A Wrap-Up of Our Summer Staycation with the Kids

I just returned home from a wonderful four day weekend celebrating our 38th Wedding Anniversary.  We had the most amazing time in Door County, and I can't wait to tell you all about it...next week. 😀. Today, I'd like to wrap up our week with the kids and grandkids when they came to visit this summer.

Celebrating Birthdays

I chose an animal theme for their birthday party and it was a complete disaster.  I was trying to keep a generic theme since the three of them are different ages and sexes, but Alethea wanted a princess theme, and Atticus wanted a action figure theme, and Elisha didn't seem to have an opinion. I think Lazarus appreciated the decorations the most, and it wasn't even his birthday. 😁. Next year, I think we'll just skip the decorations entirely.

Atticus and Alethea are summer babies and Elisha is a fall baby and Lazarus is a spring baby.  So, for the time being we celebrate the three oldest grandkids birthdays mid-summer and Lazarus' in the spring when we go to their house.

They always enjoy opening presents...but what kid doesn't?

I think Alethea's favorite gift was this make up kit from her paternal grandfather.  It wasn't something I would have chosen for her, but she sure did love it!

We were so busy running around all week I didn't have time to make a proper birthday cake, so we just purchased some simple bakery from the grocery store.

Swimming at the City Pool

Eau Claire Wisconsin has an amazing city pool with very reasonable admission prices so we spent one day there.  The kids LOVED the water slide.  I couldn't even count how many times they went down it.

It is so nice to have a pool that is surrounded by grass and trees so you can have some reprieve from the sun.  I enjoyed laying down and looking up at the sky through the leaves.  I soaked it in.  Summer is short here in Wisconsin

The pool doesn't open for public swimming until 1:00 pm so we had lunch at home, but then I brought lots of snacks for them to enjoy too.  

Chilling Time

Remember back in April when I shared My Newly Redecorated Family Room?  Well, I said in that post that we needed a better seating arrangement for our growing family so I bought a new sectional and made some other changes to the room so there would be space for everyone.   The little ones (and the adults) really liked the changes I made;  they enjoyed my new sectional and the kids no longer fought over seating, because every seat is comfy as you can tell by the photo below.  The entire family fit on the sectional, so if my daughter doesn't have any more kids, and my son never marries, we should be good for a while. 😀

4th of July

4th of July was a scorcher this year, making it a little more difficult to enjoy, but we managed.  We took the kids to a nearby city for their 4th of July celebration, but we didn't stay long because of the heat.  They really enjoyed the inflatables; especially the water slide.

We struggled to find a spot in the shade for the parade, but we managed to squeeze on this corner. 

The kids love the parade because they give out so many goodies!

The boys always enjoy the big trucks and tractors, although the noise seemed to bother Elisha a bit.

Grandpa got us all malts from the VFW booth to cool us all down.  They were delicious!

We don't have marching bands, big balloons, and all the other bells and whistles the big city parades do, but Buffalo City is sure creative with their parade entries.  This big teddy bear on the gurney was the cutest!

We loved these blow-up farm animals too.

They gave so many things away at the parade, including this plush beanie baby.  Isn't that incredible?

What's a small town parade without a small town princess?

Love these Dalmatians!

The grandchildren loved the frozen popsicles they threw from the floats.

Atticus and Alethea eagerly waiting to see what's coming next.

Later that night we went to our local fireworks.  I bought the grandkids a bunch of phosphorescent toys to play with as they waited for the fireworks to begin.  I love these toys! So much safer than sparklers.

Even Baby Lazarus enjoyed the glow sticks.

We were super impressed with the fireworks this year.  They had ones that landed on the lake and then twinkled or exploded.  Those were everyone's favorites.

I've included lots of short videos for you to enjoy if you wish.

 Next week, I will start my Door County series.

Have A Great Day!  Amy

Linking Up with these Fabulous Blogs HERE!

A Holiday Week Full of Fun

Hello! I'm popping in today to do a brief lifestyle post.  I had planned to have had  this post written yesterday already, but we had yet another summer storm move in and knock our power out for ten hours.  I am growing very tired of summer storms, but I know, it could be a lot worse than other people are experiencing throughout the country, so I will count my blessings.

I hope everyone had a great 4th of July.  Just like last years, our 4th of July was a wet one and the fireworks were cancelled once again.   But we were determined not to have the kids miss the fireworks two years in a row, so we found a nearby town that rescheduled them for Friday night, and we went to their firework display...which was far better than our own town's which always cancel in rain and does not reschedule.  😡

Unfortunately, we did have to sit behind a light pole, as all the best seats were already taken, but we still had great views!

We really enjoyed all the effort this small town did to make the fireworks family friendly...especially for young children.  They had food and drinks available at reasonable prices, a live concert, and they brought in both motorized and unmotorized toys for the little ones to ride in.  Alethea had fun pushing Elisha around in this scooter:

My daughter held baby Lazarus the whole night.  He slept peacefully through the whole fireworks the entire night.  And my son Jordan is just being goofy for the pictures.  He told me not to post this photo on Facebook, but I did anyway...ha ha.

Elisha had so many different scooters to choose from, but I think he liked the pink motorcycle the best because he kept going back to it again and again.

Grandpa pushed Alethea on the swings.  In the distance you can see the motorized scooters for the bigger kids.  They set up a race track for them so they were contained in a specific area.

Atticus played mostly on the jungle gym/slide area, but he also took some time out to ride the vehicles.

