Weekend Wrap-Up

How is it already Sunday night??!?!?!?!?

We had some fun this weekend!  Yesterday we decided to do an impromptu road trip.  We ended up buying a State Park permit for the year earlier this summer, so we went to Nerstand Big Woods State Park, a little under an hour away from home.  Luna came with too!

The girls all had fun running around the paths in the woods.

And we hiked to the Hidden Falls waterfall.  It was absolutely BEAUTIFUL.

On our way back to the car we had to hike up a big hill.  Guess which MOM beat all the rest of them up the hill by a lot???  Overall it was such a fun and beautiful day!

This morning we headed over to Auntie Yoda and Uncle Craigles house for brunch! 

Then we walked to a park near them for some outside play time.  It was another beautiful day!

We spent a lot of time swinging, too.  

This afternoon we went over to G-ma and Pa's house for some badminton and dinner.

Click here for some videos from the past week.

Finally...I’ll leave you with the comments from my children when I actually wear pants.

Have a great week!

A Picture Update

Happy Friday!  This week I was back at Work Monday-Wednesday.  Preparing for this school year is just absolutely crazy.  I'm thankful I'm not in administration because making plans that will please everyone is purely impossible and just ridiculous.  So my advice to any parents out there...please be kind to school staff.  They are working so hard and there are no good solutions.  Just be nice.  Assume good intentions.  Express gratitude.  Ok. There's my little soapbox.

Anyway...as I was masked up all day (bottom middle), the girls spent Monday at Boom's house!  There was lots of playing and art and fun!

On late Monday afternoon, the tree guys came out to take down the dying/dead/invasive trees behind our house.  The top right was before, the bottom right was after.  We definitely lost a lot of privacy, but we are hoping to make use of the extra space we have back there with some fun landscape stuff.  Hopefully someday (soon), anyway! The girls had fun watching them out Callie's window.

Tuesday through Thursday was a bit of the blur.  The girls hung out with G-ma and Pa, and they also met Auntie Hanna and Mitchell at the beach! And Pa set up water Olympics in their back yard.  So much fun.

Auntie Hanna and Mitchell came over yesterday afternoon for a little pink pool time in the shady front yard!  Those three cousins in the tub were pretty much the cutest. And Mitchell in our (decade old) baby towel was also the cutest!!!

Other things from this week...we did some back-to-school prep.  The girls' school had a technology pick-up day, so we went to get their chrome books.  We also went to get school supplies (the list was much shorter this year...) and watched a "Return to Learn Community Event" to learn more about what the Distance Learning program will actually be like.  It was riveting, as you can imagine. Ha!

This morning we met Boom for a picnic lunch and play time at Lake Harriet (including ice cream!) and then hung out a bit in G-ma and Pa's backyard.

And I’ll leave you with a correction. Pa caught that I mislabeled a baby on my Tuesday Timehop! 

That is definitely not 2020 Maya...it is 2020 MILA! It has now been corrected in the Timehop post from Tuesday. Gotta love back-to-work MUSH BRAIN.

Have a good weekend!

Timehop Tuesday

Happy Tuesday! First up, girls playing with toys in pools.

Maya’s goofy face:

And finally...Callie in 2010/Mila in 2020!

Weekend Wrap-Up

Well, that’s it for my summer. The girls have a couple more weeks and we are still very much in the dark what our actual fall schedule will look like.

As for the weekend...Luna was cute and the girls played with the boys. 

We went on a paddle boat with Boom.

The sunrise was pretty this morning.

And we enjoyed the hot, humid evening with family. 

Have a great week!

A Picture Update: Summer 2020 Week 11

Hello!  It is Friday!  On my last week of summer.  Sigh.  I don't think I have given a school update yet... so here goes.  Since I posted my rant-y school post in early August, a couple of things have happened.  First off, when I posted, there were really only 2 options for school: hybrid (going to school 2x/week) and fully online (a totally different school, have to commit for the year).  Then the district decided to add a third option called hybrid flex, so families could choose to start the year distance learning through their individual school (instead of through the online school) and move to the hybrid model when they were ready/comfortable.  So we decided to go for that model so the girls would start fully distant instead of hybrid.  I felt good about it, but a little bit guilty that they would be missing out on the in person stuff with teachers and peers.

