We spent our summer in Lake Charles at my parents house like we've always done the past few years and had a grand ole' time! Our days were spent playing with cousins and friends, shopping, eating at Chick Fil A, swimming, hanging out at water parks/splash parks and SOOO much more!
I knew that I wanted to take advantage of our time in Lake Charles and found various activities for our kids to do to get new life experiences. Our first big activity was Vacation Bible School. All 3 kids were able to go since I volunteered to work VBS. Gavin was in class with my niece, Neve and they got to spend the week learning about Jesus! Miles and Brooklyn loved meeting new friends and went to their classes willingly everyday.
Along with swim lessons, I signed the boys up for a sports class- it's kinda like a Little Gym concept, but with older kid activities. Gavin and Miles took the class together and I did it with them. For the summer, I hired a girl, Stacey, to help me with the kids so she came along and was the 2nd parent with me. It was so nice having another pair of eyes around. The boys loved the class. They especially loved the blow up tumble track. Everything in the class was right up their alley- running, jumping, climbing, flipping, chasing, throwing. The activities were great and kept their attention and when we left, the kids always asked when they could go back!
I signed Gavin up for a local golf camp to introduce him to the sport of golf. He finally was able to use the real golf clubs he got for Christmas last year and was excited to spend the week with his cousin, David, too. Gavin really liked golf camp and did pretty good from what I was told. He and David were the two youngest kids by several years but that didn't stop them from learning and trying hard!
Part of our summer was spent away from daddy, which left me doing everything I could to make it by without him. But kids are kids and they bring lots of joy and laughter regardless of where they are and who they are with. We made lots of memories and had lots of FUN together- going to birthday parties, Mr. Gatti's, and local parks!
Miles kept all of us on our toes and graced us with his ever surprising antics and goofy personality!!
So I flew to Borger one weekend to go house hunting with Brooks and my kids stayed with my parents. They were having so much fun during the days, they decided to take baths outside! HAHA
Gavin lost his first tooth, which he was NOT excited about. He was actually scared out of his mind and cried when my mom finally pulled it. We had been working on it and turning it and wiggling it for days and it just needed to come out! Once he realized it didn't hurt and he was okay, he eventually calmed down and wanted to know when the next one was going to come out! CAN'T believe he was 4 years old and lost his first tooth.
Lunch at Chick Fil A. I'm pretty sure we ate at Chick Fil A once, sometimes twice a week. It's just easy and manageable with all 3 kids. They loved it too!
We spent lots of time with our cousins and played together! The kids played in the rain, ran around outside, took more baths outside, rode bikes, and just enjoyed being together.
We took advantage of seeing and spending as much time with our friends that we haven't seen often while we were visiting. It was great to catch up with old friends and see all our kids playing together. Every once in a while, thanks to my parents, I was able to get some mommy time and slip away for dinner with friends. It was nice getting to catch up with friends who have been around for years!! I got to spend time with friends at their kids birthday parties and even had Houston friends and Baton Rouge friends come and visit us!!
Dinner time with 3 kids is always crazy and quite frankly not always fun so we were always looking for ways to manage the chaos. My parents backyard has a large slope going down towards the golf course that makes for an AWESOME slip n slide. The kids have a blast sliding down the tarp and are creative with every slide. Even Brooklyn got in on the action and went as fast as she could!
I knew that I wanted to take advantage of our time in Lake Charles and found various activities for our kids to do to get new life experiences. Our first big activity was Vacation Bible School. All 3 kids were able to go since I volunteered to work VBS. Gavin was in class with my niece, Neve and they got to spend the week learning about Jesus! Miles and Brooklyn loved meeting new friends and went to their classes willingly everyday.
After VBS, the boys took swimming lessons. I was so impressed with how much they learned, how quickly they picked up the concepts, and their eagerness to learn. IT was precious seeing how proud they were of themselves. Both the boys were in a group lesson with 1 other kid, but they each got the individual attention they needed. Gavin was able to swim confidently by himself in the deep end and almost mastered his front stroke. Miles learned how to hold his breath underwater, blow bubbles, and to let go of the side of the pool and swim out. He wasn't even scared to try. I'm sure it helped the boys having access to a swimming pool daily in Saudi, but this was great in teaching strategy and building up their confidence.
Miles:
Gavin:
Along with swim lessons, I signed the boys up for a sports class- it's kinda like a Little Gym concept, but with older kid activities. Gavin and Miles took the class together and I did it with them. For the summer, I hired a girl, Stacey, to help me with the kids so she came along and was the 2nd parent with me. It was so nice having another pair of eyes around. The boys loved the class. They especially loved the blow up tumble track. Everything in the class was right up their alley- running, jumping, climbing, flipping, chasing, throwing. The activities were great and kept their attention and when we left, the kids always asked when they could go back!
I signed Gavin up for a local golf camp to introduce him to the sport of golf. He finally was able to use the real golf clubs he got for Christmas last year and was excited to spend the week with his cousin, David, too. Gavin really liked golf camp and did pretty good from what I was told. He and David were the two youngest kids by several years but that didn't stop them from learning and trying hard!
Part of our summer was spent away from daddy, which left me doing everything I could to make it by without him. But kids are kids and they bring lots of joy and laughter regardless of where they are and who they are with. We made lots of memories and had lots of FUN together- going to birthday parties, Mr. Gatti's, and local parks!
Miles kept all of us on our toes and graced us with his ever surprising antics and goofy personality!!
So I flew to Borger one weekend to go house hunting with Brooks and my kids stayed with my parents. They were having so much fun during the days, they decided to take baths outside! HAHA
Gavin lost his first tooth, which he was NOT excited about. He was actually scared out of his mind and cried when my mom finally pulled it. We had been working on it and turning it and wiggling it for days and it just needed to come out! Once he realized it didn't hurt and he was okay, he eventually calmed down and wanted to know when the next one was going to come out! CAN'T believe he was 4 years old and lost his first tooth.Lunch at Chick Fil A. I'm pretty sure we ate at Chick Fil A once, sometimes twice a week. It's just easy and manageable with all 3 kids. They loved it too!
We spent lots of time with our cousins and played together! The kids played in the rain, ran around outside, took more baths outside, rode bikes, and just enjoyed being together.
We took advantage of seeing and spending as much time with our friends that we haven't seen often while we were visiting. It was great to catch up with old friends and see all our kids playing together. Every once in a while, thanks to my parents, I was able to get some mommy time and slip away for dinner with friends. It was nice getting to catch up with friends who have been around for years!! I got to spend time with friends at their kids birthday parties and even had Houston friends and Baton Rouge friends come and visit us!!
Needless to say, we had a VERY, VERY busy beginning to our summer and that wasn't even all of it!
So my all time favorite picture from the summer might be the one below! My mom had a friend come over to take her usual "Bench Bunch" picture of all the grandkids so we tried to get a few of siblings together. This is how my kids felt about taking their pictures! And no, Miles isn't really sleeping- that was just his response when asked to smile. 
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