Root Canals, Boredom & Fun Times

Last weekend my tooth that I had gotten a temporary crown on was super achy so I went in on Monday to get it checked out and...they decided I would be getting a root canal. It was just as I had feared! So on Tuesday I got to spend a couple hours hanging with the dentist. It was super fun. Especially when he hit my sinus cavity (or whatever that is called) and rinsed it out with whatever he was rinsing my tooth's root out with. And believe me that stuff did not belong in my sinuses. It was so painful and gross and since then my biggest pain has been my sinuses- not the tooth itself. I'm hoping that at least means that the root canal was successful. Fingers crossed!

The rest of the week was spent listening to various kids fighting and listening to Steven complain about how bored he is. I tried my best to entertain that stinker but he never failed to find at least one moment in the day where he was just SO bored! 

We took several walks to Milford Central Park this week (perfect weather here people, none of that nasty over a 100 degree stuff that AZ is suffering from). The kids loved how the slide made their hair go all crazy and Penny got to try out a swing for her first time. 

And of course we had to pick up some doughnuts at the bakery at least once this week:

Don't know why there are no pictures of Ben from these Milford adventures, must be a result of him being the middle child...

We also hit the Farmer's Market on Thursday and I had to buy strawberries. This picture does them absolutely NO justice. They are actually super red in color and the most amazing strawberries I have ever tasted!

Steven adores his baby sister Penny and is constantly trying to make her adore him too. He insisted that she wanted to read this LEGO book with him. It was a super sweet moment for approximately 2 minutes before she started trying to eat the book...

Twice this week, Lucy found my lipstick and put it all over her face. The first time was a silly mistake, I had it in the diaper bag. But the second time, I thought I had put it in a good high spot. Too bad she had pulled up a kitchen chair and had no problem accessing it again. Trouble:

This morning it was cloudy and 70 so I took my 3 oldest for a walk in Kensington. Some cranes were also taking a walk and they were not the least bit intimidated by us humans. They even got in on some of our pictures:

Seriously a beautiful day so I had to take more pictures:

Summers in Michigan are pretty fantastic. Now remind me WHY we're headed to Arizona next week for a month? I feel like you suffer through the Michigan winters for the reward of summer and now I'm missing out on my reward. Lame sauce! Weather aside though, I'm pretty excited to see all my AZ friends and family next week :) 

SCHOOL'S OUT!

Last Saturday our community had their annual picnic. The weather was perfect and with free hot dogs and free ice cream, there is no way we would miss it! I headed over early with the boys and Penny (Lucy was napping). The boys had a blast in the bounce houses and then we got our hot dogs and waited for a bazillion years to get a free ride on a horse. Tyler and Lucy timed it just right, arriving when we were just a few people away from our turn. Steven and Lucy had no problem getting on the horse but Ben had a bit of anxiety. I ended up walking with him and that calmed him down. After the horse ride, we got some ice cream and then they sat on a fire truck. Fun times!

On Wednesday Steven had his First Grade Celebration. We got to look at work they made throughout the year, they had an awards ceremony where he got the "Smarties Award" for being such a Smartie (obviously), they sang a super cute song called "What I am" and then we watched a fun slideshow. At the end they had some extra time so Mrs.Rupp asked if any of the kids wanted to say something. Some kids got up and totally cried as they told how much they loved first grade and how much smarter they had gotten. It was pretty adorable. Of course Steven was oblivious to the touching moment and was whining to me about how hungry he was.

First grade really has been a good year. Mrs. Rupp was a great teacher for him, his class was full of awesome friends (including 2 from church- the only 2 in kinder at Kurtz nonetheless) and he made good progress. I am glad that I made the choice to not have him loop up with his Kindergarten teacher, I feel like he was so much happier this year. 

Picking up Steven from school on the last day of school is a challenge- people park in the parent pick up line and then don't get into their cars until WAY after the bell has rung. As I was dealing with this frustration, I failed to notice that Lucy was squeezing the entire contents of a bottle of hand sanitizer onto her head and seat. She was pretty proud of herself and hey- her car seat has never been so sanitized!

