The summer is flying by!

If I haven't mentioned, the first day of summer vacation was approximately 100 hours long. Well, I blinked and now we are 2 months into summer vacation. Interesting.
Here are a few more snapshots.

Anna can now ride her bike! Last summer she occasionally sat on the seat, but now she pedals it around the sidewalk. She is definitely of the age where she wants to be outside A LOT and loves to ride and play catch....sounds familiar! All my kids at age 4 would probably be outside all the time if I had let them (or wanted to be out all the time myself). This week has been really hot, so I try to convince Anna to wait until the evening when things cool down.

Carolyn chose tennis for her sport this year. I especially love it because it doesn't involve school year games and practices. She loved her tennis camp and coincidentally it was led by one of Matthew's 6th grade teachers! He did a great job making it fun.

Matthew has become a photographer this summer. Be warned, when boys are no longer Cub Scouts things ramp up in a big way (money, time, responsibility) for Boy Scouts. Anyway Matthew has been working on merit badges and the easiest way to prove you did part of a badge is to take pictures. So Matthew has been photographing animals, the planetarium and his money making job. He must be enjoying himself, because I found this pic. on my camera today :)

We went to the Science Museum last week because it has the only Iowa Planetarium and Matthew needed to go to a planetarium for his Astronomy merit badge that he started at camp. This is an example of the Boy Scout ramping up as I mentioned before. Don't get me wrong, I like the Science Museum. In the past we have been members to the museum. This summer, however, with the huge expense of siding I would not have chosen to spend $38 for the day at the Science Museum. Alas we went to fulfill the merit badge and had a great time. Joel probably spent an hour (and I don't even think I am exaggerating) working at making his rocket. They then have a launcher and runway for the rocket. All the kids love it.

True confessions. Carolyn, Joel and I went to opening day of Harry Potter, book 7 part 2. Matthew stayed with Anna and went to see the movie with Ken the next night. My kids have seen almost no movies on the big screen. I think this relates to their expense, but mostly because Matthew's 1st movie was Finding Nemo and it scared him and he never really wanted to go to the theater. He saw Moster's Inc. (which is really not as scary as it sounds - it is a kids animated movie!) and then never went to the theater again until Harry Potter 6. The other kids have seen Alvin and the Chipmunks and Ponyo. I think that's it! I haven't seen a movie in the theaters since Harry Potter 6! Which means I did skip the 7th movie! (I just don't want you to think I am an out of control movie viewer.)

I REALLY wanted to see the 8th movie. I had been reading the books (we are on 5) with Joel and the kids are always playing 20 questions with Harry Potter trivia. Actually, for going opening day, it wasn't that busy because we chose the 1:00 matinee. People who were truly dying to see the movie went at midnight. I wasn't quite that obsessed, although I was a bit jealous. It is funny that I took the kids to see this movie, because I wouldn't let Matthew watch any of the movies until he complete each book. Joel is WAY younger than I would have ever considered letting Matthew watch the movies. I guess I decided to let him because Carolyn has read all the books and REALLY wanted to see HP at the theaters and Joel isn't really scared of film the way Matthew was. You can all just say, "it's because he's the 3rd child" and it probably is true. I am now a (re)lax(ed) parent occasionally. I must say the movie was FANTASTIC. I am one of the crazy people the reviewers talk about when they say, "move on now people". I am sad that I have read all the books and seen all the movies because I really did love them. I am soooo NOT a wizard type person, but I felt like HP wasn't really about that as much as about relationships, friendships and courage. I most liked that Harry found a family with the Weaslies and that Neville became the leader of the revolution at Hogwarts. I liked that the Weaslies were poor and material things didn't matter. I like watching the friendship of Harry, Ron and Hermione. They didn't have to be wizards, it was fiction and that was just part of it. Harry always did the right thing to help others and I ate it up.