summer and six

When you're six, summer pretty much tops the list of coolness. Summer means ice cream every day, playing in the pool for hours on end, staying up late and going to the beach. Living in your bathing suit, popsicles and fireflies, sun tans and no homework. Slip-n-slides, fishing, sleeping in past 9 a.m. and taking road trips.

Today, Dylan was the sole boy at a birthday party for his good friend Abigail. There were 25 girls, and Dylan. Hysterical. The older brother, also a great friend of D's, came later with some of his friends. When it was only girls and Dylan at the party, the line for the waterslide was so organized and everyone used their manners and followed the rules (basically, no crushing each other.) The second all the boys arrived, it switched to utter chaos with multiple kids flying down the slide simultaneously at warp speed, climbing over each other to get to the top again.

Because, when you're a six year boy and its summertime, nothing comes between you and getting to the top of that water slide as many times as humanly possible.

hot fun in the summertime

The weather has been perfectly wonderful these first three days of summer vacation, and we have the tans to prove it. We hung out at our lovely community pool Monday and Tuesday for hours on end. But today we headed to a neaby waterpark run by our Parks and Recs, just for something different. We met some friends and let the kids frolic under the fountains and the gigantic bucket dumping hundreds of gallons of water every five minutes. Summer, you rock!

what happens after three hours at the pool

No Rain

What did we ever do without Facebook? I guess I joined about a year ago and since then I've reunited with so many old friends - friends from all parts and stages of my life, past jobs, and everyone in between. Its been a fantastic way to find high school friends for planning our reunion next month, I've been able to reconnect with friends and see photos of their families and find out how their lives are. I'm not really one for doing all those ridiculous quizzes though. I don't think anyone really cares What My Care Bear Name would be, or What is My Dog's Favorite Ice Cream Flavor? Today my friend Brian from high school/college posted this photo and I'm still laughing out loud.

My great friend Liza and I decided to dress up as the Bee Girl from the Blind Melon video for "No Rain". We got up early Halloween morning, drove to the fabric and craft store, bought all our supplies and worked on these costumes all day. We were heading to some party, I don't even remember where. All I remember is once we arrived, everyone formed a circle around us and made us do the Bee Girl dance.

summer!

We greeted the kids at the bus stop this afternoon with a silly string, cookies and popsicle extravaganza. Helloooooo Summer!

Hello, my big first grader!

goodbye kindergarten

Having kids makes you so sentimental. This morning was the last time Dylan will ever catch the bus to afternoon kindergarten. He's been the only boy at the bus stop, with five girls, all year. Its been so nice having our mornings of leisure, meandering out to the bus stop at 11:20 each day. Next year will be a whole new world of scrambling to make it by 7:20 a.m. Thank goodness we have the next 11 weeks off of school to get used to that concept.

It's been a year of watching him make new friends and become even closer to old friends, develop his writing and reading skills, interact with teachers, and have even more reasons than before to feel so proud of him. I never once worried he wouldn't do well in school this year. Its just been amazing watching him transform more and more into his own person.

In just over an hour and a half, he'll step off the bus for the last time this school year and I hope to get that on camera, too. I have a box of popsicles ready to help all the kids celebrate, and then I promised Dylan I'd take him somewhere this afternoon to pick out a new Webkins as a reward for having an awesome first year of school.

Well done, buddy.

end of kindergarten party

Today was Dylan's end of year party at school, and as room mom, my last official school duty for this year. Of course a giant thunderstorm blew in as the party was starting, thus cancelling the outdoor activities. So instead, the kids made visors, wrote about what they want to learn in First Grade (Dylan wants to learn to read) and what they want to be when they grow up (Dylan wants to be an office worker), and then watched Toy Story 2 and had snacks. Logan came along and hung out with the big kids, too. Part of me thinks he is so ready for big boy school, and the other part of me fears for his teacher!

Circle time.

Olivia, Dylan, Logan and Abigail. This comprises half of the beautiful girls Dylan gets to go to the bus stop with every day.

Dylan and Caden, one of his best buds at school. Caden is moving to Pennsylvania this summer and we're going to miss him and his family a lot!

