Mini-Vacation to Craig, Loose Tooth, Emmie Lately

We took our first trip of the summer last week. Justin had to teach some training out in Craig, CO, which is about 45 minutes west of Steamboat Springs. He had to train for three days, so we decided to make a family trip out of it. We headed up to Steamboat on Sunday, June 7, and enjoyed some sightseeing that afternoon and evening. On Monday, we drove out to Craig and stayed there for the next two days. 

Here are some memorable moments from our trip:

1. Hiking up to Fish Creek Falls and seeing the roaring river

2. Bike riding on the Steamboat trail

3. Listening to story time at the Steamboat library and seeing the stained glass windows in the children's area

4. Visiting the Museum of Northwestern Colorado in Craig (and hearing the bells and sirens on the old fire engine)

5. Seeing the wood carvings in the Craig City Park

6. Taking a bike ride to the Botanic Gardens in Steamboat

7. Having a nice, quiet Emmie in the car... and then finding out what she had been up to (drawing all over herself with pen)

8. Swimming in the hotel pools

9. Getting pulled over for speeding on the way from Steamboat to Craig... and not getting a ticket :)

We had a fun getaway and got to enjoy some vacation on the clock for Justin. That's always a bonus!

Eli is getting ready to lose his first tooth. His permanent tooth is coming right in behind it.

I wanted to remember these cute things that Emmie is doing lately:

She goes around singing "Happy bufday oo you, happy bufday oo you... monkee" (imitating her brothers who go around singing, "Happy birthday to you, you're 102, you look like a monkey, and you smell like one too). I have a cute video of her singing it in the bath while she stacks her little cups.

Emmie does a funny thing when she is done eating. When the boys were this age, they both would throw their food on the floor when they were done eating to let me know they were finished. Emmie is much more civilized about it. She politely "returns" the food she is not going to eat by handing it to me or setting it on the table. I much prefer that to picking the food up off the floor.

The Start of Summer, Rockies Game, Moments in Pictures

Eli's last day of school was May 28th. I can't believe this guy is already done with kindergarten! He is growing up way too fast. 

We've been on summer break for a couple weeks now. So far we've joined library summer reading programs, been to park playdates, gone on long bike rides, and taken a mini vacation. Right after Eli got out of school, we started a new behavior chart system. The boys have lots of fun plans for the summer (many of which involve expense), and I wanted to give them a way to earn some of those privileges themselves. I got this idea from a friend, and let me just say, it has worked wonders for behavior, especially Eli's. 

To briefly describe it, the boys have six different colored cards in each of their folders-- blue, green, yellow, orange, red, and black. They start out each morning with a blue card, which is the best card. If they have negative behavior, such as fighting, arguing, etc., the blue card in front (or green, or whatever the color may be) goes to the back and they've "lost" a card. If they have a positive behavior, the card in the back comes to the front (as long as it's not the black) and they "gain" a card. However many cards they have in front of the black card at the end of the day determines how many stars they get (5 being the most). Sometimes we give out an extra star or two for extra good behavior. The stars are paper cutouts I got from the dollar store and the boys each have a ziplock bag that holds their stars. They can redeem their stars for rewards once they hit 25 stars, 50 stars, or 75 stars. They can earn rewards such as dates with mom or dad to places like McDonald's, Jump City, the Apex (swimming), miniature golf, Water World, etc. Eli is very focused on earning stars so he can go to fun places. 

On Tuesday (June 2), Justin and Eli went to a Rockies baseball game. It was a special date for just the two of them. I dropped Eli off at Justin's work around 5 and they headed over to the game together. They had nosebleed seats, but were planning to spend a lot of time in the little covered playground area closer to the field so Eli could play and Justin could watch the game. As they were walking around before the game started, a man approached them and started chatting them up. After a minute or two, he said he was with Stub Hub (a ticket vendor) and wanted to pick the two of them for their seat upgrade of the night. So Justin and Eli got moved to club level seats, got bags of Rockies gear, and were featured on the Jumbotron! 

