The Last Few Weeks of Summer…

School officially started for us yesterday. I suppose that technically means we have to hole up in the house and forget to have fun, but we’re still milking the last days of summer as much as we can. (We may have celebrated our first completed day by heading to the pool.)

Over the last few weeks we’ve spent time camping and doing some fun things together as a family – in short, life. If you follow my Instagram or Facebook feed you may have seen some of this, but here’s a quick peek at what we’ve been up to.

We wrapped up our summer swim league with a long day of swimming at the final championship meet. The kids all did AMAZING! Zachary broke one of the league records and two of the kids placed first in their events. It was a great end to the season and the kids were so excited to share in the fun with their team. You can see a video clip of Zachary in his backstroke event here.

We’ve watched a ginormous spider build a web right outside my bathroom window and even saw her enjoy a tasty meal (if you are brave, you can see a little video snippet of that here).

Each morning the kids come snuggle in bed with me, sometimes chatting, sometimes reading. It makes my heart so happy to see this (and makes me not want to get out of bed!).

In just a few short weeks we are headed to Universal in Orlando for the Family Forward conference. The kids are literally counting down the days until we leave. They have been busy saving their money and working hard to earn spending money for the trip. It’s actually been a great lesson in what is worthwhile to spend your money on, especially when you see how much a sibling saves when not making seemingly small purchases like a candy bar here or a soda there (life in action!).

The monarch caterpillars are out in full force and we have several that have already gone into the chrysalis stage. It doesn’t matter how many times I see it, there is something absolutely amazing and breathtaking watching the transformation from caterpillar to butterfly. It never gets old.

Last week we took the kids to the top of a nearby mountain, laid out in the field, and watched the meteor shower together. SO much fun. Until one child had to repeatedly use the bathroom. Then not as fun. But watching it all was unbelievably awe-inspiring. (The above is my proof to the kids that a picture from my iPhone was not going to work.)

Camping – ah, how we have missed it! We’ve had the chance to take two trips recently, Rick has been teaching the kids new fire-building techniques, and we’ve just had fun relaxing with friends.

While camping, the creatures abound. The kids caught crawdads and boiled them for a little pre-dinner snack (I’d rather have lobster, thank you very much).

At the pond/lake – little tree frogs everywhere. McKenna had one that wanted to stay with her. We also found tons of tadpoles and froglets (I may have wanted to bring some home with us), but Kaleb found many in different stages of tail development and that was so neat to see.

And last week I spent some time sorting construction paper by color (because it’s easier to grab what you need that way). The paper was a great deal and on sale, but hindsight – I am willing to pay a little extra so that I don’t have to spend 20 minutes sorting a small pack of paper by color. Dear Crayola – please consider sorting your paper by color otherwise. Thank you very much. It’s not too much to ask, is it?

Well, that’s our last few weeks in a nutshell – what have YOU been up to?