THEN, this week, the district's school board voted unanimously to start everyone fully distant and NO hybrid option. So...I'm relieved. The girls were ok with distance no matter what.  They understood why we had previously decided no hybrid, but it still makes me feel better knowing that the district is taking steps to make sure everyone stays safe and healthy.

As for my school, most students will be doing distance learning, but will have the opportunity to come in to the building if they need support.  I will be working on campus 3 days a week and from home 2 days a week.  I have no idea how we are going to structure our weeks, but that is a problem for future us to solve.  At the moment, I'm going to just make it through going to work Monday-Wednesday next week with a few other staff members socially distanced and in masks and see how it goes...

Anyway, on to our week. On Monday the girls had their annual physicals, and then we enjoyed a beautifully morning/picnic lunch at Minnehaha Falls.  They even got to go into the creek for awhile.

Later we hung out at home outside, went toad hunting with the neighbors, and biked/walked to the park.

G-ma and Pa had the girls Tuesday evening through Thursday morning. So Tuesday night Chris and I went out for Mexican food and to hit some golf balls.  

The girls had so much fun on a "staycation" at G-ma and Pa's house.  They picked pumpkins at the neighbors' house, ate pancakes, went to the beach, painted rocks, and Maya even made an animal wellness center!

On Wednesday night Chris and I tried a new Indian place near our house (our favorite food by far) and I finished my puzzle!

I picked up the girls on Thursday morning, and they spent time cleaning the upstairs, and then we had a pool party, floaties and all!  Later they got in their hot pajamas for some reason, and had some crazy time (see video later).

This morning we met Jenna and the kids at the beach!  It was a gorgeous day for swimming in the lake.  

Click here for some videos from the past week!

Have a lovely weekend.

Timehop Tuesday

Here we go!

Three cousins 

And two sisters

Weekend Wrap-Up

Happy Sunday!  

The girls spent the day at Boom's house yesterday.  They met Lucy and Uncle Craigles for mini donuts, played and wrote Harry Potter fan fiction.

Then later Boom, Auntie Yoda, Lucy and Mila came over for another deck dinner!

It's always a riot trying to get a good picture of all four of them...

...and this one is pretty darn cute!

This morning included a 6am viewing of Jupiter and Mars, a sunrise run, reading on the porch, and a variety of art projects.

This afternoon consisted of fun at the beach!  We met G-ma, Pa, Uncle Dan, Auntie Hanna, Auntie Cat and Mitchell for a beautiful afternoon of fun.

Mitchell had fun in the water too!

And later he played with Luna and took a nap. 

Have a great week!

A Picture Update: Summer 2020 Week 10

Happy Friday!  I only have ONE MORE WEEK of summer.  I start back to work on the 24th and am trying not to freak out about it.  

Anyway...here's our week in a nutshell!

Monday: as you'll see in the videos at the end, we had a crazy storm on Sunday night that lasted all night long and ended up taking down a gigantic tree behind our neighbor's house.  But Luna and I enjoyed the sunshine after the storm on Monday morning, and we had fun exploring the downed tree on a walk that night.

On Tuesday morning we met Auntie Hanna and Mitchell for a walk and picnic at Woodlake Nature Center!

Let's see...on Wednesday Callie finally let me take out her starter earrings and change them to little hoops. Maya put together quite the outfit and the girls hung out in the porch.  Later, Boom came over for dinner and then we got to see a rainbow!

On Thursday morning the girls went over to hang out in Auntie Cat's backyard.  They helped her clean her canoe and a bunch of other camping things!  They enjoyed getting very wet in the process.

That night I went to my school's graduation.  It was a small, socially distanced crowd, but fun to see the seniors I worked with one last time before they move on.  While I was doing that, Chris and the girls went to dinner at Uncle Dan, Auntie Hanna and Mitchell's house!  Maya had fun carrying Mitchell around the house.  

Today Luna spent time staring me down to get my undivided attention about 85% of the day.  Tonight we went to our friends' house for a BBQ, and the girls got to drive their "four wheeler" around the yard.  They were STOKED.  Maya was also driven around by 2-year-old Mae and she was less stoked for that. Ha!

I'll leave you with a few videos...Maya being looney, some water balloon action, and the storms.  The last video of the storm was taken at 1:40am Monday morning.  There was not much sleeping that night. Crazy times!  CLICK HERE!