One day we rode down to Westbrook Park (where Benjy's birthday party was) and enjoyed some lovely scenery and a picnic at the playground.

The kids have been playing out in the backyard quite a bit.  

On Friday (June 5), there was a microburst in our area. It started pouring, followed by almost marble-sized hail and fierce winds. It was blowing so hard that I took the kids down into the basement. Later that afternoon, we saw that a trampoline had been blown out of the backyard of the corner house onto the street. It's so fortunate that no people or cars had been on the street right at that time.

I snapped this photo after bathtime when Emmie insisted on combing her own hair.

I asked Eli to stack the dishes from the dishwasher so I could put them away. These are the "stacked" dishes I ended up with. I realized I should have given him a little more explanation!

Emmie with Grandpa Herb.

My friend started a program called Home Slice that donates birthday cakes to a children's shelter in Denver. I made this cake for their May birthday party.

Benjy loves to take his Lego people apart and build them with mismatched bodies. The combinations are often very funny! I thought the Venom head on the Batman body was particularly unexpected and a little creepy.

Memorial Day, Eli's Field Day

The month of May has been solid rain. It has not rained this much in a long, long time. It has been great for our lawn! Here it is looking lush and green. I will post a picture in August for comparison-- it will probably not be quite so verdant.

The kids looked so precious before church on Sunday that I had to take some pictures.

I couldn't pick a favorite. Each was full of character.

On Memorial Day, we decided to break our four-years long tradition of going to the cemetery with my grandparents and take the kids instead to the zoo. It was the first sunny day we've had in awhile, and since Justin had the day off, we made the most of our family time. I did miss going to the cemetery, but I'm sure we will make it out again next year.

Emmeline got so excited about the carousel. She's been on it once before, and when she saw it, she immediately started pointing and saying excitedly, "kitty ride." During what must have felt like interminable waiting for her as we bought our tickets and waited in line, she kept walking up to the gate and in a distressed voice pleading, "Turn." Our turn came, and our sweet little cat girl even got to ride the kitty.

On a side note, Emmie's vocabulary has increased exponentially over the last month or so. She now says lots of 2+ word phrases. "Mommy shirt," "Where Daddy/Kitty/blankie/Lucy go?" "Apple dirty" (she dropped an apple outside the other day) are just some of the things that pop into my mind that I've heard her say.

Later that afternoon, we had a barbecue with my family. My mom made these beautiful jello parfaits that I had to snap a picture of. 

Later that night as we were getting the kids ready for bed, we had an awful scare. I was in the kitchen and Justin was in our bedroom when I heard a loud clap and Eli started screaming. I ran into his room and he was standing on his bed with blood in his mouth. He had trouble explaining right away what had happened, except that he had put something in his mouth that had exploded. He thought at first it had been a glow stick. After he had rinsed his mouth out, I saw that he had a superficial burned/blistered area on the end of his tongue and on the inside of his cheek. 

We called my dad right away to get his advice on whether we should take Eli in. The bleeding had quickly stopped and it didn't look like there would be any need for sutures, so my dad thought it would be alright to just keep an eye on it. We had Eli show us what he had put in his mouth, and it was the string from one of the confetti crackers my sister had given Benjy for his birthday. The string had come loose with the little exploding part still attached. We had a good long talk about it and what Eli should/shouldn't have done in that situation. We also made sure that the confetti crackers were placed under maximum security after that. We're just grateful that the damage wasn't worse. 

 

Tuesday was Eli's field day at school. The kids and I went to cheer him on. He and his classmates did a great job! There were about six or seven different "events" they participated in. Here is Eli with his teammates:

The javelin throw was the last event his class participated in. On his first throw, Eli set the record for farthest throw among his classmates. I caught his second throw on video, where he blew his previous record away. It was so fun to watch! He was a great sport and his whole class did a great job.