The rest of summer

What else we've done besides travel this summer:

 We met some friends at an In 'N' Out near LAX, they were returning from a summer in Chile. We ate dinner together and watched the planes fly overhead. If you look, the palm tree is blocking the view of the plane. The kids thought this was a great activity and want to do it again.

 We went fabric shopping for a quilt, and Gordon's face is priceless in this picture. We sent a pic to the Grandmas so they knew what fabric he liked.

 Swimming lessons. I enrolled the girls in a week's worth of swimming lessons, and they are so much more confident in the pool. They are so, so close to being able to swim on their own. They learned some valuable things, like bobbing in water that's too deep, gliding, and swimming underwater. The girls have already had to use some of these skills when they got into water that was too deep at the pool last week. I'm glad I was right there to pull them to shallower water. Gordon is growing up quick, all that little boy toddler-ness is all gone.

We have been to the beach, but not as much as we should have gone.

 Evelyn is not a fan of sandwiches in general, but she does enjoy a peanut butter banana sandwich on occasion.

 Jilly playing with her "Petshops."

 Gigantic disasters in the living room that I just love to help clean up. Jilly's face is sour probably because we told her it was time to clean up this great and messy "set-up."

 Bike riding with Dad. After one lap around a local park Jilly asked, "Daaaaaad! Where aaaaaare we goooooing?" They thought that bike rides were for going to a specific place, not just to enjoy riding the bike. So after a chorus of complaints that they "weren't going anywhere," they stopped at a playground. Ben has lost 15 pounds since June, and counting. He's been wanting to lose it for some time and has finally found the right motivations to make it happen. He's looking good! ;) He tried on some shorts we bought the summer after Evelyn was born, and they fit better than any other pair of shorts he currently owns.

 Remember when I said we felt the cool ocean breeze driving over the hills into Orange County at the end of vacation? Well, that was pretty much the last time we felt it up until last week. Then the heat came back on.  I've been running fans 24/7 to keep the apartment livable. Yesterday it was 99 degrees, and today I stopped checking the thermometer when it hit 100 degrees. Thankfully, it's supposed to cool back down a bit.

The kids got their faces painted at a Primary Activity Day, and then decided to make a birthday party for Gordon. They got out all the food, and then didn't eat most of it, but I like their creativity. 

 I bought work books for the girls to sharpen their academic skills this summer. Well, the skills are dull or dusty, because we haven't gotten through 25% of the books. I lack the gumption to make them sit down each day and do some of it. I guess I really believe in a summer of relaxation and no school work!

My garden is doing well despite the heat and humidity, and I recently planted a second round of sweet corn, tomatoes, watermelon, beets, zuchinni and squash. We'll see how they do, and how much I get out of them before the days get too short. The flowers I planted in late June (Vinca) are thriving and are so pretty.