Summer at the Zoo with My Family

I really love our zoo membership year around.  In the winter we spend more time looking at the animals but in the summer is when they turn the water on and we can sit in the shade and have a picnic.  

We pretty much just walk straight to where this is and let them play for awhile.  If the weather isn't too bad we might visit the petting zoo but in reality, most animals are hiding away from the heat.

We love to bring along Ryan's best friend Georgie.  He's a great kid and he gets along with everyone in the family.  Him and Ryan are the same age and both just as goofy.  Chaz is soooo sad that his best friend moved away and that happens to him a lot.  :(  He was crying to me about it last night.  I wish I could just steal his friend for a week since he lives about 2 hours away.  If our cars were reliable right now I would even drive up there to snatch him!  LOL.

Sigh.... I love that my husband is such a family man.  He enjoys hanging out with all of us.  Back in the day, like way, way back in the day... neither one of us would've been okay with hanging out with a ton of kids just for fun.  Ha..

Chaz likes to take our picture.  Sometimes I wonder if photo taking would be good therapy for Chaz because he's really good at it and can get lost in it.  By the way, I'll be getting an updated evaluation for Chaz but it takes awhile to set up the appointment and wait to finally get him seen.  Sigh... sometimes dealing with it is a lot to handle and a lot to think about.  I get overwhelmed and sad just wanting Chaz to enjoy life and not deal with all the bumps in the road that his brothers don't have to deal with. Especially rejection from other kids.  I wish I could protect him forever...

Ashley has pretty blue eyes and she's excited about turning 5 this year and "going to school."  She asks me how many days almost every day and wants me to rewash her new backpack for her Friday school.  Soooo cute....

Juliet is hiding in the back of the stroller so you can't see her but there we are with an extra kid in the middle!  I wish each kid could've brought their best friend but then we wouldn't all fit in our van.

Ivy is growing up fast and is actually a really good girl.  She gets her emotional moments but she's a sweetie pie.  Here we were in the gift store and she tried on some funny glasses.  

Ryan and the boys are trying to wrestle and get Chaz into the water. Chaz loves to wrestle but I've always warned the boys that once you wind Chaz up you are now responsible for winding him down.  He will wrestle you till the son goes down and beyond.  LOL.

Summer Stress and Fun

Life has been good!  It has its ups and downs.  Right now, my husband just finished his last day of work and is currently looking for work.  Yikes!  Yep, that means NO PAY.  You bet I am nervous.  Everyday him and I are looking for work together.  I'm not looking for myself, just helping him.  His field of work is soooooo slow that everywhere he calls they aren't hiring.  So now we are looking outside of his field (which is Engineering).  He said he so wishes he had gone to school to be a programmer instead because they are doing better right now.  We even discussed him going back to school so he can work in that field.  We will see.  It would be really hard for awhile but in the long run it could provide more stability when the economy goes down like this.  Goodness, I hope we can find work and soon.  Please pray!

Life has been good in the sense that my kids are healthy and we are adoring Juliet!  With my last baby our crib broke when Ryan crawled in to read a book to Caleb.  He had been doing that for awhile but as he got bigger, the crib finally gave way.  Now he knows, no more crawling into the crib to read with little ones.  LOL.  Juliet has a gorgeous new crib and we decided to set it up in our bedroom.  We don't want any little ones crawling in so we figured it's safer for her first year.  After she turns a year we'll move her in with her big sisters.  They are excited and that also means they'll get the bigger bedroom that is now the playroom.  

Yesterday we took the kids to the mall and Charles was so proud to walk with us.  He's usually shy and doesn't like people staring at us.  He's finally starting to not care and just enjoy our time out.  People will stare when you are a larger family and we just have to get used to it.  I could help but chuckle when I was coming back from getting a coffee and I saw Charles and the kids heading towards me.  They looked like this large group laughing and chatting.  I was like, "whoa, that's a big family."  Soooooo cute.  Even recently Charles has been telling people who comment on his family size that he loves all his kids and enjoys every single one of them.  He said he couldn't imagine life without any of them.  That makes me smile because for awhile there he had a hard time with people's rude comments.

Who Forgets Their Own Children?

