June 30

I had a pretty substantial to-do list for today, and we managed to check everything off the list by 12:30. Awesome!

The last item on the list was a playdate with Jill and sweet baby Naomi. Lily woke up from her nap soon after they arrived, and we headed out to splash in the water table.

From the look Lily is giving me, I'm guessing she's thinking, "GOSH, MOM! I'm trying to play with my friend! Stop taking my picture and leave us alone!"

And Naomi is like, "What? Picture? I'm in. Where's the camera?"

I love that the girls have matching little ponytails, and I wish I had taken more pictures of them!

Lily looked so cute in her little swimsuit that I couldn't resist taking copious amounts of pictures of her.

Lily made up a game that she seemed to really enjoy. It involved lowering her face until it was almost, just barely, maybe touching the water (can you see the ripples of her breath on the water?), then lifting her head up and grinning at me.

Fun!

Okay, so I can admit that this is not the cutest picture ever of my baby, but everything about it makes me smile. 

Ponytail

Big brown eyes

Striped swimsuit

Chubby baby thighs

I call that a keeper.

June 29

I'm finally caught up with blog posts from our trip!

Since we got home late yesterday evening, we decided to skip church today and have a Do-Nothing Sunday to rest and recover. I did laundry and went grocery shopping, and Chris and the kids washed the cars. I caught up on blog posts, and Lily caught up on her naps. It was a good day.

I was editing photos this morning when Chris stuck his head in the kitchen and said, "You might want to take a picture of this."

That's reason #57,361 why I love my husbando. He always notifies me when something cute is happening.

This is what was happening:

Caleb and Daisy were trying their hardest to "help" Daddy wash all the road bugs off the car. It was pretty cute.

A little after noon, Caleb came inside and got dressed. Surprisingly, he chose to wear his Easter shirt and a pair of khaki pants. When I commented on it, he said that he has to wear his work clothes on Sundays. Then he asked me when we were going to church.

I was a little bit surprised, because we'd been playing and loafing all morning. When I told him that we had skipped church today, and that church was already over, he got pretty upset. He couldn't explain why he wanted so badly to go to church, but he did. Caleb was dressed and ready, but we weren't going.

Poor kid! I hadn't felt guilty about skipping church until that moment.  I'm glad to know it means something to him!

Later, Chris showed me Lily's new trick: she has started giving Chris kisses. 

He leans in and puckers up, and she leans in to smoosh her face against his. I know this is a terrible picture of it, but it's so, so, sweet.

She's also so, so, silly. Lily really is a very fun child!

Hi, Baby!

Time for another kiss!

After bathtime tonight, Chris came stomping down the hall, yelling, "It's a two-headed monster!" 

Daisy (wearing her Christmas jammies and Caleb's socks) was the second head, popped through the neck hole of Chris' shirt. Caleb wanted desperately for it to be a three-headed monster, but Chris didn't want to ruin his shirt.

Instead, Caleb was Spike-Headed Man!

Tomorrow, real life resumes. We have one commitment-free month to really enjoy summer, and it starts tomorrow.  Caleb still has five items on his summer to-do list, so we need to get started!

June 28

On the last day of our trip to visit my grandparents, we spent some time with my dad's mom. We stayed in a lovely hotel with an indoor pool and free breakfast, so when the kids woke up at 6:30, as usual, we headed down to the lobby for breakfast. After breakfast, Chris took the big kids swimming and Lily and I went back to the room to pack up.

Unfortunately, Lily decided she'd rather go back to sleep. So instead of heading right out to see Grandma, I put Lily down for a nap and let Chris and the kids keep swimming. When they were done swimming, they had second breakfast and watched cartoons in the lobby. When they were done with eating and cartoons, they went outside to play baseball.

And still, Lily napped.

After she'd been asleep for nearly two hours, I decided it would have to be enough, and I woke the girl up.

I know, Lily. Welcome to my life. I feel this way EVERY MORNING.

Then we headed over to Grandma's. Euny just turned 93, and is as sharp as a tack. She lives independently, and still drives, even driving friends around for appointments!

Caleb and Daisy were feeling shy (and distracted by the cartoons that Euny insisted on turning on, despite our objections), but Lily warmed up to Great-Grandma right away! She was especially fond of Grandma's dog, Allie. I'm not sure the fondness was mutual.

Euny took us all out to lunch at Village Inn, and the big kids finally warmed up to her. By the end of the meal, they were all smiles and snuggles!

Our server drew this picture of Daisy sticking her tongue out. Earlier, I had reminisced about how Grandma was always so good at coloring, so she borrowed the kids' crayons and colored the picture in. Daisy was so excited!

By the end of our visit, the kids were in love with Great-Grandma, and she was in love with them!

But it was finally time for us to head home.

On the way home, though, we got to savor a major milestone: my car hit 100,000 miles!

In 2007, Chris and I replaced my 1992 Honda Civic (with 225,000 miles!) with a brand-new Camry. Even though I didn't need a full-size sedan at the time, we bought it hoping that it would be our Baby-Mobile.

Good old Yammy has definitely lived up to his end of the deal! 

(Pardon the dusty dash - it's clean now!)

Chris and I were so excited to be together - and paying attention! - when Yammy hit 100,000 miles. We are currently hoping, planning, and budgeting to replace Yammy with a van next spring, so this milestone was bittersweet. He's a good little car; if only he weren't so cramped with three car seats across the back!

And just like that, we were home. There were loads and loads of laundry to do, but it felt great to be back in our beds!