Because all the 4th of July festivities were cancelled due to rain, we decided to celebrate the grandchildren's birthdays that day.  We celebrated all three at once even though their birthdays are in different months, that way no one felt left out.  Plus, we won't see them on their actual birthdays anyway.

Alethea insisted on dressing up as a princess for her birthday and Elisha did not want us to light his candles.  I guess it's always a good thing for a little one to be fearful of fire.  He did not care for the fireworks either.  He spent the entire firework display burrowed in Grandpa Todd's chest with his ears covered, but thankfully he didn't scream or cry like a lot of little kids do.

It's getting harder and harder to shop for this crew as they already own everything under the sun.  Atticus just wanted craft supplies, a water bottle for school, and an electric toothbrush.   Elisha got train tattoos, a learning book, and Scribble Scrubbies (for the life of me I do not understand the attraction of that toy, but the kids love them).   Alethea asked for a Polaroid type camera of which I thought was ridiculous with all the technology we have today in our phones, but that is what she really wanted, so I bought it.

I gave them each a handmade card, but I can't show you any of them because I also designed them for the Dirty Dozen gallery on Splitcoaststampers and I am not allowed to show any of those cards for six months (see THIS POST if you missed it or want to know what the Dirty Dozen gallery is).  It's gonna be a long six months, as I can't wait to post them on my blog.  

We had ONE nice sunny, HOT day while the kiddos were visiting so we took them to the pool.  I wish I had pictures, but when you have four little ones, it gets harder and harder to take pictures because we're always chasing after one of them.  My daughter took this beautiful selfie of herself and baby Lazarus:

And I took this one as I lay on my back in the shade after swimming with little one's for a while.  It was so nice to see an almost clear blue sky again.

One of my oldest and dearest friends came over to see the grandchildren.  She has known Ashley since she was in Kindergarten but she never met the grandchildren.  It was such a special day.  She was the one who took the photo, so she is not pictured.

We took two trips, one to the Circus World Museum which I wrote about in this week's travel post HERE, and the other to Olbrich Botanical Gardens, which I wrote about last year HERE.  Last year my husband and I went to Olbrich for our anniversary in August.  This year we went the first week of July and I couldn't believe how different it looked as there were so many flowers in bloom that weren't in bloom in August.  So if you haven't been there yet, I highly recommend going in July.

My grandchildren are finally learning how to pose for the camera, which makes life a lot easier for me. 😀

However, getting them to all pose perfectly together is another challenge!  😀. I wanted all three of them on the elephant at once, but they insisted on each having their own separate picture.

Atticus

Alethea

Elisha

Like I said earlier, pretty good posers for the camera, eh?

They loved climbing the tower in theTower Garden.

This was the one and only photograph taken of me during this week.  I had to have one taken to prove, yes, grandma did exist ha ha!

These red winged black birds were fiercely protecting their nests.  I was actually surprised to see them in the gardens as they are usually near ponds/rivers.

However, there were man made ponds nearby filled with gorgeous water lilies so maybe that is what attracted the red winged black birds.

I absolutely LOVED this white shade pot display.  I purchased the variegated begonia plant in the middle this year and I just love it.  I also have the fuzzy trailing plant on the bottom.  That one I actually bought last year and took some cuttings of it and it rooted over the winter in the house so I was able to use it again outside this spring.  I don't have a white caladium, but after seeing this display, I might have to get one.

The herb garden used a lot of bamboo to create interesting supports and architecture.  I'm gonna have to buy me some bamboo too!  That is Elisha walking in the distance.

The clematis at Olbrich is incredible!  This is just one of the many clematis vines we saw.

There were so many varieties of heavenly, sweet lilies in bloom!

These Trumpet Lilies were especially impressive.

I loved the white cosmos.  I know it's such a simple, common flower, but it's so pretty.  I managed to grow some pink cosmos in my yard this year and it did really well.  I'll show you that in a future garden post.

I thought this was interesting how they utilized a dead tree...they filled the holes with tropical plants! I will have to remember that next time I have an unsightly tree stump in my yard.  I usually just stick a pot on top until it naturally rots away on its own.

We were so disappointed that the pavilion in the Thai Garden was all covered up.  My daughter saw pictures of it last year on my blog and really wanted to see it in person.  But they are doing renovations on it so it was covered in white plastic. 😢. You can see a peek of the white plastic covered building in the background of the above photo.

I thought this bottle brush plant was so pretty!

This fountain wall is part of the Tower Garden

I was excited to see this plant because I own it and I never know how to prune it.  It's the kind of plant that gets very leggy if you don't prune it.  But what was also interesting about this plant is how huge it is and the stems looked like wood!  So now I now what my little plant is capable of.  I also put mine outside in the summer and bring it indoors in the summer.

The same with this spike plant.  I had no idea you could grow/prune these spike plants to look like this!  I will have to try it myself.  This is a plant that's usually sold as an annual accent plant in the spring, but you can overwinter them as houseplants.  I've had problems with this plant in the past (losing its lower leaves and such) and now I know I can just let it and hopefully it'll turn into a tree like this.  This and several of the examples shown above are one of the many reasons I love to visit botanical gardens to get ideas for my own garden!

Well I hope you enjoyed my lifestyle post of the grandchildren's visit.  We won't see them again until fall, but I have a trip to Yellowstone before then, so hopefully it won't feel so long.  It's always so quiet when they leave, but it's nice to have life return to some order too.

Have A Great Day!  Amy

Linking Up with these Fabulous Blogs HERE!