VBS

This week the boys are attending Vacation Bible School at First Baptist in Bentonville. My local church doesn't do VBS but has a week-long adventure camp in June that is all day from 8-5 at a lake. They offer water activities, archery, a ropes course, derby cars, crafts, etc. Hudson was too young to attend that camp, and Owen was reluctant to go from 8-5 since he is new to the church and didn't want to stay all day by himself. So, we opted to go to First Baptist's VBS instead since both boys could attend from 9-12.

Today was a great day! I am always a bit nervous as I wait for them during the first day of a new activity, as I hope they make friends and have a good time. The theme was Crocodile Dock, and the boys seemed to really enjoy it. The church had over 600 kids attend VBS today, and it was by far the largest VBS program we've ever attended. They are looking forward to going back tomorrow. Arden wasn't too happy that she didn't get to stay with her brothers and was grumpy all morning, so I'm hoping that will improve tomorrow.

Summer at the Library

For those of you who live in my area, the Bentonville library has planned a lot of fun, free activities for kids this summer. I am always looking for activities for my young children that are inexpensive, and I'm excited to see the Bentonville library's summer schedule.

Every week there is story time (this is done year-round):
Baby play and rhyme: Thursdays at 9:30
Tales for Toddlers: Tuesdays and Wednesdays at 9:30
Preschool Stories: Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays at 10:30

This summer, the library is hosting special weekly presentations every THURSDAY at 2:00 pm:

June 18: Children's Theater performance (*Owen will be performing in this after attending the camp!!)
June 25: Magic with Scott Davis
July 2: Music performance with Brian and Terry Kinder
July 9: Marty the Balloon Man
July 16: Crystal Bridges Art Experience (best for ages 5-12)
July 23: David T. Magic
July 30: Sugar Free All Stars music concert

Hope you and your family can enjoy some of these great, FREE experiences!

Birthday Bash!

We celebrated Owen's 7th birthday and Hudson's 4th birthday this past weekend with a joint party on August 2. We rented out a local gym and invited several families from our church as well as a few of the boys' school friends. We ended up with 18 kids plus their parents! My brother Asher flew in from Colorado for the weekend and was able to attend. Stuart's parents drove up from south Arkansas, and my mom was also in town from Bryant for the event.

The boys (and three girls) had a great time playing in the gym! Nothing else can beat running, chasing, jumping, and swinging! The highlights of the event were the inground trampolines, foam pit with swinging rope, hide-and-seek, and a few strong dads who got into the action by throwing boys into "the pit!"

After an hour of running and jumping, the 18 red-faced, sweaty kids were ready for cake and ice cream! We had a dinosaur theme party with a cake shaped like the character Chomp from the cartoon "Dinosaur King." It scored well with the kids! (Many thanks to Sam at http://www.cakesbysam.com/ for another special cake).

We survived the 102 degree heat outside, and we survived another birthday party. We were exhausted, but we have a year to recover! The boys said it was the best birthday ever, and that was worth it all!

Happy birthday, boys! You're growing up so fast!

Roadtrip

Well . . . last weekend we actually got brave and decided to go on a short weekend getaway since we hadn't gone anywhere with the kids all summer. Due to finances, we stayed in state, and we only planned to stay one night in a hotel. I thought, how hard can that be? It's just one night. We should be able to pack light and get everything in one bag.

Wrong.

The van was loaded down by the time Stuart had put in all the stacks of bags that I had filled. Two bags for snacks. One bag of diapers/wipes/baby food stuff. One suitcase for our clothes. One pool bag for the hotel pool which included sunscreen, floaties, 4 bathing suits, and goggles. A cooler to keep drinks cool in the car. A bumbo chair for Arden. A stroller for Arden. A cradle swing for Arden (very huge, but she is still addicted to it). It looked like we were moving instead of going away for one night!

The trip was about a two hour drive, and no, we don't have a DVD player in our van. So, we must have heard, "Are we almost there yet?" about 45 times on the way. We realized that driving with a baby is harder than we remembered because we had to stop to change her poopy diapers and feed her. We also have a baby who (for some reason beyond us) doesn't like to sleep in a moving vehicle! We made it almost an hour, then we already could smell some toxic fumes coming from the back of the van. Her first poopy diaper. We then realized we had brought no empty plastic bags to dispose of them in! Ugh!

Since it was around 100 degrees that day, we were drinking a lot of our cooled drinks which soon made the boys have to take potty breaks too. When we finally arrived at our destination, it was lunch time and much later than we expected. Arden had not slept at all in the car, and she had been awake for 5 1/2 hours straight at this point already, so she was getting a bit cranky.

We checked into the brand new hotel (big mistake thinking that "brand new" would be great!) which took Stuart almost 25 minutes. He later told us that the front desk attendant didn't know how to check him in and that the hotel had just opened a few days earlier.

