The Castañeda Clan Best Day Ever: The Final Days of Summer

We are really gearing up for school now! Only one week left of summer vacation! I can't even believe how fast this summer has gone! Papa turned 30, Max turned 5, Mama turned 29, Nico's well on his way with potty training, and Belle is ready to crawl! It won't be long for her now! We've had a Sea World vacation, SMA summer camp, Religious Education marathon, swimming, a nice long visit with Cousin Jack, Firefighter appreciation, birthday party after birthday party, our own family Olympics, Science Day at a friend's house, visits to the library, play dates, not to mention some of the best times spending time together at home. And that's only a little of what we did. Phew I'm exhausted! Our goal this summer was to make it the best that we possibly could, especially since last summer was pretty much a bust for the boys with me being preggers and sick EVERY DAY ALL DAY! I'm proud of us for doing most everything we wanted to do and much much more! I'm thankful that the Science day worked out at a friend's house because that was the one thing we wanted to host but were unable to find a good time. We will be blogging on a limited basis for an indefinite amount of time while we get adjusted to our new school schedule. We've got Max starting his Pre-K 5 class, Nico getting ready for his 2's class, and Belle excited about attending her first class with the Babies at St. Michael Academy. I've been blessed with a teaching position at their preschool so I will get to spend Max's final year with him and Belle's first year with her. Even more of a blessing, I was hired to teach Belle's class! We have three kids in Preschool. THREE! I just can't believe it. The past six years of my life have been the most joyous with this past 6 months being the fastest. I guess it is true what they say, "Time flies when you are having fun!" This reminds me of something Max said one evening this week when finding out it was already dinner time. "Mama, why do the days go so fast? I just want it to go slow!" I took it as one of the highest complements I could receive from my kid.

I wanted to highlight a few of the things that we did this week. The biggest highlight of the week was my trip to the dentist, of course! Okay, no not really. I actually dread that every time I have to go, but the people are very nice there so that makes it a more pleasurable experience. The actual biggest thing that happened this week goes to Nico. His first poo in the potty!!! Whoop Whoop! I won't dwell on the details, but we are proud of him. I've been doing a LOT of sewing for That's Sew Belle, which always brings me joy. Fer's taken on the blog job of creating picture collages, making my life a little bit easier, and he's been excited about the idea. Max has been, well Max, with his awesome imaginative personality, creating never a dull moment. Belle's been working on her crawling muscles. She's almost there (not that I want her too.)

Tuesday we decided to get out of the house and go outdoors. Even though it was rather toasty, we just couldn't stay couped up and we didn't really have any special place we wanted to go. Since I'm using the garage clothesline for drying our large laundry items, I needed to be out there to hang a load anyway. I moved out the minivan, brought out the toys , large rolls of plotter paper, markers, crayons, race cars,etc. and had a grand ole' time. We are "forced" into using our garage as our backyard since we do not have a backyard. We do have an alley, but with the two hyper boys and a baby to keep track of, sometimes it is best to get out my trusty little orange cones to block off a space for them to play. I don't know what it is about those orange cones, but they usually stay within the perimeters. Of course, it isn't a day in the life of the Castaneda Clan without a little bit of drama. So Nico decides that he wants me to change his diaper (he's still not completely potty trained), but Belle was playing contently on our lovely "race track" we had created on plotter paper attached to the garage floor. I asked Max if he would please run inside to get a diaper and some wipes for me to use on his brother so that I wouldn't have to move everybody inside. Max being the awesome kid he is did so willingly, only he told me that I better not tell anyone that I was changing his brothers' diaper in the garage (where no one could see). He told me that he didn't want me to get arrested....Anyway, I guess his hands were a little too full when he came back outside. He was carrying toys in one hand and the diaper and wipes in the other. I suppose when he pulled the door closed he accidentally moved the lock. And guess what? Thirty minutes later when it was time for me to start making their lunch, I couldn't get the door open. Yes, we were locked out! No, we didn't have a spare key...Thankfully I had my cell phone on me, which is not always the case when we go outside. The poor hubby had to spend his lunch break driving all the way home and letting us inside. Of course, we had to wait for him to finish a meeting, and then I still had to fix lunch when we got inside, but nonetheless, we were not outside the entire day baking. We may have been hot and hungry by the time we got inside, but the boys were still insistent that we have the picnic I had planned for us (before getting locked out). So no cooling off for us. I quickly prepared lunch and we all trekked back outside for a picnic. By the time we made it back in we were all pretty much done for the day...well I know I was. I learned a very valuable lesson though. NEVER GO OUTSIDE WITHOUT KEYS! Also, I think it would be wise for someone close by to have a spare so we don't have to bake so long next time. Because who am I kidding, I'm prone to make little mistakes like this.

