short lived

Already? 

Really?

This is what I posted on Facebook this morning:

"Even though my kids would love for it to be super hot outside and for us to be heading to the lake (which will come soon enough), the first morning of summer break finds us (me) sitting on the couch sipping coffee in front of the fire while listening to the rain outside. I have to admit that all this makes me happy happy happy."

Then real life happened.

Kids started fighting; worn out from the busy first couple of days at school this week, they are short on sleep and loooooong on overdone activities.

It was time. Even on the very first day of summer break, I just knew it. 

Time to pull out my get-out-of-jail-free card.

I piled all the kids in the car and after a 25 minute drive through pouring rain we made it to civilization "town" where we had lunch at Dairy Queen and rented Red Box movies - both of which are a HUGE (and rare) treat in this house.

Right now the three older kids are laying on blankets in the living room zoning out watching a movie. Fischer is sleeping soundly in his bed. The house is quiet. It's still raining outside and, once again, I am happy happy happy.

Here's to everyone living through summer break!

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humility

Jack was coloring this morning and Fischer was playing with some bowls (as opposed to "playing with bowels" as I wrote initially) on the kitchen floor. 

Jack asked for Fischer to quiet down.

I said, "Is his playing loudly messing up your artistic abilities?"

He replied, "No. It's just annoying me. Nothing can mess up my gift of art."

So now that we have "art" down, maybe we should work a little on the humility?

summer is almost here (!)

Image source

Already we're in that time of year where in order to plan something new we have to look at least 6 weeks down the line to find the time. 

I love summer (the kids have 4 days of school left, not that any of us are counting...) and can't wait for things like my kids' laundry smelling like sunscreen and campfires. Mmmmm.

I might also love Summer because right afterwards is fall and oh how I love fall.

Summer normally isn't my favorite time of year because I don't really like the heat (I hate sweating when I'm not doing it on purpose). I don't like that girls wear next to nothing, seriously - COVER UP! such skimpy clothing, I'm not a huge fan of water (although I love me some lake time!), and I don't like that even though it's summer, Jeff still has to work, but I sure do love having all my kids all the time. 

OhmyMamaheart. 

Summer fills it to the brim.

We're not making a summer bucket list lest I feel I failed, again, at the end of the summer but Jeff and I have a mental list we'd love to check off one at a time and the kids have huge lists that they'd like to check of daily as well. 

All in all, we're ready for this season to begin - only FOUR more school days! YAY! 

Image source

...

Biggest news of the day?

The dog threw up and ate it.

Aren't you glad you stopped by here today?

going rogue

We have cows. 

Two, actually. They're 9 months old and their names are Jeremiah and Jason {I kid you not} and this morning they went missing.

Since I'm here solo with all the kids for the night I'm the one who got the phone call from a neighbor who said they found the cows on their property and which field exactly they were in {we have 42 acres so "neighbors" aren't exactly right next door unfortunately?}.

So, the kids and I took off tonight on "Operation Find-The-Cows... Mission: Bring them HOME."

The kids were stoked. 

I was stoked to be done with it.

I grabbed my camera (because, obviously), threw Fischer in the Ergo on my back, and we went on our way.

Off to save the cows!

We walked our way through our fields and were trying to find where they got through to the neighbors' field when our cows randomly {and thanfully!} came running through a different neighbor's field to the fence line where we were.

I just had to break down a little of our fencing and let them back in.

We'll keep them fenced in the barn area until someone else...Dad and/or Jeff can fix the fencing again.

This is kids when they finally spotted the cows in the next field over.

Sorry, party's over - the cows are coming home.

MISSION ACCOMPLISHED.

Gosh, I love these kids!

Carter asked me while I was tearing apart the fence if I liked living in the country now as much as when I was a kid and I laughed realizing that even when things go crazy and the cows go rogue, the answer always a big sigh followed by, "Yep. I sure do."

Heading back home.

guilty

Yesterday morning the kids were crazy hyper. I was upstairs with the baby and I could hear them screaming and jumping around acting like a herd of monkeys. 

It was ridiculous. 

I went to the top of the stairs and whisper-shouted, "You guys! You are being way too loud! If you can't have inside voices then you need to go OUTSIDE!"

My Dad comes out from the living room (where the kids were) and he's visibility sweaty. He just looks at me with a totally guilt-ridden face and says, "Can you believe them? I was trying to calm them down..."

Right.

I'll bet you were. 

Oh how I love my Dad.