After washing the sanitizer out of her hair, we headed to the Farmer's Market with my friend Tina and her daughter Maizie. The kids did a fun butterfly craft and had some yummy chocolate chip cookies (Penny also had a piece of the deliciousness).

Later that night Penny overwhelmed with her complete cuteness. She has been one of my most challenging babies giving me troubles with everything- nursing, sleeping, eating solids, being happy...EVERYTHING. Her adorableness is definitely her saving grace!

Saturday the library had its summer program kick off. There was hardly anyone there which was super nice. The  kids got tattoos, got their face/arms painted, made a superhero mask, and made a necklace. There was also a man on stilts who the kids found rather terrifying. It took them awhile for the boys to decide they were ok with standing near him. Lucy never got there.

The nice Librarian took a few pictures and shared them on the Library's website since I had failed to bring my phone and my camera.

Are you surprised the boys wanted Creepers? Can we say obsessed?

She didn't get any pictures of Lucy so I got a couple when I got home:

I'm not sure what that face is about but seriously, that face!

I got 2 girl's nights this week. Can we say spoiled? Wednesday night I went and saw "Pitch Perfect 2" with 2 ladies from the Ward (Ashley who is in the Primary Presidency with me and Mandi whose son is in Steven's class and whose daughter babysits for us- love her family!). It was a ridiculous movie and definitely not the cleanest movie but...still had some good moments. And Friday night I attempted to wrangle a group to go to the Cheesecake Factory but apparently was lacking in cool factor and only one person was nice enough to come. That's Ok because it was my buddy Laci and and she is super fun and we had a blast. I'm so grateful Heavenly Father sent her my way- she moved here in January. We really mesh well and she doesn't seem weirded out by my social awkwardness so I think we may have a winner here ;) All in all another fabulous week down! Now 14 more sleeps until AZ!!!!

Fun Times

My crazy Lucy absolutely loves her purple church dress. She wears it CONSTANTLY. She also loves to be like her brothers and she loves to put on all the things in her dress up bin. With all that in mind, the picture below is really no surprise. It pretty much is her in all her favorite things. Should we have let her go to church like this?:

I have been trying for what feels like forever to take the kids to Kensington Metropark. It is only 5 minutes away from us but things kept coming up that prevented us from getting there (rain, pink eye...). Well, on Tuesday all roadblocks were finally out of our way and we made it! There was no rain and the weather was gorgeous! We started off our fun morning at the Farm in Kensington. Lucy kept calling goats sheep, Benny loved petting an actual sheep and Penny was just full of smiles:

After seeing all the fun farm animals we headed down to the Nature Center and took a little walk down one of the nearby trails. The birds were out and singing and there were lots of chipmunks scampering about. Lucy had fun scaring away all the birds and chipmunks by chasing after them and she loved shouting "I see a birdy!I see wader"

The other morning Steven came into the house shouting "I found a frog!" I shouted "Get that out of my house!" He was super excited and wanted to keep it as a pet but I was a mean mom and instead convinced him to let it go.

Penny seems to be feeling much better this week but her eating habits still stink. She doesn't eat very much and she is very finicky about what she will eat. What she gobbles down one day, she won't touch the next. This week I got her to eat some ground turkey and slurp down some yogurt but like I said, both foods were pretty much a one time thing:

Because we just can't escape sickness Benny had a bit of a fever and runny nose this week and then woke up Friday morning with rosy red cheeks. 

I'm pretty sure he has Fifth Disease (because Steven has had that before) so that's fun. Supposedly it's no big deal unless you are pregnant and supposedly it's only contagious before the rash so I still took him out to our park play date that morning. Since it was our Ward's first official park play date and I have been the one behind arranging them all, I figured we couldn't miss it. He ended up getting spun around a bit too much on a merry-go-round thing in the hot humid heat and feeling sick (in addition to the cute red cheeks) so we left early. 

Thankfully after a little R&R at home he felt all better and was able to still go on the Father & Son camp out that night. He loved getting to walk on trails by the river and Steven loved getting to eat S'mores! And Tyler...well as usual tried to play Capture the Flag like he was 16 again and ended up hurting his knee. When is he going to realize he's getting old?