Summer vacation is off to a fine start! I think that I am finally into our summer schedule. It took me a little while. Gone are the days of actual "quiet time". Several don't nap so the over stimulation lasts all darn day! All report cards were great and remnants of school supplies have been dealt with.
Jordan is really enjoying his job with the Parks and Rec Department. He goes swimming, to ICubs games, bowling, Big Creek, Sleepy Hollow, and occasionally has some office time answering phones and greeting people as they come to the Community Center. A great job for an active teenage boy. He spends most of his evenings playing baseball. After state track was over he was suiting for both JV and Varsity baseball to catch up since he had missed about a month of baseball practices. Now he is just suiting Varsity and starting in right field. 2 weeks ago he had his first home run ever in the JV game against Perry and then later that week followed it up with a home run in the Varsity game against Jefferson-Scranton. Not doing much pitching. Occasionally they will ask him to suit for JV and have him pitch an inning or two. The rest of his nights are spent with Kelli. They are enjoying as much time as they can together before she leaves for Central in mid-August.
Abbey has time on her hands right now. Softball finished last Friday for her. The "B" team, which she was on, was undefeated. She spent most of her time at second base. She has already read countless numbers of books and makes many trips each week to the library for more material. The Youth Leadership Group she is a part of is starting to meet and prepare for the upcoming school year. Abbey and a few of her girlfriends find time to hang out in the afternoons. And she has really been a big help here with daycare. She helps in getting them outside and playing fun games with them. She helped me take a few to the pool one day. She is indispensable and I love spending time with her. She is excited for the new Harry Potter movie to come out. It has been a tradition that Dana and I take her out for dinner (which for Abbey includes lobster!!) and then we go see the movie. Just the 3 of us!
Carson is spending his summer playing video games, catching up on Ben 10, reading, and playing outside when it's not "too hot"!! (Gets it from me. I hate the heat!) Emma spends her day doing girly things and coordinating the play of her friends (daycare kids) each day. They both have been to their share of baseball games so far and we have another 3 weeks for sure yet. They are both looking forward to swimming lessons and this weekends 4th of July party hosted by our close friends.
Dana has been playing a lot more golf this summer than in the previous ones! I guess when you aren't working yourself to death that you have time to do some of those things you really enjoy. He also finished up coaching the t-ball season and has umpired a few Little League games. He calls that his boat gas money! He got tickets to the Indy race at Iowa Speedway last weekend and all six of us went and spent Father's Day at the track with Dana. We all had a great time.
Other than being behind in almost all my tasks (except laundry! I'm afraid there would be mutiny here if I was behind on that) I am doing the usual mom stuff. I have the same 4 families that I watch during the school year. The house really needs a deep clean and I have countless projects that I am trying to do. I finally got our new computer up and running and am still figuring our Vista and my new Photosmart program. It really is never ending.
Dana and I celebrated 19 years of marriage last Tuesday. We did nothing exciting. The rain ruined our meal plans on the grill so instead we had Casey's pizza and were in bed at about 9:30. It was one of our first nights home in a while and we were all exhausted. We saved the celebration for Saturday night. We had tickets to Taylor Swift and Keith Urban here in town. We went with our great friends Mark and Kelly and it was awesome! We were in row 16 and had free liberty to go up to the stage to take pictures! I was up there taking pics of Keith and the next thing I know he walks down a ramp right in front of me. A nice security guard stepped in between us but I was close enough and crazy enough to slip my finger in the back of Keith's jeans to keep up with him as he walked to the back of the arena to a small stage there. I only had my finger in his pocket a short time as he walked quicker than the security guard did and my arm didn't stretch that far. I got some great pictures and even some bootleg video!! We had a great time.
Well...as far as we know the boat is fixed. Dana and I did the work on the impeller ourselves. We had it running in the drive and thought we had all the issues worked out. When we put it in the lake it wouldn't shift out of neutral. After talking with our boat guy we had probably melted the shifter cable in our first outing and the lower unit had to be removed to replace it. We thought that was a bigger task then we could handle and had someone else do it. Plan on testing it out Friday as we are all off for the holiday weekend.
Ok....so that is the 411 on us right now. Enjoy the following pictures. And keep our fingers crossed that I get my poop in a group enough to get to this each week.
Father's Day at Iowa Speedway
Jordan on a typical weeknight!
Abbey enjoying a nice day with a good book!
Little man!
Sweet Emma!
Keith Urban! And to think I was even closer!!!
19 sweet years of marriage!
