summertime!

We're doing great and staying very busy!!



Baby girl is already 6 months old!! She's growing up way too fast!



C will be 4 this month!!



J is five and a half and starting kindergarden this month!! She's very excited!!!



We're actually thinking about moving soon. It's all up in the air and not really decided... still in the thinking stages.. but we're excited about a possible move to a different area. :)



We've had a very busy summer!! We decided it would be fun to get the kids a little pool this year. Like a the kind with a pump. Oh my. Biggest headache ever!! A $40 pool has turned into like a $300 project ha!! You need all the chemicals and the brush and the net and the chlorine float and the test strips and the pool cover and the air pump to blow the edge up...and I'm sure I'm leaving some things out. All that is added cost, of course. We haven't even bought a pool ladder yet. We've already filled up the thing twice. All the things that we've had to buy really aren't so bad.. it's maintaining the pool that's a hassle. Cleaning the darn pool out, brushing off the slime (or whatever) that gets on the bottom. Dealing with the cover. Testing the water. Shocking the water. Nagging my husband to test the water and shock the water. We've had the pool about a month and the kids lost interest after about a week and a half! Ha! Last week I told them they were going outside to swim one day whether they wanted to or not. At least baby S loves the pool when conditions are perfect and the water is actually clean enough to get in. She'll float around in her little float for an hour or so and then she'll nap really well! If your baby won't nap just get a pool!! It wears them out. :) The wet towels, bathing suits, pool toys, putting on sunscreen and swim diapers are a bit of a hassle but things I'd live with happily if the darn pool would just take care of itself.



The older kids went to VBS twice this summer. We didn't realize our church was having one so we sent them to VBS at a church that's pretty close to our house. They had a lot of fun with that one. It was "circus" theme. Then our church had VBS for the first time in the 5 years we've been going there. My husband and I volunteered to help out a few nights. The kids had a great time there too! Then a church friend had an in home Bible camp this week for the little kids so we went over there three days this week. I swear.. we've been constantly busy this summer. It's been fun though!! :)



Back in early June my husband and I went on a cruise to the Bahamas for a few days with my husband's company. It was a lot of fun and great to get away!! I wasn't sure I'd be able to stand leaving baby S who wasn't quite 5 months at the time but she did great and it was so nice just to get away and relax for a few days! I had a really hard time leaving, and being away from, J when we went on vacation and left her home when she was about 15 months old. She was our first and our only child at the time. I've found out that baby #3 is a different story. By the time you've had three kids in five years it's not quite the same. Ha! I missed baby S for sure but I definitely didn't worry about her 24/7 like I did when we left J a few years ago.



I will try to post lots of pics soon!! I just lost over 2,000 pictures that I had stored on my phone. I have no idea what happened or how to get them back. :( Thankfully a good bit of those were put on Instagram but still.. I want my pics back! Has that ever happened to you? Were you able to get them back?



It's hard to believe we have just a few more week of summer vacation before J is off to school. :( Sending her off to kindergarden is so bittersweet for me. If the idea that "homeschool is always a possibility" wasn't there I'm not sure I'd be able to stand sending her to school. As it is I'm keeping homeschool open as an option for the future in case public school just doesn't work out or if I end up missing her too much ha!

Hope everyone's having a great summer!!