Livin' Mi Vida Loca (Version 3.0): Summer of Fun, Week of June 10.

While there were times this week when I thought I might just pull out my hair (everybody needs a little break every now and then!!!), the kids and me still managed to have tons of fun together! Summer is truly flying by for us!!

Only Emmy and Thatcher were home on Monday, so the three of us spent the day finishing up my one major (and only) project for the summer: a total house clean-out. Ben and I worked hard over the weekend cleaning out every closet and every drawer downstairs as well as converting our guest bedroom to more of an office space and I finished with the upstairs on Monday. It took FOR-EV-ER, but it is so nice to have it finished! We threw away tons of junk and still have tons left over for a garage sale. (It's happening this Saturday if you're interested!)

This sweet girl sure does look cute but don't let her fool you: she's an awful organizer. I'm quite certain she added at least an hour to my work time. :) Everything got done, though, so no worries!

On Tuesday, we made our third trip to the doctor's office in less than two weeks. Had was showing a few signs of a UTI infection, so we scheduled a mid-morning appointment to get things checked out. Everything turned out fine (yay!) and we made sure not to let the office visit spoil our fun for the day. Because we scheduled a mid-morning appointment, we headed over to a playground close to our pediatrician's office to get a little outdoor action in before things got too hot.

The kids had a blast swinging! I promise Emmy was all smiles in there...

Both of my girls inherited my sweat gene. I hope they don't hate me for it later in life.

And this sweet boy chilled in the shade. Love him, love him, love him.

Wednesday morning brought our fourth appointment of the summer: a dermatologist's visit for Harry. Because this appointment had actually been planned, I didn't have to drag all four kiddos to the office with me. Babe and Thatcher hung out with Auntie while Harris, Emmy, and me made the office visit. Thankfully, Harris and Emmy are two peas-in-a-pod and made the most of our time there.

We made it back to Auntie's in time to catch a few of the "home movies" they were watching and then we all headed over for one last visit to our local Monkey Joe's (it's closing in about a week). We don't go to Monkey Joe's often but always have fun whenever we're there. Even with Auntie's help, keeping up with everybody required all of our attention...especially because Doe was a fan of the big slides, too. I managed to snap the following two pictures. I'm pretty sure they capture the only times during the entire morning that the girls were still. Harris was moving the entire time. :)

Just to prove that we do, in fact, spend time at home, here's a shot of the older three enjoying their morning "screen time" while waiting for breakfast on Thursday morning. I'm pretty certain they're watching a "Tom and Jerry" DVD in this picture. They tend to rotate between "Tom and Jerry," "Mickey Mouse Clubhouse," and the History and DIY channels.

After breakfast, Granti came over and we headed to a local park to check out their new-to-us water feature. I'm not sure what to officially call the structure, but the water is about ankle-deep and the structure consists of two pond-like bodies of water connected by a few different creek-like sections. We'll definitely be making a return trip. :)

Because Granti was with us, Thatchy-Buddy didn't spend the entire morning in his car seat. :)

Not that he ever minds.

Granti was also smart enough to bring a bag full of plastic army men for the kids to play with in the water. And trust me, they played and played and played with those things!

Babe also had fun pretending to be Ariel. At least this time I got to be Sebastian instead of Ursula.

It was a super fun morning! The kids even spent a few minutes on the adjacent playground before we headed over to Johnny's to have lunch with Auntie.

Thursday night was Game Night at our house. Unfortunately, Harris chose not to eat his dinner. Not eating dinner is really not a big deal around here. The kids know that if you don't eat, you don't get dessert and you go to straight to bed. We don't fight or argue about it and it rarely happens. I honestly think Harry was pretty wiped out because he ended up going to sleep pretty quickly.

Ben, Babe, and I had a fun time playing The Disney Princess Game, though. I won again, which means my Summer Family Game Night record is 2-0. Not bad.

Friday was Harris' birthday. In addition to our traditional birthday celebrations (separate post to come soon), we decided to check out the Archaeobus at the library.

Our first stop was the tattoo station. You can't go wrong with a tattoo around these parts.

We then spent some time checking out some of the exhibits that were set up. Babe and Harry LOVED the fact that most of the artifacts on display were from the Native Americans that lived in Georgia during the 1600s (I think). They have really been into Pocahontas this summer (we've googled her and everything!) so to see "'real" Native American stuff was cool for them.

They even got to try their hand at piecing artifacts back together (it was tough!) and "digging."

And then we climbed on the actual bus to see even more artifacts! The whole thing ended up being a lot more fun than I had anticipated.

Of course, no trip to the library is complete without a little computer time. Emmy had fun watching this Elmo game while Babe and Harry selected their books. Trips to the library are a weekly outing for us during the summer...I love reading and want my kids to love it as well!