It's almost here, that dreaded first day of school. When last school year was ending we were begging for summer to hurry up and get here. We no longer wanted our 6am mornings, homework battles, early bedtimes and the constant whine of "I hate school" at pick up in the afternoon. Now, after 80 days of summer travel, late nights, late mornings, beach time, friend time and video games, I think we are all ready to head back, maybe. As mom, I know I am. Not to get rid of them but simply because they become socially unruly and so tired of the same momservations, that they are in desperate need to have someone other than me to talk to. I don't blame them. I am truly boring at times! But, all good things must come to an end, and this past summer was probably one we are happy to say goodbye to.
May had already been filled with chaos. I had finished my semester and it was on to 8th-grade graduation madness. Lots of planning meetings for the dance, dinner, ceremony, and supplies. We had tons of birthdays in May along with Mother's day and Memorial weekend. We also had all of Zoey's end of the year school events like the book fair, school Olympics and classroom end of year fun! Then, for good measure, we all got sick. Strep throat, sinus infections, a double ear infection and tons of antibiotics. May ended in disaster. We lived, though. Xander promoted from 8th to 9th grade, Zoey sadly finished 3rd grade (she was so sad to leave behind her favorite teacher) and we were ready to leave for Ohio/Massachusetts on June 5th. We were all still recovering, Zoey with still two weeks of meds to go but we were excited and looking forward to 4 weeks of some summer fun!
The trip was great but it had many moments where we just weren't sure we were going to make it home in one piece. Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating a bit but this trip was on for the record book.
Zoey and I fell down some stairs, she banged up her toe pretty good and I bruised my tailbone and hip to the point that walking was like dying!
Everyone was on meds while out there.
We bought tickets for the wrong day at the Boardgame convention, but thankfully that still turned out awesome.
Our 12-hour drive to Massachusetts was going great until we hit construction and Zoey became horribly car sick.
Massachusetts had a few of its own disasters. I bashed my head on a pipe on a tall ship while visiting Boston, giving myself a mild concussion.
Our play in the park was rained out by a severe thunderstorm that produced tornado warnings
The worst was Zoey's 2nd-degree burn. She fell asleep with some hot hands hot packs unintentionally and left two quarter sized 2nd-degree blisters on her belly. Thankfully, we found an amazing urgent care out there that treated her and even called to check up on her. Today, she is physically healed but still processing the situation. We are way more careful about those things now and fully stocked up on sunscreen for life.
Throw in a few other mini-disasters in the middle of these. That sums up our four weeks of summer vacation "fun". It wasn't all terrible though. We had some amazing moments.
Ohio was filled with tons of board games with our best friend, a trip to Columbus, a beach hunt and some awesome hiking trails and a waterfall, NIAGRA FALLS, and of course our favorite road trip from Ohio to Massachusetts.
We spent most of our days in Massachusetts just hanging out with the family. We helped Nana clean out her garden, Zoey got to bake tons of goodies with her, lots of BBQ and fires in the back, movie nights, phase 10 game nights, flowers, laughter, and love, late nights, early mornings and a family reunion. The good overshadowed all the chaos or the most part. Life would be boring if everything was perfect all the time!
We came home on the eve of Fourth of July, actually home around 2am on the fourth of July. It was a long day, to say the least, but it was nice to be home and surrounded by our friends and family out here. Seemed liked we hadn't seen them in ages. We celebrated Xander's 14th birthday. Which is still unbelievable to me. How can I possibly have a 14-year-old!? He's growing into a fine young man, he's learned so much and accomplished so many things. I can only imagine what the future holds for him. We've hiked the Pinnacles in triple-digit heat, made a trip to Monterey Bay Aquarium and played on a beach when the ocean and weather were a bit angry. We had more plans, but we also felt the need to stay home and be a family, just us. We've had a crazy amount of family movie nights, slowly but surely moving through the Marvel Universe. Spiderman, Thor, and Ironman being a few favorites. As of today, we are on to Guardians of the Galaxy, which the kids are sure o love!
Today, we attended the back to school fair downtown. Xander received his official high school schedule which made it all too real. High school??? I'm in denial. I'm not ready but he sure is! He was happy about getting out of middle school, definitely wasn't his favorite three years of his life. Zoey is heading into 4th grade and should be receiving her teacher assignment sometime this week in the mail. She's dying with anticipation! It's our favorite part of our summer. We wait for the mail and rush out to check to see if the letter has come. So far, nothing, so we keep waiting. We did meet the new principal today, which was nice. She is definitely excited to go back to school and see her friends.
