Hogle Zoo

My parents purchased us a zoo membership last summer. And boy did we use that thing!
So with it expiring in a few days we went one last time. But this time we went with our neighbor and her kiddos. Which was nice A) I can have someone to talk too & B) an extra pair of eyes :-)

 The zoo had a Lego exhibit which was way more cooler than I thought.

 My Lego monkey's :-)

 My kids are so cute!

 Cati just kept petting the inside of this faux skull. I'm not really sure why (?) but she just kept doing it. Oh well......

 Trying to hide in the shade. :-)

 My only good photo of trying to get 7 kids to look at our camera at the same time. I gave up after a few tries. :-)

 My baby birds. Aww!!!! These two girls are too funny when they get together.

 Hailey, Ducati, Mason and Lily all taking a breather in this log. Hey- they're smart for finding shade when they could find it. :-)

 All the kids just kept saying, "Whoa!!" each time the sea lions swam by. So adorable to watch.

 Our kids admiring and trying to figure out how someone made this Lego Polar Bear.

 I have to admit whoever made these lego animals has very impressive skills.

 

 The closest I've been to penguins in a while. I ♥ Penguins.

 "What are you doing in there turtle?" asked Ducati.

 And we can't leave without going on the animal carousel. My girls loved this.

 Even Mason joined in. But don't tell him that I have a picture. He'll deny this ever happened.

After all our fun with our friends this was such a great outing to start the summer off. 

My Man of Steel ♥

Father's day is always a hit or miss. Sometimes our kids are little angels and sometimes they are.... NOT! And this year they were not very nice. But then again what better way to be reminded of the unconditional love a father has for his children if our kids were perfect angels.

On Friday night Mike and I went to see, Man of Steel. I'm not a Superman fan but this movie was awesome. Mike- he was so excited that I found a sitter since he was secretly having doubts that he'd see this movie on opening weekend.

So this was my gift to him. And a new drill with drill bits that I gave him a month early since he was close to swearing when his old drill broke.

 (Hailey colored this for Mike. Cute!)

Our kids had sweet intentions. We took a trip to Dollar Tree and they each picked out some gifts for Mike.
Mason- root beer and headphones
Hailey- magic trick cards and pop-it fireworks
Lily- fruit snacks and cotton candy
Ducati- popsicles and some blue rocks.

Cute gesture until Mike wasn't looking; Lily and Cati raided his gifts and ate them all. Punks!

Mike truly is an amazing man. He's able to take the "step" out of stepdad and just be an amazing dad to all our kids.

Double Date

Lily and I went on a date to Boondocks to play a round of mini-golf. Mike and Ducati were going to go do something different at Boondocks so they can spend some quality time. So there was no surprise to see Mike and Ducati following us to the golf course. So instead of a solo date it turned into a double date. :-)

Mike and I made a rule to never keep score until I learned how to correctly golf. So with some time and practice I worked my way up to keeping score now. Big accomplishment for me :-)

Lily and Ducati on the other hand- we just gave them par each hole plus some points for creativity. Like Lily pushing her ball like a vacuum cleaner into the hole.

So after 18 rounds of some insanely funny golfing Lily placed first, Ducati second, and Mike and I tied for last. :-)

Pond Fun

The weather has been amazing so we couldn't just waste these gorgeous rays inside. We headed to the local pond to feed the ducks. 

 Secret weapon: birds love Cheerios! Whenever we throw this verses bread the Cheerios always get eaten first.

 And I read that ducks/geese suffer malnourished due to over eating bread that gives them no sort of vitamins. So some animal expert says to throw peas/corn/carrots instead so at least the ducks will have some sort of vitamins. So Ducati threw some peas..... Yeah-Sorry-we're sticking to Cheerios :-)

After the ducks were all stuffed we played in the water for alittle bit.

 Hailey was eyeing this rope swing for alittle bit until she finally gathered enough courage to take a swing. I'm so proud of her.

Lily collecting rocks. 

 Mike showing off his swinging skills.

 Yeah! He's super awesome!  He swung right in front and over me.

 But at his second attempt Mike crashed. He's OK. He says that he's alittle rusty at these sort of things and that he needs to do this stuff more often so he won't crash. OK babe :-)

 We splashed alittle. And skipped rocks. Found water treasures.

And Miss Hailey climbed this tree. 

 She's pretty proud of herself. Mason was thinking about climbing it until he realized how high it was then he backed down and went back to the pond to throw some big rocks.

This little afternoon adventure was so peaceful. I was telling my Mike, Mason and Hailey that when I was a kid I didn't go to ponds to skip rocks since I lived in a big city. Mason said to me, " Oh. Too bad Mom." Well thanks son! :-) It's OK- I'm glad my kids can have these types of memories.

Schools Out!

The last week of school isn't really school. Mason and Hailey had so many fun things this week that homework was none existent.  

They had a field trip to the movie theater so see, Rise of the Guardians.
Field Day which is just a bunch of bounce houses and games in the field. (where Hailey recieved her face painting flower)
Also a water day. The last hour of school their classes went outside to get wet. Super fun they both tell me.

And so many more things that I just can't remember right now. But here are my kiddos on their last day of school. Mason was alittle sad since he'll miss the school library ( seriously... that's what he's going to miss). And Hailey she'll miss some of her friends but she got the phone numbers of the few friends she wants to hang out with and already has a play date set up for Monday. 

But a long time tradition for the last day of school is to go and get ice cream. So we couldn't break tradition so we stopped at Wendy's for some yummy cold frosty's. 

So now to have fun, fun, fun in the sun, sun, sun. :-)