summer project.

before...

after...

some mother's summer projects might be to reorganize the laundry room or to repaint a room or learn to sew a dress for their daughter but mine wasn't any of those.  mine was to take all of jack's legos and rebuild them again.  i was tired of seeing all of these lego pieces sitting in a box and hardly being used.  jack has collected quite a few sets over the years and it was time to put them to use again.

jack organized all the pieces by color while i started to go manual by manual rebuilding each little thing.  ava would help me find pieces and eden was there to ask questions that i couldn't answer (as usual, always full of questions).  it ended up being a family affair.  jason would even come in at times and sit and play games on his phone and watch. as strange as it may seem, legos were never his thing. what? jonah was actually a really good sport about the whole thing too.  he would occasionally watch but never tried to stick a lego in his mouth of mess with the neatly organized piles.

it only took us (me) around two weeks to complete this little project.  surprisingly, only a few pieces were missing and i was able to manage without them.  now, these legos are all put together and they are being played with...nonstop!  i'm always glad to see when i am getting my moneys worth ;) (plus, i strongly believe that putting legos together can be very therapeutic.)

gilbert swimming championships.

we are so proud of ava. she was a little rockstar at the town of gilbert swimming championships.  she placed second in the 25yd freestyle and second in the 25 yd butterfly for the 5-6 year old division. (she's only 5!) she was very exciting to watch and funny enough, i was so nervous for her.  now i know how my parents felt all those years during my swim races.

eden was putting on her own little show with the lifeguard's megaphone and jonah was just trying to keep cool by running through the splash pad and trying to escape into the pool whenever he got a chance.  i forgot how busy those 16 months old are.

well, i am officially signing off from swim team posts and happy to say that we survived another summer of early morning practices and dreadfully hot swim meets.  farewell until next summer, swim team.

the summer is winding down.

things have been pretty boring around here lately.  i think that it's a sign that summer is winding down and school will be here before we know it.  yikes.  as much as i do love summer and no school, i feel that i am running out of things to do to entertain these children of mine.  swimming just isn't as exciting as it was at the beginning of summer and the constant one on one attention that my lovely kids think they need every second of every day is a little too much for me...then guilt sets in and i feel bad for not wanting to play a game with them or even make them lunch. (i definitely wouldn't win mom of the year.)  so, thank goodness for a $2 purchase at target, i got my kids these almost endless amounts of fun punch balloons.  they have been running all over the house playing with them.  we will see how long the fun lasts.  hopefully, it will last for the next week until we leave for a much needed trip to california where we will finish out our last days of summer.  i can't wait!!

sparklers.

a little backyard fourth of july celebration to show our our love for the usa.

proud to be americans. 

grateful for our independence.

happy birthday america!