Vacation Day 1: people arrive

For a week or two before our guests arrived Isaac had it in his head that he wanted to make name tags for everyone.  I was kind of hoping that he'd forget about the project, but he persevered.  He finished them up, minus names, just before the first guests arrived.

He made himself a green one with a star, since he had done all the work making them.

Joshua also showed off his sleeping closet for the next week.  It worked very well.  There was already plenty of stuff in our room (ahem, clean laundry that wasn't put away) and so it gave us a bit more room.

The first family got in late morning.  We just hung out, took a few walks, and napped until the other two families arrived right around dinner time.  By the time dinner was done it was more or less time for the kids to go to bed.  The adults talked for a while after that, but we all went to bed at an almost reasonable time.

Wednesday: story time

Story time was quite hilarious again today.  I like the new leader.  All the kids got to hold a puppet (and somehow there was enough for everyone that wanted one.)  So Joshua was moving this mouse all around and Puppy Dog had a dog and it was fun to watch.  The theme today was Scotland, so he kept dropping into a Scottish brogue.

We also had thunderstorms this morning!  And Aunt C came over to spend a few hours with the boys.  It helped me get caught up with grading (since I slacked last week) and get things around the house a bit more figured out.  Two medium sized boxes of toys are destined for donation, along with a few of the larger ones.  I didn't mark all the small kid things for giving away, but there are still some that I have my eyes on.

Tuesday: misc

Joshua made a rocket this morning.  It has a lunar lander inside of it.

I froze two containers of pulled pork.  The labels on the two lids I pulled out already said pulled pork.  Score!

Monday: no more vacation

Today was the first real day of no vacation.  I'll be honest, it felt a bit rough.  I think it is somewhat because I have a lot on my to-do list again and I was a bit tired.

Anyway, we did make it to a library event about owls.  I think Isaac enjoyed it, but Joshua got bored half way through and just played under my chair for the rest of it.

The boys went up to feel some thing individually, but ended up next to each other as they were waiting.  I like how Isaac's arm went around Joshua's.

Sunday: upstairs church

Joshua moved from nursery to upstairs church (3&4yrs) today.  I know it's a bit early, but I got an email last week that summer might be a good time to move him up.  Isaac said that he'd be fine with Joshua joining him and Joshua wanted to go.  They both had a good time.

Joshua was also very excited to see the "big" bed in his room.  He looks so small in it.

Isaac wanted to sleep in the closet tonight.  He called the closet his hideout.  Guess he enjoyed it. :)

Saturday: gone

The last of our guests left tonight.  It was a really good vacation and it was sad to see them go.  Isaac also asked if we could do it again sometime, so I think both boys enjoyed it too.

I'll try to do a recap here soon.  I think I have several things to catch up on.  I'm pretending that I'll have more time now that I don't have to get ready for this vacation, but I'm not really sure why I think that.  There are still several things to get back to normal, several things that I've wanted to do for a while and have been holding off on, and then the normal things.

There was one thing I would have changed about the vacation though; I would not have put Flurry's water fountain in our master bathroom.  I moved it (and her food) so that she would be able to eat without braving the possible chaos.  However, it made me think that the faucets were running or the toilet was running all the time.  I apparently sleepily asked Ben several times if the toilet had actually stopped flushing when he came to bed.

Isaac and Joshua have moved out of their sleeping closets (which worked very well) and are having a sleep over tonight in Isaac's room before Joshua's bed gets moved to his room tomorrow.

Tuesday: happy 4th of July!

Happy 4th of July!  We have friends over and I've been having too much fun to post.  There will be a summary post later.

However, today we went to Dutch Village (twice) and had some backyard fireworks.  Most people went to see the city fireworks, but Joshua and I stayed here.