once upon a time on the dock, and other late night shenanigans

360's off the dock=

our afternoon movie

above:

once upon a time there were two kids on a dock,

and a mom on a lounge chair on the deck.

one day when the sun was piping hot,

a boat came into the no wake zone with a wake boarder on the back.

it made the dock wobble,

and papa ryan came out a'yellin.

"my babies are down here! no wake within a hundred feet of the dock!"

he pointed at them, and they didn't like it.

this of course made the wake boarding boat very angry,

so they cursed the silver papa and pointed back at him.

the silver papa then looked at the mom on the lounge chair with a very proud and noble face,

you know, like the face of a man protecting his own, and said,

"yeah, they tend to do that when they know they're wrong."

and then he went inside to cook us some very merry bbq chicken and corn on the cob.

leaving the two babies and the mom on the lounge chair in an awkward silence with the wake boarding man cleaning up his boat for the day.

the end.

also, the boys brought over all of the paddle boards from the broke down house {did i forget to talk about my parent's lake house flooding so we stayed in rentals this whole week? well, yeah, it did and we did.}

and then we went on the traditional cocktail cruise,

where adam and kelsey decided that they never wanted to have kids ever,

and the kids ran from the front of the boat to the back of the boat every 2 seconds.

kind of like the dog.

i want more kids, and no dogs.

and brennan asks me daily when i will ever change my mind.

and could he maybe have a snake or a tarantula if he can't have a dog?

or just until he can have a dog?

and i ask you, how did an animal lover such as myself grow up to not want animals?

my answer: if humans are waking me up in the night then a dog definitely is not allowed to.

also, it snows in utah in winter and i don't like pet hair on my stuff.

{above: auntie K and max}

above: all ryan's present and accounted for. the only night this happened. it was awesome. when we got home, we put the kids and grandparents to bed, and i made everyone else play 31 with me inside until midnight {card game--i play for blood. or quarters. whichever.} kelsey fell asleep between drawing her cards, adam ate pb dipped oreos with me and whined about the music i was playing, and sean, well sean just listened to all of our stories about how kelsey and i ditched adam at a fair in iowa once to go hang out with boys, and also how adam got punched in the face outside a bar and then chased down by himself by a pack of iowans.

memories:)

also, chase made us all sea sick when he insisted on driving us in circles out on the cocktail cruise.

i almost barfed.

no, really.

"if you take a mouse to the movies..."

the women took the kids 

to the movies.

and the men went to applebee's to watch the world cup.

brennan didn't move a muscle the entire movie,

max got bored about half an hour before it was over,

and chase discovered a new and convenient way to eat popcorn.

i just kept thinking,

"if you take a mouse to the movies..."

or a toddler.

whichever;)

lessons from AC.

Cocktail Cruise lessons from Uncle AC.

with rum and milk.

or something like that.

...

step 1

step 2

step 3

step 4

boo-yah.

the day we conquered BIG BERTHA.

scariest water slide 

we've ever faced.

sean was sent to clear the path.

we heard rumors it was really dark in the middle and that the house keeper's daughter once lost a toe nail in it.

so basically it scared the crap out of me.

never had any intentions of going down it myself.

fully planned on cheering on sean,

maybe encouraging brennan into it,

and calling it a day.

and then max went down right after sean.

which made brennan want to go.

followed by brennan bullying me into it.

using my own words against me.

ha!

"mom, if you don't go today, you'll never get to go.

you'll miss your chance, and you might regret it.

just do it. you'll be glad you did."

-brennan

and then i went down it 6 more times before my dad called us up for dinner.

we conquered bertha.

and she bettered our courage.

and it was such a great day.

the swimming hole

"mom, mom, mom! i saw this in a movie once!"

and then he jumped off the front of the boat.

{if your friend jumped off a bridge his name would be brennan.}

...

the swimming hole.

where you jump off the boat,

swing into the lake on the rope swing,

and push the boat away from the shore when the wind blows it too close to the rocks.

once a day.

every day.

above

 dad: "what's is called when someone does that?"

me: "photo bomb."

dad: "oh yeah, yeah" as he chuckles and walks off.

note: baby with orange ear plugs on my shoulders. basically he tore them out 

and screamed about them until we finally gave up 

and decided that he doesn't like to put his head into the lake water anyway.

also, we rescued a boat from absolute death and towed them to safety. 

it was thrilling.

after 10.5 hours in a car.

when you're trying to go on vacation 

someone always has to lock your bathroom door 

with no one in it. also, please note dirty moldings.

all areas standing 3-4 feet tall look this way in my house.

...

i give you...

The Lake House

after 10.5 hours in a car 

with a 6 yr old, 4 yr old, and 2 yr old.

then we fed them all bowls of reese's puffs and put them to bed.

with the magic twirling aquarium lamp.

my story about when summer really got going.

i spent most of june breaking up fights between my kids,

getting them to make their beds,

put their breakfast dishes into the dishwasher,

and their jammies into the washing machine before lunch.

we got used to swimming lessons,

sunscreen,

and going to bed waaaaaaaaay too late.

like 10pm every night.

or 10:30.

whichever.

and some nights i would turn to sean and tell him how much the beginning of summer stinks like moldy cheese,

and how was i ever going to survive without kindergarten every morning to send brennan of to???

because brennan without a routine is like a firecracker pointed at the crowd.

no really.

it's not pretty.

 but then there was this one day at the end of june 

where our friends had all gone home from the pool,

gigi brought out suckers,

and the sun fell behind the fence.

and there's just this beautiful thing that happens to the family yard pool water at dusk.

it changes from turquoise green that has served you well all day, 

into this glowing silvery blue.

and you know that you aren't going to have to put sunscreen on your babies for the rest of the day.

and that your kid are going to be so distracted by the bath water which the family yard pool produces at such a time of the day, that they will forget about needing to eat dinner, watch tv, say they are bored,

and for five minutes they 

might

NOT

even 

argue:)

and they will share licks of their suckers with each other. 

and that's when it hit me.

we had made it into our summer groove.

GLORY BE.

i all of a sudden knew i never wanted summer to ever end!

where we swim all day, 

have no plan for dinner EVER,

go to bed after 10 every night,

and sleep in until 9 every morning.

the point where you wonder how getting kids off to school in the morning 

was ever something you looked forward to doing.

and how on earth will we ever adapt to that life again anyway?

also, you vow to never use a hair dryer again

except maybe once a month on sunday.

maybe.

and that's my story about when summer really got going.

the end.