The Letter "L" (June 8-14th)

We did so many fun things the week of June 8th- the 14th!

Sunday: We went to see the last performance of Ballet in the Park's Peter Pan performed by Ballet Wichita. It was such a cute performance! Ares sat through the whole thing intrigued, and the girls tried to do their own ballet moves.

We also had a surprise! Turns out that Sheryl (My Aunt Jenny's mother in law) had taken Lily, Zach, and Riley to the ballet too! She offered us her lawn chairs that Zach and Riley weren't using because they would rather play at the playground.

After the ballet was over, the kids got a chance to meet the cast! Ares wanted his picture taken with Captain Hook and the Crocodile and the girls liked Tiger Lily.

Monday: It was a rainy day on Monday so I took the kids to the library. Ares and I got new library cards because our old ones were either lost or stolen. Afterwards I signed up all the kids for the Summer Reading Program.

That evening we had a family game night. We started it off with playing this fast electronic Scrabble game that my Dad got Ares for Christmas last year. It is a great game to get Ares and his spelling. Next we all played Hungry Hungry Hippo, and that was the hit of the evening!

Tuesday: While Ares was in school, the girls had their second gymnastics class. Since Kyle went with me this time, I was able to take pictures of them!

That afternoon, Ares wanted to make a special drink. He has been on a making drinks kick where he has given me milk and water, milk and water with peas and bacon.... With those drinks in mind I thought it'd be a good idea if we made an infused water drink. We put blueberries and lemon in it and let it sit over night.

Afterwards we drew pictures for the people at an old people's home we went to visit. We are particularly fond of this older woman and have visited her a couple times since.

That evening we went over to my Dad's for dinner because Ares' wanted to show off his new bike riding skills to my Dad. Now we had practiced on and off with him to learn how to ride his bike without training wheels, but it was Ares' Dad who got him through the final hoop of it.

Once dinner was over, and it began to get dark, the kids and I went out to catch fireflies.

We caught one! Ares named in Light Star. I let him keep him in his room for one night, and made him convinced him the next morning to let it go so it can be with its' family.

Wednesday: The girls did their "L" art project for the week. I cut up a lemon and had the girls taste it. Surprisingly they really liked it. Then we took the other pieces I had cut up and used them as stamps.

 

Later on it was time for our trip to the Zoo! We saw lots of different animals, but I'm only going to post the main even that we went to see for the letter "L"... the lion!

After such a fun trip to the zoo, we went over to my Grandparent's house. Ares had wanted to "help" Granddad with some work, which really meant Ares wanted to finish digging a hole where the basketball post used to be. Grammy and Granddad gave Ares his birthday present early and it was water guns! He of course decided it was time for a water fight with his sisters.

 

 

Afterwards it was time to feed the ducks! Brigid wanted to feed the ducks this time while Ceri and Granddad just sat and watched them.

The Letter "K" (May 31 - June 7th)

My kids have not been bored at all this summer! From Saturday, May 31st to Saturday, June 7th we talked about the letter "K", as well as doing some much loved family activities.

On Saturday, we got to meet our cousin Apollo for the first time! We met up with some of the Harpenau family at Get Air, and I got to love on baby Apollo while the kids had fun jumping around.

On Sunday, we went to the Butterfly Festival at Botanica during Riverfest. We tried to be one of the first 100 kids through the door so we could get to release a butterfly, but sadly we were about 4 away when they ran out. So close!

Ares wanted a butterfly to land on him so badly! He picked a flower (that he wasn't supposed to do) and held it up to try and get a butterfly's attention, to no avail.

We waited in a line in the butterfly house because we thought it was a line to exit. Turns out it was the line to let loose one of the 100 butterflies. Well since we didn't have a ticket for it we got out of line (we didn't find out what the line was for until we were almost through the line). One of the nice ladies that worked there stopped Ares and let him hold and release a butterfly anyway. It was so nice of them!

While he was holding his butterfly, my sister Lindsey had caught one and was showing the girls.

After our adventure in the butterfly house, we walked around Botanica.

It was such a hot day that we got some snow cones for the kids before we headed into the children's play area.

Special thanks to my Mom and Lindsey for helping me out! I wouldn't have been able to do this without them!

On Monday we met up my cousin Jason's wife Lori and their kids, Kylie, Gabe, and baby Katharine, at the sprinkler park. Brigid had to stay home with Daddy because she had misbehaved all day so she had to stay home and take a nap. Ceri, Ares, and I had a blast though! It was so nice to catch up with Lori.

Tuesday was the girls' first gymnastics class. They had such a fun time with Miss Kate, but since it was just me that had taken them to the class that week, I wasn't able to take more pics. I took some the next week though. I did get this one with their teacher though.

On Wednesday, Ares had a boys night out with Kyle and my Dad. They went out to the Touch-a-truck event for Riverfest. They had so much fun together :)

Ares was NOT in it while it was in the air just fyi!

Ares was comparing his muscles to the fireman's :)

After touch-a-truck, it was time to go to the ice cream social. This was an event where they gave out free ice cream. Yummy!

Thursday was our science day, and since Kyle Ann and Jude had come over, and I was watching Parker that day (and Friday) we had fun with cornstarch and water. Granted I know cornstarch starts with a "C" but it makes a "K" sound so it "counted" for the day. Ares was at his summer reading program at school so he wasn't able to do it.

 

Friday was another fun day where we had Parker, and we were able to play outside since it had rained the day before and we couldn't go to the park as planned.

We then made kites for "K"! I thought I had taken pics of them finished, but apparently I didn't. Here's pics of them coloring though :)

Saturday was the last day of Riverfest, and we planned on going to the fireworks show. Turned out that the city wasn't doing a firework show this year, but a light show instead. We took Ares' friend Aidan with us, and took them first to the end of the carnival. We got some yummy funnel cake, and then found the perfect spot for the light show (and had some fun with glow sticks while we were waiting for it to begin).

Sadly, the light show was not impressive. About the only thing the boys liked were the glow sticks we were playing with, and then Kyle took them to watch some fire eaters while I stayed with the girls to watch the rest of the light show. Hopefully next year they will bring our fireworks back.