With only ten days til school, we will try and cram in as many family days, fun and adventure as we can possibly handle and some lazy days as well. It will be bittersweet to send them back to school, but I think we will all be a little happier.
Maybe.
May had already been filled with chaos. I had finished my semester and it was on to 8th-grade graduation madness. Lots of planning meetings for the dance, dinner, ceremony, and supplies. We had tons of birthdays in May along with Mother's day and Memorial weekend. We also had all of Zoey's end of the year school events like the book fair, school Olympics and classroom end of year fun! Then, for good measure, we all got sick. Strep throat, sinus infections, a double ear infection and tons of antibiotics. May ended in disaster. We lived, though. Xander promoted from 8th to 9th grade, Zoey sadly finished 3rd grade (she was so sad to leave behind her favorite teacher) and we were ready to leave for Ohio/Massachusetts on June 5th. We were all still recovering, Zoey with still two weeks of meds to go but we were excited and looking forward to 4 weeks of some summer fun!
The trip was great but it had many moments where we just weren't sure we were going to make it home in one piece. Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating a bit but this trip was on for the record book.
Zoey and I fell down some stairs, she banged up her toe pretty good and I bruised my tailbone and hip to the point that walking was like dying!
Everyone was on meds while out there.
We bought tickets for the wrong day at the Boardgame convention, but thankfully that still turned out awesome.
Our 12-hour drive to Massachusetts was going great until we hit construction and Zoey became horribly car sick.
Massachusetts had a few of its own disasters. I bashed my head on a pipe on a tall ship while visiting Boston, giving myself a mild concussion.
Our play in the park was rained out by a severe thunderstorm that produced tornado warnings
The worst was Zoey's 2nd-degree burn. She fell asleep with some hot hands hot packs unintentionally and left two quarter sized 2nd-degree blisters on her belly. Thankfully, we found an amazing urgent care out there that treated her and even called to check up on her. Today, she is physically healed but still processing the situation. We are way more careful about those things now and fully stocked up on sunscreen for life.
Throw in a few other mini-disasters in the middle of these. That sums up our four weeks of summer vacation "fun". It wasn't all terrible though. We had some amazing moments.
Ohio was filled with tons of board games with our best friend, a trip to Columbus, a beach hunt and some awesome hiking trails and a waterfall, NIAGRA FALLS, and of course our favorite road trip from Ohio to Massachusetts.
We spent most of our days in Massachusetts just hanging out with the family. We helped Nana clean out her garden, Zoey got to bake tons of goodies with her, lots of BBQ and fires in the back, movie nights, phase 10 game nights, flowers, laughter, and love, late nights, early mornings and a family reunion. The good overshadowed all the chaos or the most part. Life would be boring if everything was perfect all the time!
We came home on the eve of Fourth of July, actually home around 2am on the fourth of July. It was a long day, to say the least, but it was nice to be home and surrounded by our friends and family out here. Seemed liked we hadn't seen them in ages. We celebrated Xander's 14th birthday. Which is still unbelievable to me. How can I possibly have a 14-year-old!? He's growing into a fine young man, he's learned so much and accomplished so many things. I can only imagine what the future holds for him. We've hiked the Pinnacles in triple-digit heat, made a trip to Monterey Bay Aquarium and played on a beach when the ocean and weather were a bit angry. We had more plans, but we also felt the need to stay home and be a family, just us. We've had a crazy amount of family movie nights, slowly but surely moving through the Marvel Universe. Spiderman, Thor, and Ironman being a few favorites. As of today, we are on to Guardians of the Galaxy, which the kids are sure o love!
Today, we attended the back to school fair downtown. Xander received his official high school schedule which made it all too real. High school??? I'm in denial. I'm not ready but he sure is! He was happy about getting out of middle school, definitely wasn't his favorite three years of his life. Zoey is heading into 4th grade and should be receiving her teacher assignment sometime this week in the mail. She's dying with anticipation! It's our favorite part of our summer. We wait for the mail and rush out to check to see if the letter has come. So far, nothing, so we keep waiting. We did meet the new principal today, which was nice. She is definitely excited to go back to school and see her friends.
With only ten days til school, we will try and cram in as many family days, fun and adventure as we can possibly handle and some lazy days as well. It will be bittersweet to send them back to school, but I think we will all be a little happier.
Maybe.
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