We finally released the kids from the van into the steamy hot parking lot and began the trek up to the second floor with about 20 bags, Bumbo chair, laptop computer bag, cradle swing, etc. We got Arden down for a nap, but not before we had to change another poppy diaper with still no way to wrap it up in a plastic bag, so it would not continue to stink up the entire room. We decided to sit down in the cool, nicely decorated suite and let the boys watch some tv. We turned on the nice flat screen tv that was larger than my loveseat at home, and there was just static! We then tried the smaller tv in the bedroom -- just static! We called the front desk to find out that they were having some cable tv problems that were being worked on. Ugh!

The next idea was the pool. The boys were restless at this point and had resorted to doing hip-hop dance moves in front of the full length mirror on the wall which was resulting in lots of thuds and stomping on the floor (remember, we're trying to get Arden to sleep). I remember the nice looking outdoor pool, and I walk downstairs to check it out. Unfortunately, the gate to the pool area was padlocked closed, so I inquired about it at the front desk. Like the cable tv, this "brand new" hotel didn't have the pool up and running quite yet, as the chemicals hadn't been checked. So, no swimming. This hotel was beginning to bug me!

We let the boys watch a Veggie Tales DVD on our laptop computer while we sat quietly in the dark living room to give Arden a chance to get a nap. Finally, we embarked on our adventure to explore the city and then get some dinner.

Several poopy diapers later and after an uncomfortable time feeding Arden her bottle on the boppy pillow in the third row of our van, we got back to our hotel. It was getting late, so we decided to put Arden down for the night. The boys were looking forward to catching part of the Hannah Montana concert on Disney Channel, now that the cable appeared to be working again. We called the front desk to remind them that they hadn't delivered the portable crib we'd reserved before our arrival, so we could get Arden to sleep.

They didn't have one. No cribs. According to the front desk, they had not been assembled yet.

It was now approaching 9 p.m. We were all hot, frustrated, and tired. Stuart proceeded to tell the hotel that we were checking out and would not pay for the night since they had no cable tv, no working pool, and now no crib. Arden couldn't sleep on the floor, as she rolls all over the place now.

Luckily, there were very accomodating and got us a nice suite at the Hampton Inn across the road. They even refunded our money for the night, and they paid for the Hampton Inn, so we had no hotel bill at all. However, we had to repack all our items, reload the van, and then unload again at a new hotel at 9 p.m!

The second hotel was great. I took the boys swimming at the indoor pool at 9:30 p.m. while Stuart got Arden to sleep in the crib. There were no more poopy diapers.

We finally fell asleep, exhausted, around midnight.

By the next morning, Hudson had wet the bed, we had run out of clean clothes, and Arden had been up about every hour during the night getting her leg stuck between the slats of the hotel port-a-crib (it had no bumper pad).

It was an exhausting roadtrip, but overall, it was still fun. We took on a challenge and survived. I don't know if we'll do it again anytime soon, but we feel that we accomplished creating some funny memories, and the kids loved every minute of it!

Things I Love This Summer

Love might be a bit too strong of a word, but I deeply like these things this summer! They are in no particular order or ranking . . . just trivia about me!

1. Splash Zone in Jacksonville
2. my TiVo
3. not grading mass amounts of Comp I essays every week!
4. Arden's room, especially with the new drapes
5. the way the heat smells and reminds me of summers in Oklahoma when I was a kid
6. Cherry Limeade from Sonic (crushed ice! mmm)
7. going out to eat at Chili's and getting their salsa and guacomole
8. children's events at our local library (free!)
9. The Anne of Green Gables movies (I rewatched them all recently)
10. the Olympics are coming! Gymnastics are my favorite!
11. seeing my nieces and nephews who now live in Ohio
12. planning the boys' birthday party and trying to make it fun
13. roadtrips
14. KFC
15. Banana Boat Kids Tear Free Sunblock with SPF 50 (my ghost white children and myself haven't burned while using it . . . first summer ever to find a successful sunblock for the extremely fair!)
16. the smell of freshly cut grass
17. watching Camp Rock with the kids on Disney Channel
18. eating chicken salad and my mom's best potato salad
19. summer rain showers which water my grass for free (you would really understand this if you have 1 acre of grass with no inground sprinker system!)
20. Mother's Day Out resumes in a few weeks!

Fabulous Fourth

We had a very eventful fourth of July. The rainy weather dampened our cookout plans at lunchtime, but we were still able to go to the Historic Arkansas Museum in downtown Little Rock for their Frontier Fourth of July Festival. I took Owen to it last year, and he loved it. So, we decided to take the entire Cearley clan this time. That led to much more "fun" (or stress, depending on how you look at it!). Arden was a bit cranky and got tired of being in the stroller pretty quickly, as we were out during the middle of her nap, then she started screaming during the gun shooting exhibits because of the loud noise! The boys still had fun participating in a watermelon seed spitting contest, whitewashing a fence like Tom Sawyer, walking on stilts, marching in the militia, and doing a sack race. They also got balloons that were made into swords. I enjoyed the ice-cold watermelon!

