Happy Birthday!

Somehow I blinked and my sweet silly boy has turned seven years old. Last week we celebrated Max's birthday at home. It wasn't our original plan, but we made it work. We were supposed to go to the beach in San Diego and spend a couple days being a beach bum, but we decided to cancel because of Rona. Max was really bummed about this so we did what we could to make it a fun day quarantine style.

First, we ordered breakfast in from Max's favorite pancake place and we ate outside on the back patio.


Max was very eager to open his presents.




At lunch I ordered in Max's favorite food that he can eat pretty much every day.

Andy and Max had a relaxing afternoon playing video games together. I seriously cannot get him out of the Spiderman onesie. He has been wearing this everyday since his birthday. I think we have washed it a few times already. I seriously don't know how he is wearing this onesie when it's over 100 degrees outside, but he just loves this thing. It's apparently a huge birthday present hit!


Of course we had what Max wanted for dinner while we watched a move that Max picked out.  He didn't want a traditional cake because he really doesn't like cake. I never liked cake as a kid either. Instead he requested a blizzard and I still put a candle in it while we sang happy birthday to him.




It was a perfect day of celebrating Max's seventh birthday. I honestly can't believe how fast the time flies. I am so blessed beyond belief to have such a sweet, silly and sensitive son that I get to watch grow up before my eyes. A HUGE HAPPY 7th BIRTHDAY TO MAX!

Father's Day

I started out Father's Day with homemade Belgium waffles. It's one of my specialties and Andy has always been a fan of them.

 

Max helped Andy open his gifts.

  

A couple weeks ago I took Max to one of those pottery places to pick something out to make for Andy for Father's Day. He chose a coffee cup and a bowl for his cereal. We had a lot of fun making it and it was a secret where we went that afternoon...until Max couldn't hold a secret in and told Andy where we went. Max had so much fun there that he wants us to go back as a family and make something together.

I had the water slide for the whole weekend so that's how we spent Father's Day afternoon. It was a ton of fun. The afternoon was filled with a lot of laughter as we all raced down the slide. I must say that Andy and I were getting tired quickly, but Max was still full speed. I wish I had his energy. We did that for a few hours and when I woke up on Monday morning I could barely move.

We shared popsicles outside before we headed in to get ready for a BBQ dinner. I hope everyone had a fantastic Father's Day!

 

Birthday Party

We had a small birthday party for Max on Saturday where our circle of friends were invited and he invited one friend from his kindergarten class. It was a pool party and I rented a giant waterslide for the kids to have fun. The slide arrived at 11:30 and Max had to test it out before his friends arrived at 3:00. He was so excited that he didn't even change into his swimsuit.




The cake arrived and Max requested an emoji theme party. I definitely did not go all out on the theme when I did when he was younger. I just did the theme with the cake and tableware. We also had one of Max's favorite foods to eat...Chipotle.

The kids also had fun in the pool.


It was time to sing to the birthday boy.




He was so tired from the day that he waited until the morning to open his presents.


Max had a fantastic quarantine birthday party with his closest friends. 

Camping Round 2

We had our second camping trip of the season this past weekend with two other families. Overall, it was a blast. I say overall because I suffered from allergies really bad starting on Saturday morning due to excessive wind we had which was blowing dust so hard that it looked like a dust storm was going on. It was crazy and my throat felt like it was closing up and I was not feeling well. I spent most of Saturday in the camper away from all the dust blowing. Ugh...now that I got that out, we still had a good time. I mean, how can you not when you are in the woods with friends and all the kids are friends having a good time?

We had a kickball game, or two.




The boys took the kids fishing on Saturday morning and no fish were caught.







A flat tire happened and the kids waited patiently.




We projected a movie on the side of the camper for the kids after we had s'mores. There may have even been a popcorn contest between Andy and I to see who could bake the best Jiffy popcorn. Andy did it over the fire while I did it over the stove. Unfortunately the kids voted for Andy's popcorn. 

The kids had plenty of time to be ninja warriors on the slackline.


Then it was time to go home. Our second camping trip of the season is in the books. Next time we go I really hope there is not a wind advisory.

Latest Update

School has ended and summer break has begun. Max was supposed to start summer camp on Monday but that was canceled due to not having enough kids registered. Ugh, this put a dent in our Summer plans and my excitement of starting to get back to somewhat normal. We moved onto plan b and that involved Amanda. She now comes to the house everyday from 8am - 1pm and Max and her have a blast together. She is such a good babysitter because she plays with him the whole time. He just loves her. It’s not how I saw his summer break going because I wanted him to play with kids his age, but it’s definitely a great plan b, just ask Max. 

We too have been keeping busy since school has ended. We built a massive fort in the dining room and there was a small room for girls only and a larger room for boys only. The larger room needed to fit daddy, as Max would say. We all gathered for lunch in the giant fort. This fort stayed up for days until we had to take it down because the cleaning lady was coming. 

We also had a great time with cousin Stephanie. She came down one da to spend time with us because she is leaving Arizona very soon to head back to Wisconsin. We didn’t see cousin Stephanie that much while she lived here, but we will definitely miss her after she moves. I will make sure to give her a call when the temps hit freezing there and we are having our usual beautiful weather. 

We have also spent plenty of time in our pool. It’s what is making the weekends more tolerable right now since there still isn’t that much to do. Max did start up swim lessons again as they recently opened back up. He’s been doing an awesome job at learning the butterfly. 

The dogs have certainly enjoyed having everyone around the house more often.

I am back in the office part-time now, but while I was home Zoe would be all up on me begging for pets, or a walk. I was working and she was bugging me and this happened almost everyday. She was more of a disturbance than Max was while I worked from home. I think Zoe has certainly missed me since I have been back at work this week, but she does have Andy still at home along with Max and Amanda.