Summer Kick-Off

June 5-7:  We started summer off with a bang... some fun activities on our first days off school...

 

Thursday:  We went to Ms. Pearl's.  Sadie doesn't get to go during the school year so this was her first time in a quite awhile.  Another bonus of going during the summer is that I don't have to rush to be home by 3.  I get to stay for the afternoon and help as needed.  We made it home around 4:30 and I didn't have any dinner prep so we headed to check out a new park we found out about in Shorewood.  The city recently did some updates and added a splash pad.  It was such a cute little park--a small splash pad, some climbing rocks designed for young kids, benches & big swings overlooking the river, a sand volleyball court (aka--giant sand box!), and a walking bridge over the river.  We spent a couple hours here before heading home for dinner.  That night we roasted hotdogs over the fire pit and created our 2nd annual summer bucket list.  We each member of the family pick three things to contribute.

I love Sadie's face in this picture!

Our neighbor, Ben joined our wienie roast.

 Friday:  We joined some moms & kids from our MOPS group at Blackberry Farm.  It is a "living history museum"--demonstrations of life from the 1800's/pioneer life.  It also includes a lot of fun attractions (pony rides, carousel, paddle boats, playground, peddle tractors, train & wagon rides, and more).  We went on a free day (the first of the season) and it was PACKED!  The weather was great but it was so busy.  Everything had long lines but that didn't stop us from having fun.  We ate a picnic lunch, rode the carousel and train with some friends from MOPS, rode paddle boats with a different group of friends, and spent the afternoon hours checking out the one-room school house, the blacksmith, and the weaver.  The kids also enjoyed the zip line before we left.  We decided that we definitely wanted to come back because we only got to do/see about half of what the park offered!

Saturday:  Marc had plans to help a friend re-roof his house on Saturday.  We knew he would be gone all day, so I made plans to take the kids swimming.  The weather wasn't super warm but they were so excited for our first swim of the summer that it didn't matter.  We started our morning with homemade chocolate chip pancakes.  We headed to Streator to swim at Ms. Jennifer's pool and couldn't leave without stopping at "Time Out" for ice cream.  On our way home, we stopped by Sarah & Eli to check out the progress on the roof.  Sarah & I took the kids to the park for a bit and we stayed for pizza and got home.  We were all exhausted when we got home that night!