June 27

Daisy's favorite thing about our hotel stay has been the hotel room phone. We haven't had a land line for years, so my children are completely unfamiliar with any phones other than cell phones. My first step when we got into our room was to unplug the phone so that the kids could play with it.

Often, when she thought no one was looking, we caught Daisy doing this:

"Do you want to build a snowmaaaaannnn?

Or ride our bikes around the howwwwssssseee?

I think some *mumble mumble* overdue

I've started talking to the pictures on the waaaaallllll!

(hang in there, Joan!)

We used to be the sweaties, but now we're not

I wish you would tell me whyyyyyyyy..."

It was the funniest. Thing. Ever. 

Especially her version of the lyrics - instead of "we used to be best buddies", she insisted on singing, "We used to be the sweaties." HA!

Meanwhile...

"No pictures!"

(Can you tell he just woke up?)

And Lily practiced her standing and mirror-gazing.

We loaded up our stuff and hopped in the car for a drive through my mom's hometown, which was mostly on our way out of town.

Clare, Iowa, is a rural farming town with a population of 146. I'm not even kidding. 

It's also Lily Clare's namesake town, so I couldn't resist a few pictures, despite the rain.

Lily Clare, in front of the Clare public library, with day lilies in the background. Love it!

And the Clare fire station. Many, many years ago, my Grandpa worked for the fire station.

(And yes, it was still raining when I took this picture. I'm a terrible mom.)

Then we got back in the car and drove through the bean fields and corn fields and wind turbine fields until we finally reached Cedar Rapids, where we'd be seeing Tim and his family, and my other Grandma.

We arrived at the hotel with enough time to give the kids baths and veg out in front of the TV for a while. 

What were they watching?

Super Friends: the Lost Episodes.

Caleb found the DVDs at the library, and though I thought they'd be a bust, I let him check them out for the trip. Amazingly, Caleb, Daisy, and Chris all love them! The cartoons came out in 1983, and are obviously dated and ridiculously campy, but they're perfect for sensitive children who love super heroes but aren't prepared for the violence of modern cartoons. 

After they had rested for a while, we headed over to Tim and Carli's house for dinner.

My children made a mess of their living room,

and Naomi and I made a mess of the whipped cream, but it was a lovely, lovely evening.

Tim grilled for us, and Carli created a gluten-free feast fit for royalty. We talked, laughed, and stuffed our faces with gluten-free cookies and fresh whipped cream

I'm pretty sure it doesn't get any better than this!

Or maybe this. Daisy insisted on giving Isaac a giant goodbye hug, but still cried on the way back to our hotel because she didn't get to give him a kiss. Sweet girl.

We are blessed to have such wonderful newfound family!

June 26

Day three of our trip to visit my grandparents was a fun one!

Chris and my aunt, Deb, took the kids on a bike ride around the lake. Many years ago, my grandpa loaned money to a man who was starting a bike shop. The store ended up doing really well, and is now located on prime real estate next to the lake, where he sells and rents bikes. The store owner, who has a great fondness for Grandpa, got Chris and Caleb set up with a bike and a Tag Along bike trailer, and Deb and Daisy set up with a bike and child seat. I intended to go with them, but ended up staying back so that Lily and I could spend some quality time with my mom and grandparents.

The bicycling group really enjoyed themselves, stopping at a few beaches along the way to play and rest. Grandma and Grandpa live in a condo overlooking the lake, so Chris called when they were passing by. I took these shots from the balcony:

Deb was a good sport about towing around 30 extra pounds of Daisy, and Caleb and Chris loved the Tag Along bike. We may have to buy one!

Biking boys! Caleb was concentrating on his pedaling. I was surprised to learn that Caleb's pedaling actually helped them go faster!

And our biker chicks! Daisy was so happy behind Deb!

After the cyclists were done cycling, we all had lunch together. Daisy is being silly and squirmy in this picture, but she's so darn cute!

Lily and Deb enjoyed some snuggles together. After their playtime at the pool yesterday, they were fast friends.

Caleb only wanted to make silly faces for the camera, but Deb tickled some smiles out of him.

Goodness. Wrangling three children for a photo is challenging! This was the best one I got of all three of them with Deb.

Deb helped Daisy figure out which shoe went on which foot.

And Daisy showed us her best silly face.

Chris and Lily enjoyed the sunshine, gentle breeze, and lovely view on the balcony,

and Daisy snuggled in for some cuddles with Great-Grandpa.

Again, wrangling three children for photos is hard. 

Leo and Madonna with two of their four children, and three of their eleven great-grandchildren.

Lily was done with pictures, but I had to sneak in for one, too.

Then, Lily could recharge her batteries with some Grandma snuggles. I know Mom will hate this one, but I love it because it's so peaceful, real, and unvarnished. 

Later, there was a small thunderstorm. After it cleared, we were excited to see not one, but two rainbows! 

Lovely, isn't it?

We couldn't resist a photo of our Baby Rainbow with the rainbows.

Caleb and Daisy were fascinated!

And then it was time to say goodbye. 

It was bedtime, and Deb's flight back to Oregon left the next morning. Grandma and Grandpa would have to be on the road at 7am to get her to the airport in time, so we said our goodbyes. I think Deb and I were both delighted that our cautious Caleb gave her great big goodbye hugs.

Before we got in the car, I took a few more photos of the kids with the rainbows. 

I think this one is my favorite.

Aren't they cute, all lined up on a bench?

And kisses for their Baby Rainbow!