It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year...

I'll be back in September. Happy summer!

Five Things for Friday

This is probably going to be my last Five Things post for awhile, so enjoy!

1. I'll start out with the controversy of the week. I'm disappointed that Roseanne got cancelled. I really enjoyed the re-boot season this spring and I was looking forward to the second season in the fall. While what she said on Twitter was really offensive and wrong, I don't know if it merited cancelling the entire show and putting hundreds of people out of work. Whatever happened to apologizing (which she did) and forgiveness? People make mistakes, and if they choose to they can learn from those mistakes and change for the better, or at least not repeat those mistakes again. In this case I think she should have gotten a second chance. I think the whole situation is sad and that there's a lot of hypocrisy involved. In any case, I'm going to miss the show.

2. We spent Memorial Day weekend in Minneapolis. We hadn't been before and it was really fun. We went to the Mall of America, which was huge and has a big fun theme park in the middle of it where we spent most of our time. While we were there, John spotted Drew Drechsel from American Ninja Warrior walking around! He's a long-time fan of Drew's and of the show. He went over and talked to him and got his picture taken with him. How lucky was it that in that big huge mall he happened to see him? This kid is so blessed!

3. We could have bought a very historic house in the center of Hopkinton. I've always called it "the George Washington house" because Washington visited there. This is the link for the house's listing on Zillow if you want to see it. It was at the top of our price range, but I think it could have been ours had we wanted it. I wanted to go to the open house when we were out there house-hunting a month ago, but we didn't have time. It wasn't a high priority because we knew it wasn't the right house for us, but still. If I were in a more entrepreneurial stage of life, it would have been cool to have bought it and maybe turned half of it into a bed and breakfast.

I bet it's haunted too!

4. One of Sam's best friends wrote him this note on Wednesday on the last day of school:

"I will remember all of our fun times. You are my top ten favorite buddy. I am sorry you have to move. I will always remember you. Even when I die." 💔 

I hate moving.

5. Speaking of which, my pipe-dream goal of getting all of last summer's blog posts done before we moved was just that. There's no way it's gonna happen. If I had two or three more weeks, I could do it, but next week is our last full week in the house and I'm going to have way too much to do. So I'll just have to finish blogging about last summer at the end of this summer, which isn't ideal, but it's not the end of the world.  

I'll be taking the rest of the summer off from blogging, although I might try to squeeze in an updated post about the Cape house next week for "advertising" purposes. I'll be back after Labor Day with a plan to get fully caught up on everything. In the meantime, wish us luck as we move from our beloved Iowa to our soon-to-be beloved Massachusetts!

Have a wonderful summer!

My 37th Birthday

Ten months ago I turned 37, which is weird because I feel at least six or seven years younger than that.
This was how I spent my special day.

That week the boys did their week of science and nature day camp at The Cape Cod Museum of Natural History, which left me on my own from 9:00-2:00.

My mom was there and we went to Saint Landing's Beach in Brewster in the morning. It's so peaceful to relax and rest on the beach with the gentle white noise of the waves and a view like this:

The tide was going out so by the time we left the sea floor was visible.

My mom treated me to lunch at The Optimist Cafe, a place I'd been wanting to try for years. It didn't disappoint! 

The clam chowder was delicious.

For dessert I enjoyed my first-ever frozen hot chocolate. I loved it! 

The building is really old and cool. I'd definitely like to come back here again.

Peter sent me a nice big Edible Arrangements that everyone enjoyed that week.

We went out to dinner at one of my favorite restaurants, Yarmouth House, where I ordered one of my favorite meals, lazy man's lobster.

That very loose front tooth finally came out later that week!

I love the good times we spend together.

When we got home from dinner we had delicious ice cream cake that was decorated with edible seashells, and I opened my gifts.

The page from my planner that day.

It was a very nice birthday, with some of my favorite people and things!

Family Camping Trip. Aaaagh!

Last summer my family did something we hadn't done in decades. We went on a family camping trip. 😲

We used to camp when I was a kid. I enjoyed it then. As an adult, not so much. I like the idea of camping more than the reality of it. But as someone who's into emergency prep it's a good thing to do every now and then. I'm a nature lover too, so there's that. And of course, it's great to spend time with family.

We went to Tully Lake Campground in central Massachusetts. It was really nice and classic and in the woods. I'd love like to go back there again.

Here's some of what we did, other than try not to fight with each other. Ha!

We went on a walk to a waterfall. 

Shane is my nephew and he's so cute and mischievous. I just love him.

My pictures of the waterfall didn't turn out that well, but here's the best one.

My boys and my sister Elizabeth's boys. They have so much fun together.

 Sam was being a goofball.

Me and my boys.

Elizabeth and her boys. I can't decide if I like the vertical or horizontal shot better so I'm going to be an undisciplined editor and leave them both.

Me, my sisters, and three out of four of the boys.

Now that's some real rock-climbing!

I've always loved woods and the old stone walls of New England going through them.

Dinnertime!

Sam talked (a lot) to my brother's girlfriend's brother about Terraria, a game they both play. I took pity on him and gave Sam time limits on the Terraria talk. Kat's brother was very patient and kind. 😊

I went kayaking for the first time and I enjoyed it! I'd always been afraid of it because of my fear of flipping over and getting trapped underwater. But it was just fine.

John did great, too.

Jennifer, my mom, Adam (Jennifer's husband), and John.

😍😍😍

Rocco and Sam are only six months apart and they're really cute together. Rocco showed Sam how to fish. Rocco is such a good-natured, sweet boy. I just love him!

My mom and I shared a tent with John and Sam. It was a pretty comfortable set-up but I slept terribly both nights, or rather, I got hardly any sleep at all. (I have trouble sleeping away from home--it usually takes me a few nights to get used to the new surroundings. I should've taken ZzzQuil!)

The boys played many games together, whether it was Uno or playing hide-and-seek in the woods or searching for Bigfoot or having Nerf gun fights. They had a blast!

Packing up and getting ready to go home. Ugh, camping is a lot of work! A cruise is so much easier. 😉

Oh, and the scenery was beautiful!


There were such pretty trails through the woods here.


The campsites were very nicely situated off the trails.

And two of the best pictures of the trip, taken by Elizabeth and texted to me:

I'll admit that it was a fun weekend! Especially for the kids!

A big P.S.!! 
We went home with a bothersome and expensive souvenir, although we didn't know it for a few days. Sam got poison ivy...in his crotch area (boys!!)...and it was all swollen down there but I wasn't sure what exactly it was, so I brought him to an Urgent Care clinic on the Cape and they referred us to Cape Cod Hospital's E.R. to get an ultrasound done of his testicles(!!) to make sure it wasn't something serious. Thankfully, it turned out to just be poison ivy. But it took a whole Friday of beautiful weather on the Cape (the first in awhile) and it cost quite a bit of time and money. (Who said camping was cheap!?) That's what we get for going camping!

Don't let the big smile and relaxed attitude fool you too much--he was uncomfortable! But he handled everything so well.

I guess it was still worth it! 😏