The summer sun is starting to shine, albeit intermittently here in Colorado. The neighborhood pool opened over the holiday weekend, but when we stopped in for a dip it wasn’t warm enough to stay for very long. But the early sunrise and late sunset mean our days are long and we find ourselves searching for things to occupy our time. We read a lot, and we keep up with our school work. We play outside, and we take field trips to local museums and places of fun. (Lots of places of fun. Check out the pictures.) And though the season’s not yet arrived with full, hot weather, we feel antsy. Waiting for it.
Tessa’s learned to ride a two-wheeler. We got her a new bike to celebrate the occasion and we updated the rest of our bikes with some cool duct tape decorating. She’s still practicing starting on her own, but she’s pretty good at stopping–which is nice. Baby really, really wants to master the bike riding skill (whether he wants to put in the work, though, to get there is debatable) to be like the big kids. He doesn’t get that we started on big wheels, then rode small bikes with training wheels, before trying the two-wheeler. But his determination might just get him there from the get-go. Stay tuned.
We’ve been to the Children’s Museum and the Zoo recently. We took a behind the scenes tour of the Tropical Discovery Area at the zoo, getting to meet some of the aquarium denizens. We fed a Komodo dragon some dead mice. Learned about poison dart frogs and Asian forest turtles. The zookeeper was super nice, listening to us talk about Tessa’s new bike and how we were going to Pop-pop’s after our tour to blow bubbles and eat popsicles. Asher napped for most of the tour. Mom and Dad thought that was a good choice on his part, as his attempt to climb in the Komodo dragon’s enclosure was met with a big, fat ‘No.’
We start a summer soccer league (each and every one of us) next weekend. We can’t wait for our shinguards and new soccer shoes to come in the mail so we can try them on and see exactly how awesome we all look kitted up. (Obviously, we will look super awesome. Of course.) The sessions are at an area rec center we just discovered. It has a trampoline area, a kids obstacle course, and a pool with a big water slide and whirlpool (as in, get yourself stuck zooming around and around and need to have someone reach in and pull you out, whirlpool). Outside it has a sprinkler park we haven’t tried yet and a zipline and climbing wall we aren’t big enough to try. Overall, a good find.
We are deep into the Percy Jackson and the Olympians book series. We like to talk about Greek gods and Greek heroes. It dovetails nicely with our Ninja and Zen studies. We talk about reaching our true-potential, knowing ourselves, and doing-no-harm. All good things. We aren’t sure why the Greek gods seems so mean, though. We got a ‘Brick Greek Myths’ book from the tooth fairy (Emmett lost another tooth!) which features Lego scenes depicting Greek Myths and some of those people just seemed to make one bad choice after another. Tessa said that if she were there, in the myth with those gods and heroes, she’d tell them all what’s up so that everyone can live a long, happy life. You go, Sweet T!
Our favorite babysitter from our old CO neighborhood is back home for the summer, fresh from her first year of college. She comes and plays with us, hanging out while we play in the backyard with bubbles, chalk, or squirt guns or zoom around the cul-de-sac on our bikes, and we really appreciate her help. Pop-pop is a regular here too, which lets Mom get out, which we also really appreciate. (At least Mom does.)
Weather forecast says 80s are coming, so we are hoping to spend some quality time at the pool. Emmett advanced in his swim level, and now both he and Riley are Stingrays, while Sweet T is still a Sea Turtle. Whether we hang out at the pool depends on how much they all apply their swim lesson skills while playing in the pool. Only Riley does that, at this point. And having three Pigs act like they can’t get in any water over their heads (thus necessitating either Mom or Dad to yell, “What are you doing? You know how to swim!”) can be too much for any adult.
Check back in and see how it all goes.
With love,
The Pigs
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