Wednesday we spent some time at the library and attending Mass for the Feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. We had only a little time between the library and Mass so the boys thought it was "super cool" when I picked them up some lunch, parked the minivan in the church parking lot, and had a picnic in the car with our windows rolled down. The day was overcast and rather pleasant.

Their personalities are very apparent in this photo! Our session was interesting. Max with his sweet seriousness, Nico with his hilarious pretend distressed look, and Belle with her beautiful happy smiles.

Thursday I got to work in my classroom while the kiddos went to the church nursery. I'm getting so excited about teaching! I'm a little nervous and a tiny bit scared too, but overall just really happy for this opportunity! In the afternoon we played all kinds of things, but one of the things that stands out the most with me was when we were playing "Mario pirates". I got to be Mario Pirate (per Max's instructions) while Max was Luigi Pirate. Nico was going about the room as if he was a bad guy, so in my best pirate voice I said to him, "Arrrrr, are ye the scoundrel?" Nico's response in the best pirate imitation this 2 1/2 year old could do (which was really rather good), "No, I'm not a scoundrel!!! I'm just an angry boy!!!" All the while he's smiling from ear to ear. He then continued to thrust his glowing rainbow Skittles wand into the air as if it was his pirate sword. Maybe you had to be there to really get the full effect, but it was greatness.

Friday we had a wonderful adventure outside in our neighborhood. I will be blogging about this adventure in another post coming later this week: The Quest for the Fountain of Red and Blue. It was somewhat inspired by our newest found form of entertainment "Where's Waldo?" We have spent hours looking at this one book that we checked out from the library. When I was younger I would look at these books while waiting on my sister at the Orthodontist's office and then later when I was a patient there myself. Fer actually did the same thing when he was younger, looking at them at his dentist's office. I LOVE these books. I had forgotten about them and then as we were headed out of the library on Wednesday, I caught sight of a group of them out of the corner of my eye. I was ecstatic! The boys probably thought I was nuts, but what's new there? We've been looking through it ever since. We can't wait to pick up another book the next time we go back!

This weekend provided for some much needed family time. We miss Papa so much during the week when he's at work. It's so nice when we can all spend time together. Well...I did get to sneak out one day for fabric shopping and the next day for some school clothes shopping, but other than those few hours, we got to spend some awesome quality time. Saturday evening we were blessed with a downpour (or as my Dad always called it when I was a kid, "downburst"). The kids were so fascinated by the heavy rains that they sat mesmerized by our storm door watching for a long time. I taught the kids the song "Rain Rain Go Away" which they thought was quite humorous for some reason. I guess I should have been teaching them "It's Raining, It's Pouring" instead since we really didn't want the rain to go away. And then in the song, little Johnny wanted to play outside so he wanted to rain to go away, but in our case, because it was raining Fer let the boys go out back and run around in the rain! While I was giving the baby her bath I heard some very loud happy squealing coming from behind the house. When I looked outside I was surprised (only a little) that it was coming from my boys who were half dressed playing in the rain. I think they will always remember doing that. Belle and I brought the boys some towels to dry off and we heading back upstairs so I could put her to bed, only to hear the boys run back outside for more excitement. How great it must be to be a kid. And the sad part is, when we are kids we just want to be grown up. Go figure.

We aren't slacking off these final days of summer, and we hope to continue with fun family adventures even with school in session. My boys are at the age where school is fun anyway! They can't wait to go back, see their friends, and make new ones. Continue to look for our adventures throughout the school year. We'll be making new memories every day and we are hoping to share them with you!

BEST last DAYS of Summer EVER!