Labor Day 2016

I love looking through all my friends feeds and all the blogs I follow and see the little kiddos just smiling and cooperating for the cameras.  It completely makes me believe that they are chill little kids that listen to their parents when told to do something without pitching a fit or running away.  But I'm a parent, and I know better. I know that behind the scenes, those kids are just as crazy as mine.. or at least I hope they are.

 

Conner pushes the energy to the next ten levels beyond how I see most kids interact.  And Linden tries to follow suit.  I also have a 9 month old that was finally sleep trained but doesn't do well outside of his regimented night routine. 

 

You may be wondering why I'm even talking about this. It because despite how these boys are, we decided to go tent camping for Labor Day weekend.  Take a moment.  Soak that in. 2 year old + 9 month + tent camping. yeah, that happened.

 

First off, I have to fully admit, it was fun! We had a blast hanging out with Joe's family. Conner even did great without a much needed nap.  A huge part of camping with Conner being a success was because he had his cousins there to play and wrestle and a lake for him to swim all day in.

 

See Exhibit A:

 

Most of the day was spent doing just that. Swimming. Walks. Eating! Watching the boys wrestle.  It was so much fun!!

 

 

 

Nighttime... not fun. After trying for two hours to get Linden to fall asleep, he finally caved and drifted off.  That lasted a whopping 2 hours and then he was back to crying until I gave in and laid down with him for the night.  Moments where you have time to talk with other adults sans kiddos is rare, so I was a little bummed that I had to throw in the towel early instead of chatting around a campfire.  Then 3am rolled around, and we were back to crying. I gave it 2 hours and finally called it quits, so me and Linden headed home at 5am for a morning nap.

 

Best hour of sleep ever!

 

We rejoined the group the next day for more swimming, walks, food, fishing and missed naps.  I left to pick up lunch, and while I was gone I receive this picture:

 

 

Conner caught his first fish!!

 

All in all, it was such an awesome weekend with family and our first camping experience as a family of four.  It was definitely an adventure.  And of course we rounded out our last summer weekend with a trip to the beach!

 



life lately | a look at august

I totally realize that I missed a lot of my updates last month. It's just that.. where did the month even go??? August always end up being our busiest month of the summer which inevitably catapults us so fast into Fall faster each year. And I know I'm not preachin' to the choir when I say that this summer went waaay too fast.

 

So in a brief overview, here's our life lately:

 

Nana and Papa came up for a weekend and we hit up the splash pad, playground, fair, and beach.

 

We celebrated one of our favorite little girl's second birthday.

 

Forget what Pinterest tells you, this sums up how toddlers really react to birthdays

 

We swam, ate and played the day away at the company picnic.

 

 

We celebrated Joe's birthday with family and a Moomer's ice cream cake!! And a trip to the coolest indoor bounce house ever and bummed around another beautiful northern MI town, Petoskey.



 

 

 

Summer, you were so good to us!

 

friday vibes

I had the opportunity to hangout with my two favorite little boys this afternoon.  We spent it the best way we possibly could and nobody got naps!

 

park + splash pad + minions :)



4th of july | 2016

Happy Tuesday everyone!! I hope everyone had a blast celebrating their 4th of July with family and friends.  I know we made the most of it.

 

We spent our three day weekend potty training. [Insert overwhelmed face here.]

 

Since Joe was on call and we had three days off work we decided now would be the best time to get the ball rolling.  And in all reality, there's never a good time to start training, but everyone dreads it.

 

We started Saturday morning, and I can say we've come a long way since.  It started pretty tragic with a boy who didn't care if he peed on the floor, peed in his underwear, or peed in his bed, but he absolutely cared about sitting on his potty (and not in a good way either).  Sitting on the potty is like the worst form of punishment to him.

 

 

But we really have made strides in potty training department.  He now screams and gives me a distressed look to let me know that he's gotta go and runs off to his little Mickey potty.

 

Since we were do the potty-training dance this weekend, we turned down any of the fun plans that were extended our way.  It was sad not to go hang out and enjoy the holiday weekend with everyone, but this will pay off in the end.

 

We even got brave on Monday and ventured off to a nearby park without any accidents! Woohoo!  And since we were on a roll and halfway to the river property anyway, we decided to head over and see papa.

 

 

Of course that led to some spontaneous swimming in the river that was we were completely unprepared for.

 

 

We rounded out the night with dinner on the deck. :)

Thanks to all those that gave us (and continue to protect) our freedom!!