The highlight of our adventure was when Hudson decided that he wanted to run away from us. In a split second, we didn't know where he had gone, as it was very crowded. After several minutes of looking, we got the museum workers involved, and then a police officer was called by radio to begin a search. A few minutes later a museum employee brought him up to the front desk and said that she found him on the elevator where he was heading to the children's exhibit on the second floor by himself! Like I've said before, he's our risk taker. Thankfully, he was safe, but he was very mad that his getaway was ruined.

Summer Fun!

We're trying to do a few activities each week to keep the kids entertained during these hot days of summer! We went to a place called Jump Zone in Maumelle last week which was a big hit. With a "buy one get one free" coupon from their website, both boys enjoyed almost two hours of play for a total of $7.00. Jump Zone is a huge building full of those large inflatable jumping things. They were much bigger than the ones that we've been on at local carnivals and church functions, so the boys were thrilled! Their favorite was a huge T-Rex dinosaur that you entered, complete with walls to climb and a slide that allowed you to exit down his belly!

Arden has been very good to allow us to tote her along to these places while all she can do is sit in her carseat carrier, which can't be that much fun! She hasn't fussed at all, and the boys have enjoyed having her along. They would play for ten minutes, run back to check on Arden, play for ten more minutes, return to give her a kiss, etc. It was sweet!

Arden seems to receive a lot of attention from strangers whenever we are out. I don't know why because I've had two other babies who never got that many comments when we were in public places. Is it something about being a girl? Usually, she has lots of moms and grandmas coming over to inquire about her name and age with the comments of, "She's so _____!" (sweet, cute, big, tall, and redheaded are the most common to complete the sentence). I think the cultural attitude of people paying a lot of attention to girls' appearances begins early!

Summer is Here!

I haven't decided if I like summer or not! I think it scares me now! It used to be my favorite time of year when I was a teacher and before kids. Then, I had a full ten weeks off of work -- and I still got a paycheck! I remember the glorious days of sleeping in, doing house projects, meeting friends for lunch, going to the movies, attending wonderful English conferences all over the country, reading stacks of novels, taking trips with Stuart, etc. It was such FREEDOM!

Now, summer means I have three kids age 6 and under with me 24/7 for the next 12 weeks! Yikes! It means no more mother's day out until September. It means having to find a babysitter for every haircut, dental cleaning, and any other significant appointment I have for the next three months. It means taking all three kids to Walmart which takes three times as long! It means that I will have to be very vigilent about limiting their television and computer time every day. Now . . . summer is work!

But, it also means that we can have more relaxed time together as a family. We can eat dinner outside on our deck. We can lay around in our pajamas until 9 a.m. and be less strict about bedtime. We can enjoy playing outside in the yard. I can indulge in my regular Sonic Cherry Limeades -- which always taste best when it's over 90 degrees outside! All of the activities have stopped for the summmer, and there is no schedule imposed upon us by school, cub scouts, soccer, etc. For me, that means that I create a schedule (ha, ha). No, really.

If you see Owen, you can ask him how his summer "schedule" is going! He seems pretty excited that we have a set weekly schedule for TV viewing time, computer time, scheduled reading, and daily homework review activites! I wonder where he gets that need for organization?

I also came up with a plan to take the kids on an "excursion" or field trip once per week for the every week of the summer (I thought they should at least have a little fun!). They listed some places that they wanted to go, and we picked one for each week, and put them on the calendar (spreading out the more expensive ones). We will also try to find friends to go on some of our excursions with us, so that the boys can have play time with other kids their ages. At the top of our list is Chuck E. Cheese's which we are going to next Monday! Then, we have Jump Zone (a place full of those inflatable jumping things), The Wonder Place, Splash Zone, painting pottery, bowling, the zoo, Mcdonald's playground, etc. I'm clipping coupons for admissions as I can find them, and I've limited the budget to $60/month. I think it will be a lot of fun to have a new activity each week. Arden might get left with a sitter for some of the activities (like Splash Zone) since she's too young, but for the most part I will be trying to take three kids with me! Pray for me! If you're up to joining us, email me, so we can meet up on one of our outings.

Today is Owen's last day of school. Yes, we are the mean parents who made him attend on the last two half-days which were make up days for snow. That's just the teacher in me ("If school is in session, then you are going to attend!").

I hope your summer is full of new adventures and treasured memories with your kids! As Owen says, "May the Force be with you!"