When life gives you lemonade...

Cortlan has been asking to have a lemonade stand for quite a while.  I keep telling him that it is something that takes work and preparation; you can't just wake up one day and decide that you will have a lemonade stand in an hour...especially if you also want to sell cookies and you are depending on your mom to have lemonade in the house.  Last week, we finally got on the same page and got all our ducks in a row.  The most important step - I bought the lemonade.  Once that happened, everything else fell into place.

The kids made their signs.

We made chocolate chip cookies...on a 92 degree day.  And the next day, we made the lemonade.

Soon, we were ready for business.

The kids worked well together as a team, which I was happy to see.  They asked, "Would you like ice?"  And they said, "Thanks for coming!"

They sold most of the cookies...and ate the rest.  They sold about three gallons of lemonade...and drank the rest.

What are they going to do with the money?  They already put it in an envelope...they are saving in hopes of a trip to Disney.

10 weeks...

I have been quite the slacker when it comes to writing these posts.  Somehow, I always feel like I am going to have so much more time to do things like this in the summer.  But that just isn't the case.

Sometimes, I feel that we put our lives on hold for 42 weeks of the year and we have to live it all in these 10 short weeks of summer.  Considering all that we do and accomplish in the school year, I realize that isn't true, but the contrast of feeling like everything is a balancing act (and a tough one at that) during the school year versus the freedom to just do things in the summer is a stark one.  And we always seem to put things off until the summer.  And then most of those things don't get done, anyway, because, well, it is only 10 weeks, after all.  And when you spend your time at the pool, at the zoo, at family picnics, at the museums, riding bikes, running, going to gymnastics, and catching fireflies, it is hard to tackle those major projects.

I just haven't figured out how to maintain this casual and free feeling into the school year, when I have about 50+ hours a week less time to do all of the things that I am enjoying these days, plus the things I don't enjoy so much, like cleaning and grocery shopping.  And this year is going to be a doozy...with Cortlan and Everly in two different schools, with two different days and times for gymnastics and soccer, with my fall play stuff, with John's federation stuff...and then Cortlan's allergist recommended that he get allergy shots once a week. (I am still trying to figure out which day that would work.)

But the bottom line is that we are having a great summer and we are so lucky to have these 10 weeks to spend together and make great memories.  The kids spent a good bit of time arguing and making me crazy for a while, but that has lessened considerably in the last week.  We still have a great beach vacation to look forward to, and plenty more time to enjoy the summer life.

And enjoy, we will...

Summer reading...and loving.

I finally picked up a book this summer.  It has been a while, and boy do I miss the days of laying around and reading whenever I felt like it.  We have been on the go quite a bit and have been having a ton of fun (more to come on all of that).

Anyway, I am reading Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer, simply because I found it recently on my shelf and remembered that a friend had lent it to me last year.  I should give it back, but there is a reason that I have it.  I am a bit more than halfway through, and am not 100% sure how I feel about it yet...I find it intriguing and somehow personal.

But I just read a line that caught my attention, and I just wanted to write it down.  I want to think about it some more later.

"It's the tragedy of loving, you can't love anything more than something you miss."

Thought-provoking.

Well worth the 30 tickets

Cortlan has not shown much interest in learning to ride a bike.  Whether he was nervous, intimidated, or just plain didn't care, I don't know.  But it took no time at all with the promise of 30 tickets (and the thought of redeeming them for a trip to the Children's Museum) for him to get it all figured out.

We started him off with some practice at just coasting down the driveway and getting a feel for balancing the bike with no training wheels.  With his seat lowered so that he could easily reach the ground, and his pedals removed, all he had to do was enjoy the ride down hill.  Once he got that figured out, we replaced the pedals and told him to just use them to rest his feet on them as he coasted.  He instinctively pedaled them anyway.  The final challenge was getting it all to work on flat and then an uphill grade.  In one day, Cortlan was riding his bike without training wheels.  Way to go, buddy!!

Taking it to the park...next time, I will have to have a scooter or bike; I couldn't keep up!

Summer Learning Ticket System

Knowing my shortcomings, I decided to let my kids hold me somewhat accountable for their learning this summer.  Yesterday, we implemented a Summer Learning ticket system.  My theory is this: If they know they are getting something out of it, they will have the motivation to initiate the process, whereas I would otherwise forget, blow it off, or seem like a nag about yet another thing.

The kids each decorated their ticket envelopes and journals, and we were on our way.  There are many ways to earn tickets: 1 ticket for writing a journal entry or reviewing sight words or completing a worksheet from the summer bridge book.  1 ticket if they clean up after themselves before bed without needing to be reminded.  30 bonus tickets for learning to ride a bike with no training wheels (a one time offer).  And a few more, as well.

