Father's Day and other goings on

Summertime!  It's warm enough now that the pool feels like a hot springs or a giant hot tub.  Night swimming is divine.  I'm gonna be totally honest here...I never ever wanted a pool, and even asked Cor if filling it in was a possibility when we moved in.  Obviously he told his crazy wife that no, filling it in would not in fact be a good idea. Each year we've been here, summertime has been a little better with the pool, and especially now that Dawson is a killer swimmer.  But this year, the pool is worth it's weight in gold.  We always have something fun to do outside, and the kids love it.  Corey and Asher even came up with a new game this past week, which is surprisingly fun and exhausting!  And Beckett is even doing swim lessons for Dawson a few days a week so our little buddy can learn some strokes.  By the way, a 5 year old doing free style or back stroke down the length of the pool is adorable.

Friday morning we hit the skate park so Asher could kick some soccer balls around and Daws and Beck could scooter around the ramps. They had fun, and then afterwards we hit Chik Fil A.  It made for a fun morning.  Anything to mix things up is a bright spot!

Corey and I did an impromptu date night on Saturday night.  We rode our bikes for a bit, right up 'Booty Hill' aka the volcano cliffs (I did it without stopping this time!  Yay!  And I about died, but that's ok), then went to Sprouts for some quick shopping and then home for a night swim while the boys watched Thor.  Date nights are so different than in the old days, but we had a wonderful time and I'm loving this way too.

Father's Day was nice.  I made Corey and the boys raspberry rolls for breakfast (Cor's pick) with eggs, bacon, and fruit.  So yummy.  This is the year it was Dawson's turn to give Corey a 'My Daddy' book.  I made it up a few weeks back and turned out so cute.  Dawson was beyond excited to give it to him.  The big boys helped me pick out a soccer jersey too.  Corey picked a team in the Premier League to root for (Wolverhampton) so we had to make him legit.  We actually gave him the jersey a day early because they all watched a fun Wolverhampton game on tv, and we thought it'd be cool if he was supporting his team in style.  

Corey and I did something cool for the boys, who, of course will be future fathers!  Ever since we've been buckled down with Corey working from home, he has taken to wearing Hawaiian shirts on Monday.  Throughout this past year, with Beckett home on Mondays, we started doing 'Mac and Cheese Mondays.'  Well, with Corey's shirt crossing over into mac n cheese territory, Dawson started calling his Hawaiian shirts "Mac n Cheese Monday shirts."  It totally cracks me up.  So, we just had to get one of those for each boy.  They look awesome.  And now all the boys can sport their Mac n Cheese Monday shirts together.   

 Overall, we had good food and a nice relaxing day with Corey.  He's a keeper...it's funny how when you get married you really don't know what kind of father your husband will be...I mean, I didn't really know what kind of mom I would be!  He's amazing and takes care of us all in every way.  Love that guy.  We both talked to our dads, who are also amazing.  I know I feel like I hit the jackpot in the dad department.  He is loving, generous, faithful, kind and fun too.  I just wish we could all hang out and bbq together on this celebratory day!  Happy Father's Day!❤

Summer's in Full Swing

Well, summer's sort of in full swing.  Mostly. We are swimming tons, playing outside, riding bikes, taking walks, BBQing, watching movies and enjoying family time.  We are missing swim team mornings, friends, and the carefree spirit we usually have around.  

 This week we met Aaron and his family at a park to eat pizza and play games.  It was a beautiful night and we all had so much fun being outside and together.  It was so nice to catch up!  It was our first time hanging out with people outside of our immediate family (aside from my parent's visit), so we were being wild and crazy, ha!  We are annoyed that we feel a ping of worry when gathering in any way, but we are also wanting a better balance, so we are going to do our best to make it all work.  

More sourdough loaves this week!  The new starter is ripe enough and tasty enough now, and we are loving it.  Also, our new ping pong table came this week and everyone likes it, although I think Corey and Beckett are the most excited.  It should be a fun addition to our summer!  We've already had a few family tournaments.  It seems I am in need of some serious ping pong training, ha.  On another note, I ordered some chocolate flower seeds that came and I'm excited to get them in the ground.  