Snacks!

One more day of kindergarten tomorrow and its officially SUMMER!

Happy Birthday Andrew

Happy Birthday to our Mr. Fix-It, fisherman, birthday cake decorator, music guru, monk robe wearing, gardening, super duper chef and trivia master! We love you!

typhoid Dylan

As if end of school year nuttiness isn't enough in and of itself, its been germ central at our house since this weekend. Friday night, Dylan fast and furiously came down with a 103 fever and cough. Took him in Saturday thinking he had the flu, but learned he had a viral respiratory infection instead. Got oral meds and we're doing neb treatments and he's still coughing but getting better slowly. As a result, he missed his soccer tournament on Saturday and one of his best friends' birthday parties. Total bummer.

This morning he woke up with a crusty puffy eye. The dreaded pink eye. Taking him to the pediatrician again shortly for medication, and keeping him home today. Its a rainy day, and if I can keep the boys from performing WWF Smackdown on each other all day, maybe Dylan can get some much needed rest and I can catch up on some work!

Update on Friday June 19th
Lets add to the list a little trip to the ER last night for a raging ear infection. Poor guy! They also gave him more breathing treatments for the cough, and we're goign to try another round of steroids and two antibiotics to knock this virus out. Thank goodness he isn't contagious, at least.

mamma mia

Just barely keeping my head above water these past couple of weeks. If I wrote down my to-do list, it would look something like this:

1. Clean this disgusting house. This is always the first thing to fall to the bottom of my list when my list gets too long. I have succumbed to 'fake cleaning' my house. Run the vacuum twice a week, wipe down toilets and sinks with Clorox wipes, sweep up dog hair from floor. Have kids pick up toys. That's about as good as it gets.

2. End of year party for Dylan's class. Buy all food for party on Thursday and bring it to school. End of year gifts for Dylan and Logan's teachers. His last day of school is Friday.

3. Andrew's birthday is Thursday and I'm getting a surprise gift for him (shhhhhhh). Go buy surprise gift today.

4. Make Father's Day cards for all Grandpa's and get them in the mail today.

5. Wrap Josh and Maya's 3rd birthday gifts.

6. Write some scripts and emails for work, and make some work calls.

7. Continue potty training Logan (still not getting it, but we're trying a sticker chart now too. He's hit or miss, no pun intended).

8. Finish collecting all photos for high school reunion this week, save them to thumb drive and mail to person coordinating slideshow for reunion next month.

Two things will be going off my list soon - the reunion will be over next month. We've been planning it for 15 months, and having calls every month to coordinate details. I'm also turning over my MOMS Club activities position to another club member. I've been coordinating our activities calendar and doing weekly RSVP emails for the club for over a year. That position will end at the end of this month.

Coming soon - birthday wishes to Andrew on Thursday, photos from our days at the pool, photos from Dylan's end of the year school party, photos from Josh and Maya's 3rd birthday party this coming Saturday.

and this is where I flash the middle finger

You just gotta love insurance companies.

M: "Hi, yes, I'm calling to see if our insurance covers a specific procedure (description follows)?"

Reply: "We aren't allowed to disclose that information. All I can do is direct you to our website, where you can look up our clinical policy bulletin. I'm not allowed to interpret that for you, you'll have to do that on your own."

M: ***** speechless ******** "So, let me make sure I understand. You're telling me you can't tell me I'm covered or I'm not covered for such and such procedure. I have to read words on your website and intrepret them myself. So basically what this means is you have a gigantic loophole meaning you basically won't have to cover anything if I intrepret it the wrong way?"

Reply: ****** silence ********* "Yes, you're going to have to go to our website ma'am."

You've got to be f-ing kidding me, right.

M: "What if I don't have internet access?"

Reply: "Do you have a public library near you?"

M: "What if this was 30 years ago, and there was no internet? Would I then be able to have an actual person answer my actual question, which by the way, seems pretty darn black and white to me?"

Reply: ******** silence ********* "Ma'am is there anything else I can help you with?"

