So Saturday night I received a new calling. I am now the Laurel Adviser. I have been in primary FOREVER so this is way out of my comfort zone but I'm hoping I won't be too awkward and weird to work with these girls. I'll go to my first yw's activity this Wednesday so we'll see how it goes. Everyone keeps telling me I'll be great but...I think they're all just trying to boost my confidence.
Monday I took Steven to go get a Physical at a Minute Clinic. I had tried to get him in at a nearby doctor's but the wait time was too long. I'm hoping that he'll be able to join Cross Country this fall so these was reason for the physical. I still haven't heard much info on cross country yet but that's probably because they haven't found a coach for it. I'm super hoping they don't cancel it- I think it would be good for Steven.
Anyways the girls came with us to the Physical (Ben was at a friend's house) and it went smoothly. Me and the doctor exchanged life stories during the appt- I'm getting more and more like my dad- and I felt like she was someone I could be friends with. I think I had her as our doctor when we'd been there before for an ear infection. At one point Penny told me to stop laughing- apparently doctor appointments shouldn't be fun. At the end Steven declared that he passed his physical- so proud ;)
Monday night I was pooped from life so we went to Chili's for dinner. It is always nice to not have to cook and do dishes. The kids also inhaled two rounds of chips and salsa.
Tuesday was Penny's fifth birthday! She loves the color pink, cats, smoothies and playing with her sister (and her older brothers' friends 😬). She also loves all the things and wants every toy she sees. She still refuses to eat sliced bread (but loves garlic bread and banana bread 🤷♀️). She can be so ridiculously stubborn but she really gives the best hugs and kisses and I'm going to miss my little buddy when she starts school this fall.
The first thing she did after getting up on her birthday was open her presents. She got a Lego set and sword from her Hatch grandparents. From her Brady grandparents she got a train bank and planes. From us she got a breakfast playset and a Pretty Pretty Princess game.
After breakfast I had to take a pause from celebrating Penny and go to the open house for Steven's Middle School. Tyler had stayed home to watch the other kids so they didn't have to tag along. It started out real smoothly- no lines as we got his schedule, picture, ID card and book. Unfortunately when it came time to try and open his locker, things got real stressful. The combination didn't work and we had to find someone to come and reset it. But then it still was finicky about working. Steven got really frustrated and whined that he wanted to be home schooled because he couldn't figure it out 🙄 Things got pretty tense so we ended up leaving and taking a break from it.
After a big talk/lecture about not being a quitter from Tyler and me we went back and tried it again. Tyler recommended doing an extra spin to reset the lock and that worked! When Steven spun it around 3 times in the beginning, then it opened easily. We were able to leave with him feeling much more confident about his locker.
After that Middle School drama it was back to celebrating Penny. She wanted to see "Dora and the Lost City of Gold" so we obliged. It was a really fun movie- I enjoyed the jabs at the cartoon from my younger life and the kids liked the action and silly moments.
Before her party started I got some good pictures of her with her cake. She was actually the one who had found the Hello Kitty Cake Pan at Goodwill but she had found it after her birthday so Lucy had gotten to use it first. Lucy's had a purple bow but Penny wanted a pink bow for hers. Also, I am learning that Penny really likes cat things- this is her second cat themed birthday cake.
At dinner time we had her fifth birthday party at our beach with some of her friends- Eliza, Lucie, Peter, Jesse, Graham and Reed. The weather forecast had been flip flopping back and forth between rain and no rain and really stressing me out but as the party approached it had settled on only a 15% chance. I thought we were golden and it started out well. The kids arrived and we were having fun but our first hiccup came 20 minutes in when Tyler called to say that after he got the pizza his truck wouldn't start and he needed me to pick him up. So some friends held down the fort while I picked Tyler and the pizza up. As we were driving back the sky started to cloud over and after we had ate pizza and served cake, a storm was definitely approaching. We ended up rushing through the presents and calling it quits on the party. I was bummed to have to call it quits early and rush everyone out.
I had one friend that had arrived an hour late and my bleeding heart felt bad just sending her home a short while later so I invited her and one other friend back to my house (even though I was super exhausted). I had some backup games planned at my house (in case of rain) so we played them. We colored a bow and pinned it on Hello Kitty (Penny's didn't even make it on the poster board). Then we fed the cat fish (they had to balance goldfish on a spoon and feed it to a friend). And their last task was throwing stuffed cats into their sand buckets- I was trying to get creative here. They kids had fun and then ran off and played with all the new things. I think overall Penny had a good time, even if I found it all super stressful.
On Thursday I watched my friend's daughter, Piper. It was funny to overhear her conversation with my boys about crazy cousins and uncles and such family matters- they kept trying to one up each other (well my cousin kept trying to run me over with her quad...). After lunch we went to the Detroit Zoo. I had promised Penny she could see the butterflies so we did those first. Then it was on to the birds and penguins.
Afterwards the May family arrived so we met them by the fountain. At this point my kids + Piper were already complaining about being exhausted and ready to go home. I really hate the layout of that zoo because with the long walk from the one side to the other is very conducive to whining. But we still had a neat experience seeing the Polar Bears swimming about and we walked on the red panda bridge (where we actually saw a red panda in the trees) and we visited the reptilian house (and saw a snake with 'x' eyes).
Friday I attempted to run an errand to get some school supplies for Steven with all the kids. It was not so fun. Walmart was so cleared out and the boys were being so annoying (he touched me, he looked at me weird) it was frustrating. I hate that my older kids tend to be my hardest. Then that afternoon we had a lot of church friends over at our beach for a last hurrah. It was a little chilly at times when the clouds would cover the sun but the kids didn't seem to mind. They played in the water still and built many sandcastles. We ended up staying at the beach for 4 hours because everyone was so well entertained. This beach has definitely been a good benefit of this house.
Saturday we had two end of summer parties to attend. The first was thrown by the Primary. It had food, chalk to decorate the parking lot with, a "car wash" for kids to go through, squirt guns with paint to make pictures with, and boats to float in rain gutters. It was good fun. I left my phone at home so no documentation by me.
Our second party was thrown by my friend's Virginia and Ranell. They were super organized and I was real impressed- the had the kids divided in groups and then they rotated stations. They did a craft, did some science, had a sport's class and went on a giant slip and slide. At the end they all got to launch a rocket and have some yummy root beer floats. It was a lot of fun for the kids and I exhausted my own arms holding a baby for a friend (babies always show me how weak I really am).
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