Deciding what they could "purchase" with their tickets was much more challenging.  Seeing what they decided to do with their tickets on Day 1 was somewhat enlightening.

An incomplete list of examples of what can be purchased: 2 tickets will buy a 30-minute television program.  8 tickets gets a movie and popcorn at home.  15 tickets may be traded in for a Build a Bear outfit (hand-me-downs that are like new from someone we know) or Lego figurines or a trip to get ice cream.  30 tickets gets a trip to the Children's Museum or Chuck E. Cheese.  (We figured that learning to ride a bike was worth that reward.)

What did I think would happen?  I thought the kids would each earn 4-5 tickets.  I thought they would spend 2 and save the others in hopes of earning a bigger prize someday.

What happened?  The kids each earned 3 tickets in the morning.  Cortlan promptly spent 2 so he could watch Phineas and Ferb.  Everly's eyes lit up when she realized that she could spend hers on Band-Aids (if there was an actual boo-boo, she wouldn't get charged) and she promptly spent 2 on a Band-Aid that she plastered across her forehead.

Later in the afternoon, they each earned 1 more ticket as we did a "Sink or Float" activity.  They chose objects and wrote down in their journals whether they thought the objects would sink or float.  Then we tried the experiment and they recorded the results.  They enjoyed the activity.  Cortlan now had 2 tickets - enough for another TV show - and he spent them.  Everly now has 2 tickets in savings.

Cortlan asked to have his training wheels off and is now more motivated than ever to learn to ride his bike.  It will be interesting to see what he does with the 30 tickets...a trip to the Children's Museum (which he has been begging for) or 15 TV shows.  Tough call.  Everly is not much into TV.  I guess I better stock up on Band-Aids.

Weekend recap

Friday was the last day of school for the kids, but the first day that John and I had off for the summer.  We took full advantage and had a great day together...we needed that.

Saturday was full of fun.  The group that I co-sponsor at school had raised money for Alex's Lemonade Stand (to help fight childhood cancer) in the spring.  Our local Alex's hosted a great event full of fun for the whole family, at which the president of the Actors' Society accepted a very nice award for our fundraising.  I had to be there for that, so why not bring the whole family?  Pizza and rides, face paint and Storm Troopers.  And raising funds for a wonderful cause.  What more can you ask for?

We ended Saturday with a family birthday party, also full of fun.  The kids donned their swimsuits and got to go down a huge inflatable slide that was made into a water slide.  They jumped on the trampoline.  They got balloon animals made for them.

Sunday wasn't quite as much fun...I shrunk two of my favorite shirts because I forgot to lay them to dry and instead tossed them in the dryer.  I butchered my bangs.  (It was bound to happen at some point, but did it really have to happen just before I need to get my driver's licence taken?  Guess I will eek that one out til the end, hoping that the bangs will grow back quickly.)  I realized that my kids aren't big fans of yard work, which is going to be a problem, because they will be helping around here.  And they did, after a while and much frustration.

But Sunday ended on a high note...a nice dinner on the deck, a bike ride around the neighborhood.  Smiles and laughter as Everly told us we can call her "Miss Beautiful."

And today is our family's official start of summer.  And I am ready to squeeze everything I can out of it...

Let's go summer!!

Tomorrow is a new day.

• It is nice to have someone in your life that truly knows you.  It is even better when that person is your husband.  (I love you, John.)
• These days, I am a little sad about time passing and my kids growing up.  I miss looking at them in the back seat holding hands instead of grabbing things from each other and bickering.  I knew that those days were going to be short lived...I just was wishing we could beat the odds.
• Some teachers say that their favorite days of the school year are the first and last...as a person bad with change, those happen to be my least favorites. 
• Parenting challenges of the past seem so easy now.  I remember the stress of trying to figure out how to get my babies to sleep through the night, and what to feed them, and potty training...and I wish I could go back to those issues.  Things seem so much harder now.  But maybe that is simply because I lived through those problems already and came out on the other side.  If I could do it once, I could (probably) do it again.  But now I am in uncharted territory, and I am not enjoying it.
• I am looking forward to having coffee on my deck on a weekday at 6am.  I think I may get up early on my first day of summer break just so I can enjoy that peace and the knowledge that the whole summer is ahead of me.  
• Some days are tough.  Sometimes things snowball.  Sometimes things throw me for a loop, completely out of the blue and I don't know how to react or respond without making things worse.  Fortunately, those days are few.  And fortunately, I have people to lean on when those days come around every now and then.