just summer time hanging out

manning was just wandering around the house talking on his "phone." 

the kids worked as a group to make this mickey mouse world. i was pretty impressed with their  blue mickey mouse ears.

long distance friends

the kids (and i) were super surprised (and delighted) when our friends came to visit for dinner tonight - all of the way from florida! i knew that they were coming but chose not to tell the kids. they are just in town for the weekend and came to our house straight from the airport.

madelyn and ella

while amanda and i were visiting/catching-up, mason built his army! he set them up so that they could race cars into them to knock them down. his focus and patience always amaze me.

manning refused to be in the group picture - again.

he also finished one of his birthday lego sets.

i actually remembered to get a picture of me with amanda! loved getting to see this super special lady in person. we can't wait to visit them in florida when we head down that way. love.

bathing beauties

another tooth bites the dust

sweet frog photo shoot

i snapped a quick picture of matt and i when we stopped by sweet frog on our way home from church today. we were using our 20% off coupon from vbs to "reconnect" (that is what it said on the coupon). the boys wanted to get in on the picture love too - but only with mommy. love.

community market day

let's take a long walk to a pop-up market. on the hottest day of the whole summer. not our best idea with super tired, post-vbs kids but it wasn't anything that a giant otter pop couldn't fix on the way home. 

madelyn perked right up when she realized there was shopping. and was over the moon when she found a shop that made aquarium necklaces like the one our kids director wore as a mermaid during vbs. she has a live "moss ball" that she selected for her necklace. i guess they keep them as "pets" in japan and it will grow very slowly over several years.

the king-sized otter pops from a food truck did the trick of turning those frowns up-side-down.

we even saw the blimp on our walk home. a very hot, but very relaxing, way to spend a free day. love.

vbs final night

we made it! the craziest week flew by and i can't believe all of the months of preparation are over. completely worth it when you see the smiles leaving every single night. God has done some wonderful things this week.

there were lots of fun picture moments in the lobby so the kids and i checked them out before everything is put away tonight. (yes, we have to tear it all down tonight so that everything is back to 'normal' for church on sunday.) since tonight would be another very late night, i stopped by starbucks to get myself a treat. and guess what? the person in the car in front of me paid for my coffee! that gesture pepped me up more for tonight than the coffee! kindness never grows old, even as it grows more rare.

i love how maddux fogs up the lens with his breathing!

manning wanted to take some pictures with me in them. it's too bad that he can't hold still!

manning can not stop singing the music.

we finished strong. matt came to help with tear-down. he was actually coming to take the kids home and put them into bed but there was so much work that he just stayed to help. we tore it all down and salvaged as much as possible to hand-down to one of our smaller campuses to use next year. it is going to take me a long time to break it all down and put supplies away but i don't have to do it tonight. i just have to get it done my september when we need the classroom i am storing it in for now.

i love that the church is willing to invest in future generations. and now for a nap. love.

lots to get into

our kids can always find lots of fun things to get into while mommy is busy setting up for vbs. love.

pool refresh

the kids are tired and crazy (read: fighting and crying) so we took a relaxing day at the pool. and we were even the only ones! we needed some fresh air to get us over the mid-week hump.

and back to the church we go! tonight we didn't have as much to prepare so we spent some time at the photo booth before dinner.

the kids were all super excited for the "sweet frogs" to visit with us tonight. and i was happy to get a 20% off coupon for us to use sometime.

vbs is running so smoothly. two more nights to go! love.

pumped and ready to go for day 2

manning about sums it up.

i have to be at church so early to set-up that i had to take the two sickies with me. they were feeling better but i didn't want to put them in with the other kids. matt is coming to pick up mason and take him home, but madelyn wants to stay with me. since she stayed, we got a sweet picture of us worshiping together.

another fun evening of vbs! love.

the longest/best day ever

it is "go" day - vbs starts tonight! the kids and i arrived at the church loaded up with food, movies, supplies and a change of clothes for vbs. the kids were amazing! i set them up with movies and food in one of the rooms and they let me make it happen.

notice the sea turtles in the ceiling? the netting i ordered did not have the visual impact intended.

volunteers came and went throughout the day to get their individual classrooms set up (there are 9 rooms under my age group - "preschool"). the kids and i had a little lull to get changed and ready in our vbs gear before dinner (the church feeds the volunteers every night which is a HUGE help and they also provided us a light lunch today).

vbs ready!

we had prepped for 400 kids (we had 350 on average last year) - we had 405 kids! there was a little panic during snacks and crafts and some behind the scenes registration issues to start the night, but overall, the evening went very smoothly.

mason and maddux during opening worship.

all of the "coaches" were asked to wear silly sealife hats. i got off easy compared with some of the other options (like a tie-dyed giant squid!).

madelyn working on a rainbow in her group.

to say that i was exhausted when we got home would be an understatement. we were at church for 14 hours today and i put in 18,000 steps inside the building! crazy, right?!

once we got the kids settled, the vbs shirts into the washing machine for tomorrow and i finally got a shower, i collapsed into a deep sleep.

and then madelyn came in to wake me up. i could not make myself wake up. she had to come back again. why? because she had thrown up! ahhh! so tired. i was finally able to drag myself from bed and limp (my feet were crazy sore) to madelyn's room to take care of the mess and get her back into bed. poor kid.

asleep.

but then mason came in! he had thrown up! noooooooo! on my pitiful sleepwalk to take care of mason's mess and get him set up with a 'bed' on the floor of my bathroom.

please, God. let this be the end of the sickness. this is not the week. good night. love.

final vbs home prep - sea turtles

this year, i tried to pick decorations that the kids could easily help me prepare. today we worked on making sea turtles as our final prep at home before our long day at church tomorrow before the first night of vbs. love.

saturday funday

i have a million and one things to do before vbs starts on monday but these two boys were signed up for a "beach party" at the library this morning. they were pretty excited to be the only ones in the age group for the party from our family. and all of the kids LOVE these library parties.

after listening to some books about the beach and a flannel board story about a seagull, the boys jumped into the crafts. but there weren't terribly age appropriate (the cutting was way too detailed for 3-6 year olds).

i cut the legs and claws, but he did really well with the rest.

the boys, very generously, offered to let me use their sea critters for vbs decorations. they also made some paper tube octopuses and paper plane-like seagull. we took the toilet paper tube lobster supplies home. mommy didn't have enough time for the cutting.

the boys were given little stuffed animal crabs and fruit snacks to take home. and then we were off to pick-up the rest of our crew for another free kids' event today - a visit with bob and larry.

they had fun with a scavenger hunt around the store before enjoying lots of snacks and drinks. manning and madelyn were the only ones brave enough to take a picture with them.

of course, tattoos were a different story...

mason and i dropped off the rest of the family and then went to a birthday party for one of his kindergarten classmates. all of the kids were given a cute little sundae bowl to take home (after enjoying an impressive sundae spread).

her mom was kind enough to send a sundae bowl home for each of our kids! and they were very, very excited at the possibility of ice cream. now when to use them... love.