The oddest thing keeps happening to me.  I don't know whether it's because my memory is slipping or I just have too much to remember.  Yesterday we decided to take the kids to a small water park since they will all be closing soon.  I packed some sandwiches, Capri Suns, pickles, and chips.  Well, I made an assembly line for the kids and everything to have it all put together and then into the cooler.

We get to the park and later decide we are all hungry.  I pass out sandwiches and when I get to Ivy she has nothing.  NOTHING.  I had already scarfed mine down earlier.  I then asked who ate two.   Then it dawned on me that I had once again miscalculated the size of my family.  I made only 6 sandwiches which is short only one since baby Caleb was at my moms house.  But still!!!  I felt so bad because by the time I discovered this, everyone scarfed down their sandwiches.  

(Caleb had fun at my mom's house and got to visit with my dad when he got home from work.  It was a treat for Caleb.  When I brought him to the door and my mom opened it, Caleb opened his mouth and gasped he was so happy to see her.)

Later that night I thought it'd be a treat to break out the mini marshmallows and have hot cocoa.  Ivy even helped me to add the chocolate and I used my Keurig to fill them up with hot water quick.  When I started to pass them out I realized I was missing one cup of cocoa.  Yet again I had counted wrong.  We are not 7, we are 8!  What's wrong with me?  Poor kids.  Haha.  Caleb is almost 2 and I can't get this straight.  

Those Crazy Wonderful Summers

Caleb has it soooo easy around here

Today we went to a birthday party for a friend's kid and when dropping them off, we saw how cool of a place it was and didn't want to leave.  When we were there a friend asked us if we were so happy to have our kids going back to school now that summer break is over.

No way.

I enjoyed every bit of this summer and my only regret is not getting out more.  We just had a tough summer and couldn't do a whole lot.  We had plans for different adventures around town but mostly stayed in and just hung out together. I CAN'T believe they are going back to school in just a few days.  Sigh.  I don't know.  It just is so hard to think that they are gone ALLLLLLL day like that and don't get home till around 4pm. That's hardly any time I get with them.

Sigh.....again.

The girls put him in a padded basket w/ his
favorite cereal and carried him around.

Yet when I think about homeschooling, I fall short.  I have no problem homeschooling the younger grades but when they start getting up there, I worry that I could keep up with their training.  I'm 32 years old and I have an extremely short attention span already.  You should've seen me in school.  Teachers dreaded me because of my short attention span and extreme hyperness.  Getting me to sit down for hours to this day is impossible.  I-M-P-O-S-S-I-B-L-E. Ask Michele.  <--- Ha. I always tell you to ask her because she knows me more than anyone.

My days have NEVER EVER been busier than these last few weeks and I don't know why.  More than just my kids being here.  I think it's been more about decluttering and other odds and ends that are not part of a normal day.  Another thing is I've been really focusing on really listening to the kids when they talk to me. Even if it's something I think is silly.  I'll take the time to discuss it with them.  (Even if I'm holding back a smile because their issue is so small to me but SOOO HUGE to them.)  I guess it's harder being a parent that really builds a relationship rather than one who throws them on the back burner to watch the boob tube or do my own thing all day.  I really treasure our time together.  Sigh.  I just don't want to to go away for sooo many hours a day.  Wouldn't part time school be awesome?  Can't they cut down the hours some?  Often I lose track of what I was doing because I LET the kids interrupt my activity so they can show me something.  

It really has been a peaceful summer because no one broke a bone or got airlifted to the hospital for any reason.  I mean, Kyle did bash his face on a friend's door frame at her house.  He now has a permanent face dimple (right on his cheek).  Not sure what to do about that.  The doctor said you can only fix it by surgery.

I really like these pictures because it shows the activity in our living room.  Calie (my friend's kid staying over) playing a game, my son Kyle being himself by falling over, and his friend sitting on the couch.  The other 5 kids were running around outside the view of the camera.

Who Else Loves Breaking the Rules?

Has anyone had weird and crazy fun with their kids this summer?  For us it's just been staying up all night and playing.  We literally have our hours mixed around since it's so hot in the day.  We try to bypass part of it.  My whole family is not up till around noon and we go to bed around 4 or 5 in the morning.  It's so kewllllll.  Tonight, at 1am, I took my boys to Walmart so I could get some organizing things.  I'm sure it looked odd that a family was walking in so late and we were wide awake.