My favorite night this week was Saturday.  Corey and I braved Target, which was fun but a little disappointing.  So many empty-ish shelves, and they were random ones, all over the store.  We thought that was a bit strange.  Afterwards, we all swam in the drizzly rain that had been coming down all night.  The pool was nice and warm, and as our first night swim this summer it was perfect!  The rain was even fun. We all had a cup of cocoa afterwards from Beckett's cocoa bar he'd set up.  Nice and 

cozy.

  

Cor's Birthday

Woo-hoo!  This hottie just hit double 4's.  That's kind of a cool age to be, isn't it?  It's been 11 years since he could say that, and I bet it'll make it easier to remember since we sometimes forget our age.  I can recall hearing my parents saying that they couldn't remember their age, and I thought that would never happen to me, nope, no way, preposterous.  And yet....!

Anyway, Corey's birthday was SO fun.  Having him home working on his big day meant I could make him breakfast, decorate his office door, and wish him a happy day all day long!  The boys loved celebrating their dad.  Asher and Dawson made some really cool cards for him and Beckett performed a magic trick.  Also, everyone wanted in on the balloon action.   

He wanted waffles in the morning and we ate some yummy Rudy's takeout for dinner.  Soooo good.  He chose a 'Ding Dong' layer cake, that of course we worked hard at finishing up for the next couple of nights.  We just couldn't let a good cake go to waste not could we?  Well, we couldn't, but we probably should.

He had a fun surprise visit from his brother, Aaron, who dropped by with some fun root beer and treats.  We hadn't seen him for the past few months, so it was definitely time, and we're looking forward to hanging out with the family at our place for some swimming sometime soon.  

Corey likes his birthday to last a whole month so here's to a month of celebrating Corey!  We sure do love this guy...he makes our lives happen, he keeps us going, he loves us, puts up with us and is sure a fun dad/husband.  Love you, babe, and Happy Birthday!

A couple fun weeks

We had SO much fun. The past two weeks have flown by quickly and we had a blast!  The summer weather is in full swing, and the pool has been so nice to have this year.  We are already tearing through the sunscreen, the kids are tanning up and I'm washing more towels!  The boys are officially out of school now too so we are finding our way to a new schedule.  It'll be a bit of a sad year without swim team and water polo.  My big boys always started their summer days riding bikes with friends to the pool, hanging out and swimming, going to the store around the corner, sometimes getting free breakfast at the community center, fitting in a tennis game, and riding home again.  Saturday mornings were always spent cheering them on at meets or games.  It's such a funny thing, because we miss all we had, but love the freedom the new ways are offering too.  Sigh.  There's just always something, isn't there?

My parents came in for a visit for about 5 days and we soaked up every minute of it.  It really was so fun, despite pretty much everything entertaining and fun still being closed.  They brought their bikes, and the big boys went on several lengthy morning rides with Grandma and Grandpa, around town and down by the river.  We swam nearly every day, and the kids discovered some new games with Grandpa.  And of course, Frisby Golf!  They played some in the back yard, Mariposa and we made it out to a course in Rio Rancho too.  I'm terrible, but the boys seem to catch on quick (Asher gave Gpa a run for his money) and Dawson has a pretty decent throw already!  Grandpa has been spreading out his disc collection over several states by giving them to the grandkids, and my boys are treasuring theirs.  He also had a little lesson on what makes a good disc and when to use it, and they listened intently (see pic...so funny, it was serious business though!) We walked some nights too and we were able to show them our favorite neighborhood owl.   Also games.  I love playing games, and it doesn't seem like we've done as much as we could've with our being at home so it was awesome!  My mom kept beating me at Banana Grams, so I will need to brush up on my speed.  We also played Pit and lots of Cover Your Assets.  The last night of their visit, we ordered Dion's for the first time in 3 months and lived it up.  It was seriously so good.  Dining rooms are also open now at 50% so things are beginning to slowly open up.  Yay!  We enjoyed having them here so much.  It made it seem vacation-ey, and summery and normal-ish.  Everyone was sad to see them go, and although we tried to convince them to eek out a day or two more, they had to move on to a visit with my sister.  It may be the last time we see them for a couple of years, which hasn't totally sunk in yet, but if they do go out on their mission this summer as planned, then it will be a while.  Still crossing fingers that flying won't be such a big deal in the near future so we might try for a trip to Tahiti with the fam.  I'm not holding my breath on that one though; things are just too weird still.

