A typical summer day

I love summer.  Certainly not because of the hot weather, but because I get to spend everyday with my kids!  We have a busy, fun-filled summer every year and this summer was no different.  I thought I would have to miss out on some things due to having a newborn and nursing, but we didn't.  I have great friends who helped out so much and I wouldn't have had such a wonderful summer without them.  A typical summer day was like.....

First I would check the calendar.  Nicole created a google calendar online that all us 'moms' had access too and we could schedule play-dates/activities and view what things were scheduled.  Pretty much the standard things were a free movie every Wednesday and a park date at least once a week.  The park location might change, but we did a park/picnic date once a week and then usually a house play-date once a week as well.  The calendar was very easy to use and allowed for great communication without sending texts all around trying to give details.

Our family's weekday schedule was usually awake around 7ish and tv time while I fed Ell, pumped, and got breakfast ready.  We (me and the kids) at breakfast around 8ish and then after breakfast we would do puzzles, color, or some play activity while I cleaned up the kitchen and did dishes.  If I had to make a picnic lunch, I would do that after breakfast.  Once all the cleaning was done, I would dress the kids for the activity for that day (park, movie, storytime, pool, sprayground, house).  Ell would eat again at 10, so I would either leave my house at 9:30 to get somewhere before her meal or feed her at 10:00 and leave at 10:30.

After the activity/lunch, we would come back home and get ready for rest time.  Ell would eat at 1:00 so usually I would feed her while the other 3 watched a show.  W would go down at 1:30 and the bigs would play quietly in R's room.  Depending on the evening plan, I sometimes would let A/R just have quiet play time instead of rest time.  Sometimes I made them lay down for rest time, but not actually take naps.  Honestly, if there was a show on at 8:00pm that I wanted to watch, I would let them skip naps on purpose so they would be tired at 8:00pm.  

Bryce would come home around 4, so we would have family time and dinner.  Our most favorite afternoons included swimming at our Cimarron Pool and the kids jumping off the diving board over and over again.  Swimming is great!

Our most favorite day-time play-dates would include the t-shirt making playdate at Kristen's house for the fourth of July. 

The spray-ground play-date was awesome as well and it was so much fun watching the kids play in the water.   After the first free movie, I finally figured out that W wasn't a huge popcorn fan so I would pack him something else to keep him occupied.  We have gotten better at the free movies :) The next two movies are Madagascar 3 and The Lorax which are favorites in our family so those movies will be a hit.  Even the rainy days aren't bad because we find stuff in the house to do and I'm branching out with play-dough and painting.