dad soars as one of the best days of his life (his words, not mine). They had an 8am Tee Time and were back to the house by 1, which is when we left for the Dunes. 

I think Thursday is when we walked all around town and visited the little gift shops? I could have that day wrong, but either way we did that one day. Tiff, Jack and me all bought matching shirts and later that night Tiff and I wore them together while all the girls did face masks and the guys watched Nacho Libre. Since the house that my parents rented was on the beach we could come and go as we pleased. We did tidepools more than once and we also flew kites one day as well. It was exciting! Ninny had a super heavy duty kite that all my kids got to hold and fly! It was awesome!

My parents took us all out to a delicious dinner later that night. The servings were massive! I wish I would have known that before I ordered my pasta dish  It was SOOO big! Most everyone else had fish n' chips. It was such a delicious place!

Friday was the day we had to drive home. I wish we could have had a few more days there, but the short time we had was incredible. Seriously perfect in every way. I hope to do it again a few more times in my life because it’s just such a magical place. And taking my kids for the first time made it even better. Piper doesn’t care what temperature water is, she can’t stay out of it! Lucy played in the sand most of the time, Sully did water and sand (his dump trucks were a lifesaver!) but Piper was splashing in the waves everyday. And finding things in the tidepools to hold and touch. She’s like me- the beach is our happy place. We all had the time of our lives.

We drove 10 hours that day- straight through. Sully was pretty good, actually. He didn’t have any sisters to bother him so the trip went pretty smooth. My parents had the girls and they apparently were soooo good, but their trip was way longer than ours. Evvy gets car sick and she threw up twice. Lots of stopping to pull over and crying on her end. But I feel so bad for her because she felt awful. My mom said she kept saying sorry to everyone and my heart hurt for her, hearing these things! They took 12 hours to get home and by the time the girls walked in the door at midnight they were done! Brittany and Jesse took about 13-14 hours because Adalae also gets car sick as well and I guess she just projectile vomited over everything! Oregon has lots of windy, twisty roads so it didn’t go well for those 2 girls. Brittany and Jesse said the car seat was just unsavable. It was soaked and they weren't even halfway home. They had to leave it on the side of the road and drive an hour out of the way to a Walmart to buy a new one. I felt so bad for them! We had literally NO drama in our car but everyone else had terrible trips! 

Saturday was spent unpacking and bringing the rental cars back to the airport. Shawn and my dad went to golf galaxy and played around a bit. Me and the kids went back down to the river, or ”Riber” as Sully likes to call it. And then later that night Coley, me, my Mom, Tiff and Brittany all had a girls night. We went to Red Robin and ordered a million appetizers and DEVOURED them all We had soooo much food. It was amazing! We had some good laughs and didn’t want the night to end when the food was eaten, so we made our way to Target just for fun. We tried on shoes, we browsed and we laughed a lot. I am so lucky to have those women in my life. They mean so much to me!

Sunday was giant burrito making day and I DIDN'T TAKE ANY PICTURES!!! We made a video instead that I can't upload, dang it! I have never been able to help make their semi-annual burritos so it was fun for me! And so, so good! Everyone came over and we laughed and played and ate ‘til we were too stuffed to move! But then the kids had a water balloon fight and Piper and Sully held some crawfish :) I held Coco as she fell asleep on me and just started bawling. Crying for the fact that her life is going to be different than what's considered "typical", and also because I love her so much and I can’t handle thinking that I won’t get to see her very often while she grows up. There is something so special about her that I just can’t ignore. We have kindred hearts and we have a bond that is is strong, even though I’ve only just met her for the first time this trip. I feel such a strong, sweet connection with that baby girl.

On Monday's agenda was swimming at Nana Raine's new neighborhood pool and seeing her new house. And then later that night Shawn and I had a date night! We got a hotel room and left the kids with Ninny and Baba. Well, Coley had the girls for a few hours so Sully had the full attention of my parents and loved it🤣

Meanwhile, Shawn and I first went to Ahi Sushi (a favorite place we used to eat at when we lived there) and then we went to the Gazebo where Shawn proposed to me, and he played one of our songs while we danced. It was a super sweet idea, but I’m terrified to be dipped and I’m also really bad at twirling😆. So half of the dance we were cracking up. 😂 We’re terrible dancers. 

Later that night we went swimming/hot tubbing and then sat on our balcony and watched a tiny thunderstorm play out.  After living in Oklahoma, seeing storms in other places are so insignificant! I'm not trying to be mean, but Oklahoma thunderstorms are beyond spectacular. 

   Shawn woke up the next morning and couldn’t move. His back seized up and he almost collapsed from the pain. It had been hurting him all week, but this was the worst it had ever hurt. I wanted to walk all around Boise that day but we couldn’t. Instead, we drove around downtown to see all the new things that have popped up since we left (SOOOO MUCH!!) and ate at one of our other favorites- Blue Sky Bagels. Mmmmm. We did manage to walk around a little on the BSU campus. He couldn’t do much but he was able to make it to the bookstores and out to the field! I LOVE the blue turf. It is my favorite thing! I am so glad I got to see it again before I left. Plus, walking around campus was a fun trip down memory lane for me. He went to a chiropractor later that day and then we packed up to head back to Tulsa.

While we were out exploring Boise, my mom took all 3 of my kids plus Liv and Evvy to Eagle Island State Park to swim. They got snow cones, had a picnic and played HARD. They are so lucky to have a Ninny who was willing to be brave and take all those kids out by herself! Thank goodness Liv is a huge help. **Editing to add that my pictures of my Mom at the park are NOT uploading! I can't get them added :( I have a bunch saved but only 2 will upload!

I'm glad this is one that would upload because this is Sully to a T.  He is OBSESSED with candy.  We have to hide it because he can't control himself when he gets it. Anyway, Ninny snapped this picture and it cracks me up every single time I look at it.

I’m currently on the airplane headed home. I’m writing this blog while flying so that all the details are fresh in my mind. Shawn’s still hurting but he’s feeling so much better. I’m glad he was able to get in to be seen. I know how debilitating back pain is. I’ve been there!!

When we got home, Piper was SO happy to see her baby, Jolie :)

In conclusion, my kids behaved pretty great both weeks. They had their fights, but for the most part I was so thankful that they did so well. We saw a lot of Tiff’s family (Liv is just the best babysitter and has a heart of gold!), a lot of Jesse’s family (and met baby Emma!) and Coley and her sweet babies! It was a trip where I think I spent the most time with those siblings of mine than any other time I've been to Boise. It just filled my heart to the brim. I know everyone thinks this about their family as well, but I have the best family ever. I am so lucky to call them mine. And Boise, you will always have a piece of my heart. I love you.