Do you ever feel like you are breaking the rules by not following the normal mommy book of do's and don'ts?  I feel guilty a lot. I mean, if you have a really strong bed, who says you can't jump in it with your kids?  I have not had one break yet.  Of course mine are all so little still.  Better jump some more while we can.  

Who says you can't skate in the house that is all tile?  We do because our windows are blocked off by the furniture and we don't keep breakables around here.  Where I'm from the heat is intense outside so we take everything inside.

In the morning we all wake up so groggy and in no hurry to do much.  The only issue I have is my coffee cup goes missing.  So in order to find it, I put up this post.

"Missing: My nice warm cup of coffee. If you know it's whereabouts please return to the owner. I fear for it's safety. For every minute that it's missing, the chances of finding a full cup become more slim"


About an hour later....


"Coffee cup found. Evidence shows all form of life was taken from it. I will have to go make another. Not to replace it of course. But I do need to move on."

8 Kids Ain't So Bad

I know I said "ain't".  I love that word.  Anyway, I had an extra 2 kids for 3 days and we quickly adjusted. I kept not making enough food because I was so used to cooking for 8 rather than 10. I try to not over cook for reasons of not wanting to get fat as a barrel.  I always make sure the kids get enough but I keep mine and Charles' portions small.  Now that I'm used to cooking for 10, I'll probably have some extra again.  Whenever we have kids staying over we always try to do lots of fun stuff. As if the Wii and PS2 and pool in backyard is not good enough.  Not to mention all the toys.  But still.....

Calie and Andrew (My friend's kids on left) spraying Ryan and Chaz

So we headed over to a splash park which is great because I don't have to worry about any pools.  Ahhh.... such a relief for me.  Baby Caleb was scared at first and kept running to daddy to get out of the sprays.  Even though I was right there.  After he cuddled Charles' chest, he finally ventured back out.  Once he did, we couldn't stop him.  Soooo cute....

Caleb feels safe next to daddy

I had a hard time letting baby Caleb try the slide.  8 years ago Chaz lost his two front teeth on that slide (below).  It's not as minor as it sounds.  He hit his face so hard that firetrucks and ambulance came.  He had to go to the hospital and have surgery and his face was deformed for awhile.  It was one of the most heartbreaking things.  Since then, they changed the slide from concrete to plastic to make it safer.  Little Caleb kept begging to try it yesterday and I agreed if we made him go slow.  I felt like I was gonna literally panic and started breathing heard so he didn't do it anymore after 2 times down.  It's a small slide and goes slow but the memories were too bad.  After that it was hard to get Caleb's attention from it since he kept toddling over back to it.

Ashley on slide

It's so relaxing there and it felt good to play in the water because it was SO HOT!!!

The waterfall is one of my favorite things there and we love to stand under it.  Of course I wore my lovely Voda swimsuit that they blessed me with.  Whoo hoo!!  I actually got a matching undershirt to put under it since it makes my ta ta's look so big. It's designed like that.  Normally I wouldn't mind but since modesty is an issue, I had to find something to put under it.  Just like a blue spaghetti strap undershirt.  Plus some cute swim shorts over the bottom. Truly, I love that suit.  No maternity swimsuits this summer!  :)  

Kyle

I actually loved having 8 kids for the last 3 days and I'm gonna miss it.  I didn't mind that everyone stared when we walked past.  In church we took a whole row.  When we first walked into church it was like a long time of people walking up the aisle.  It was quite funny.  Tee hee.... I'm gonna miss those kids now that they're gone.  Although as soon as kids leave my house, other kids always ask to come over. So there seems to always be a rotation going on.

The only thing that is hard is that when I have guest kids over and they don't know the rules, I have to watch out.  Over the last couple weeks of having kids over I've found toys and blankets outside all over the place. I don't let the kids bring toys out for a reason because the sun ruins them and I always have to throw it away.  Today I spent an hour throwing away tons of good stuff that got drug outside over time.  I need to make a list that I read to kids when they come over so they know the rules.  My kids are trained about that stuff but I shouldn't just expect guest kids to automatically know my rules of the house.  Calie and Andrew are great kids though and I loved their great attitudes.  I can tell that they aren't used to being around the noise of a big family though because sometimes Andrew would cover his ears.  LOL.

Truly though, I so enjoyed having them stay over and even invited them back over for another week.  Probably won't happen though since I know their mommy will miss them.  Tee hee...