Pottery 101

The next adventure we took was a trip to Poka Dot Pottery.  It was officially CAMP GRANDMAS...definition: One week in the Summer when my brother's children from Ohio come down and stay with my mom and my sister and I show up everyday and do stuff with them.

We try to cram as much as possible into 6 days. We usually have a list of things for each day and this year Pottery was on the list. 

This is Tyler my brother's oldest...the best 16 year old boy on planet earth!!! Man, I can't tell you how much I love and miss my brother's kids!  Eli was LOVIN him.  He kept calling him TIRE...so cute!

All the kids picked their own piece to paint and then they let you pick out the colors. 

Of course I had to help my lil' man.  Otherwise, he would have painted the little girl to the right (Emily).

I did the classic, predictable, hand print on the plate...I know, I couldn't help it! I must say I set myself up for disappointment if I break it. But, Eli did do some art of his own on it as well.

I tried, Oh so hard to get Dee to do one on hers, but that was not going to happen.  So, then it made me feel glad that I at least got one out of her brother.

The older kids REALLY got into this.  After I left with my crew they stayed for another hour to finish painting theirs!

Then we topped it off with a cookie :D

I would say to anyone who has not done this before... it was a lot of fun and something that will last a long time (hopefully).  They had to stay there to be "cooked", we pick them up today...can't wait!

S'more "We Did"

After our big FOUNTAIN experience, we had a Bonfire with the Fam! My sister and her kids came over for some dinner and a FIRE!

Another thing on our "We did" list for the summer!

We were in luck, since we literally have ZERO trees in our yard, a lady up the street had just cut down a very large tree, so Jacob asked her if we could have some for our Bonfire.  She was thrilled for us to take some off her hands ;) NEED WOOD? 

It was one of those rare occasions, when my niece Rachael was there.  She is almost always MIA since she graduated!  So glad she and her boyfriend could make it!

There she is in all her Glory...you can see she comes by this honestly (those are her parents)

We broke out the S'mores! Which Jason obviously adores!

and so do the kids... It was my first one, they ARE pretty good! My mom made some the other night with Reece cups instead of Hershey bars....YUMMMMY!

Dee was proud of hers...she made it all by herself!

Aparently, you cannot eat these without getting them ON your face!

And we topped off the evening after

dinner and dessert with some GREAT entertainment from the kiddos!

Stay tuned for our next "We Did" adventure. It was quite interesting  ;)

Oh and BTW, we are off to get my lil' man a BIG BOY bed today and the paint for his room.

Can't wait to have my bed back, wish us luck on this!

Our Summer "We Did" List

We have done a few things since school has let out....the slip n slide, camp, several graduation ceremonies, but it's really starting to feel like Summer is going by fast. I have a lot to catch up on I am a little behind.  This week is CAMP GRANDMA'S at my mom's (more on that later).  For now it's time to go back to last Friday!

I found out that there were some fountains for the kids to play in at a local college campus.  So, my friend Sarah and I picked a day to have a picnic and let the kids play in them.

We sat there enjoying our picnic while we waited for the fountains to be turned on only to find out, after patiently waiting as long as anyone could with a 1, 2, 5, and 6 year old, that the fountains were closed for maintenance.  They have only been open a week, what's up with that?

Disappointed, we moved about 30 minutes down the road to another location that we knew would have their fountains open. They were more than we expected....HUGE and AWESOME!

The kids were lovin' it while Sarah and I were wishing we had some waterproof clothing on!

IT WAS HOT!!!

Trust me, we still got wet, it was hard not to.

Needless to say, they had a blast!!!

and right beside it was a REALLY HOT playground for them to play on!

It was a 2 for 1...Jackpot!

The kids We all wore ourselves out!!!

We had a blast making memories together, I see more of this to come! Next time I will come a little more prepared, hopefully.

Now that I know the parking lot is at least a block away, I don't need to bring a gigantic camera and I need to wear clothes that I wouldn't mind getting wet!

I thought for sure I would have some NAPPERS on the way home, but it didn't happen, mostly because I broke out the Popsicles in the car. So, when we got home I stripped the kids down and started getting the really wet  laundry together... about 10 minutes later I walked through the living room to find THIS!

My lil' man had snuggled up in the chair all by himself. He couldn't wait on Mom to put down for nap this time!

We had a great day!