M: "Considering I didn't really get much help in the first place, I'd say this call is over."

sounds of summer

Last night we spent the evening the way a good summer evening should be spent - good friends, great music, in the gorgeous outdoors enjoying awesome food, tasty wine and a rockin' band.

We love taking advantage of all the local summer concert series at various venues around town. There just isn't anything better than listening to some good tunes, letting the kids run with their friends, and relaxing under the stars. Last night, we checked out the first summer concert of the season at Tarara Vineyard, in Leesburg. They have a beautiful setup right on the Potomac River, and the acoustics are fantastic. And we got to enjoy the sounds of U2 for only $15 a ticket verses $100 or more.

We enjoyed a bountiful selection of processed meats and cheeses:

U2 songs old and new. So many great songs over what...30 years or more now?

We went with our friends John and Paige, along with six other familes:

Logan thought about it, then remembered he doesn't know how to swim. He did end up with "The Edge's" guitar pick by the end of the night, so not all was lost:

Rock on "Bono"!

canine anatomy

D: "Mom, how do we know Bella (our dog) is a girl?"

M: (slight pause). "Well, because she has a vagina."

D: (silent) "Oh. Well, where is it?"

M: "Ummm, between her legs." (please don't ask me to show it to you)

D: "Which legs? Front or back?"

M: "Back." (can we move onto the next subject?)

M: "Boy dogs have penises." (what a brilliant conversation segue!)

D: "Really? Like mine?"

M: "Ummm, well, kind of. But kind of different too. Hey, look, its time to go to the bus!"

(Above photo, Dylan at 19 months, with Bella.)

saying the quiet thing out loud

One morning this past weekend over breakfast, Dylan mumbled something under his breath. Andrew and I looked at each other, eyebrows raised, and asked him to repeat himself. "What was that, Dylan?"

"Oh Dear God Dammit!"

So hard to keep a straight face. I'll admit, I'll utter 'Dear God' several times somedays in exasperation, perhaps after Logan has emptied the drawer of crayons for the fifteenth time of the day, or like yesterday, when he went downstairs to the playroom, dumped all of our board games on the floor and mixed up all of the pieces scattering them from wall to wall. 45 minutes it took me to get it all put away again.

But dammit, I only reserve to be a quiet thing I say in my head. However, I'm wondering if lately I've said the quiet thing in my head out loud a time or two and didn't even realize it.

9 hours

That is how long we spent at the pool this past weekend.

Dylan and I, at least. Logan and Andrew spent a portion of that there with us, and then came home to nap and work respectively.

Nine hours. Yesterday we were there 5.5 hours. I don't think I've spent that much time at the pool since I was a teenager and I basically lived at the pool from dawn to dusk in my skinny-mini bikini eating bags of Funyuns, drinking Orange Crush, and listening for the Good Humor man.

Being at the pool with Dylan alone is a dream now. He's already passed his swim test this year and now that he's been in school all year, he knows half the kids at our pool. He's off in the deep end busy jumping and going down the slide, and playing tag. And I'm free to lounge in a chair, socialize with friends or just stare off into space. He literally did not get out of the pool, other than during break, for 5.5 hours. He about dropped dead when we got home. I watch the older boys at the pool, who've walked and come without their parents, and imagine someday that will be Dylan...making towel forts with lawn chairs and snickering at all the girls coyfully ignoring him and his friends.

Its even slightly easier having Logan at the pool this year. Although he can't swim yet, he is totally entertained by the giant sack-o-toys I cart along and will play in the shallow beach entrance part of the pool. He still needs a lot of guidance about sharing but he's better than we was last summer. Taking them both by myself, as I will many times this summer, I'm still a few years away from bringing my book and chilling out. But we'll get there.

We're totally a pool family. I love taking a picnic and eating lunch there. Doritos on the grass in the picnic area? No problem, some birds will be along soon. Mustard on the face? Go wash it off in the pool fountain. The pool is an instant playdate, a mommy social hour and place for them to burn off their energy, all rolled into one, and no one has to have their house trashed.

We belong to the three pools in our community and we'll rotate and make our way around throughout the summer. Two of the pools have real deep ends with diving boards. How I'm going to keep Logan off of them, I'm not yet sure.