The Botanical Gardens opened up for reservation only visits and we jumped on that.  It was beautiful and SO nice to be out somewhere else.  Dawson had his first outing (as a side note, he has taken to calling Lamb's Ear plants he sees by another name....it is now Ear of Lamb, and it's cracking me up) with a mask, and although he said it felt weird, he was a trooper and didn't mess with it too much.  The everyone-wearing-masks thing is still strange but I'm betting it will seem normal soon. I think we want to go to the zoo next, so we're waiting on that one still.

Asher is now as tall as me.  I swear it happened about a week ago.  That's sort of a strange transition as a parent, since he will never be shorter than me again.  I think he's liking it though, hehe. Ash had a fun Saturday.  His soccer buddies from school got together (gathering limit of 5 still, sheesh) and played at the park for a couple hours, and will definitely be doing it again.  Later that day he played tennis with Noah, so things are creeping into some sort of normalcy and the kids are excited.

Beckett brought a toad home from the park one day after an impromptu frisbee golf game with my parents.  The day they left, we found 3 more under our trampoline at home.  It looks like last year's Reitz yard inductees survived the winter and are in fact still around eating our bugs.  I say carry on little friends!

Saturday night, Corey and I had planned to walk around the temple, hit Trader Joe's and get some Bahama Bucks on the way home.  Let's just say things didn't go quite right.  After a nice walk, we went back to the car and it would not start.  Now, to be fair, the car had shuddered a bit earlier in the day, Cor had it checked quick at Auto Zone and they thought he should clean off any possible corrosion at the battery.  He did it, and it had started fine the next couple times so we figured all was well.  Not so.  Thankfully, the sunset from the temple is beautiful, and the weather was nice so if you have to be stranded somewhere, this is the place.  A super nice Sheriff spent a half hour or more with us seeing if he could charge the battery.  We ended up calling a tow truck, and when offered the option of a jump start and tow, we said yes.  Had we known the two options were separate services, we may have chosen differently.  A guy showed up to try to charge us up, and no dice.  We waited a half hour for him.  Then, the towing option was another long wait so we tried getting a ride with Uber/Lyft.  We hadn't realized what a blow that industry had taken.  The app searched.  And searched.  And searched for a driver.  With the recent rioting and Covid-19, there are apparently VERY limited pick up services (if any).  Picking up strangers at night during a pandemic and politically riotous times is not a popular line of work.  That was an unexpected blow so we called nearby friends.  Jessica came to our rescue, around 10 with her twins in tow, because Chris was out of town.  Such a bummer and we felt horrible but were grateful she came to our rescue.  We really were in a bind, and we love good friends.  Jessica, we owe you BIG.  To top it off, the tow company didn't get to our car until 11:30 and Corey had to meet him at 12:30 at the garage we had it towed to so he could cover the remainder the cost that our insurance didn't cover (still not sure they can make you do that....I would've refused and said bill me, but he just wanted it over with).  It made for an interesting and long night for sure.  On the bright side, there's never been an easier time for us to be down a car.

Sunday night was awesome.  We had a great church meeting that afternoon, and were able to attend Taizley's baptism via Zoom.  It was great!  We miss everything since we are so far away, and they happen often, so this was a real treat!  Seeing everyone there sitting at the church with masks on was an interesting glimpse into what's to come, but it didn't detract for the ordinance a bit and she looked so pretty in her white dress.  Happy baptism day Miss T, we love ya!