Happy Birthday Week, Dear Alex!

 Both of my kids are officially teenagers, as of today! Alex has always been my county fair baby, so he is used to being flexible with his celebration. I haven't been the 4-H Agent in four years but we still shuffle around work things. 

All this to say, yesterday I left for a work conference and Alex just rolled with it. Granted, I made sure he was thoroughly spoiled all week. On Wednesday, we had our family celebration. This year that has consisted of the restaurant of the birthday person's choice and cake and ice cream at home. Alex picked Texas Roadhouse and had steak and shrimp, his favorite! 

On Friday he had his "friend" party and three of his buddies went to Cici's pizza and Skyzone for a night of pizza and jumping. Grandma Rosie kept me company while they jumped for every bit of their 90 minutes. It can be hard to get your friends together when you have a summer birthday, but Alex's buddies always pull through. He is also planning a sleepover for his dad's house. I'll let Kelly stay up all night. LOL 

And on the eve of his 13th birthday, I made him birthday pancakes! He is so sweet, when I told him I would be in Kansas City for his actual birthday he said, "We can just pretend like Saturday is my birthday!" 

I've got some great kids, they are understanding, empathetic and still take wrestling in the living room too far at 16 and 13! Just keeping it real, right before I left the house they were both in trouble for beating on each other in not a nice way. Boys. Oh well, three out of four days of being nice to each other isn't bad!

We didn't have 13 candles but 1 and 3 will do the trick!

Daryl decorated Al's cake for him, peanut M&Ms were a great choice!

On your birthday, you get steak! 

After 90 minutes of jumping these guys were so sweaty! LOL 

One eye open for his birthday pancakes. This was not early!
I called him down at 8:30am. LOL

Camp Week! (Last Week)

 Last week four of our five kids were at camp. Four different camps! 

Lucas was at Sternberg Science camp all around Northwest Kansas. He went last year and he really enjoys it. Anna was at Rock Springs 4-H Camp. It was fun to drop her off as I have not been to Rock Springs in 3 years. It has changed a lot. She had fun and wants to go back next year. Joseph had Zoo camp at the Topeka Zoo. He doesn't get to stay over night but he has been going most of the summer and he will know the zoo better than the rest of us! Alex had his first session of Tennis lessons at Kossover. Not technically a camp but the closest thing that he would let me enroll him in. 

Since the kids had a week of having fun, Jeff and I decided last weekend it was our turn. We had our "summer camp" at The Elms in Excelsior Springs, Mo. I have been wanting to visit The Elms for awhile and it lived up to all of my expectations. The grounds are very cool, we enjoyed the spa, indoor pool and piano bar. It was a couple of days of just relaxing and it should get us through the second part of summer!

Our kids activities won't be slowing down, but that's ok, we are ready! I did really bad with pictures during all of our busyness! I can't believe I didn't get shots of the kids being dropped off for camp. Oops! 

A part of our relaxing was reading time. I have finished my first book for May!

Happy 4th of July!

This long weekend was needed; yesterday, I got a recharge from my friends, and today I have gotten all the things done. On the 4th, we always start in Potwin to see the parade, then shrimp boil at my best friend's house. We came home and did some fireworks, took a nap then went to Lake Shawnee to see the big show. I have lived in Topeka for 18 years and have never ventured out of town for this show. We did it, and it was fun! 

It was nice to sleep in today, and I get to do it one more time tomorrow! The 4th of July on Friday might be the best. :-) 

July 2024

Trying to recreate the photo in 2025! 

Decided to watch the fireworks from across the street so we could get out of traffic!

It more-or-less worked. 

It was a great show!