Feeling Torn

When school got out in June I remember feeling overwhelmed at the though of having three kids at home--all day, every day. The thought of running errands with all three kids was scary, and the task of lining up activities to stave off boredom each and every day seemed daunting. But I had big plans. I printed out a calendar for June, July and August and planned to schedule our summer with fun and to squeeze out every drop and enjoy every moment of our summer.

I threw out those calendars the other day--nothing had ever been written on them. The summer flew by! Here it is the end of August and as the weather is starting to turn cool I'm ready to cry foul. I want my summer back--where did it go!?! Ethan started 1st grade today and Noah will begin Kindergarten next week. I feel so torn about all of this! Am I excited about having quiet afternoons while the boys are at school and Aaron naps? Do I look forward to the end of "those days" when my boys would argue and fight all day? Yes, of course! And I love knowing that my boys are having new opportunities to make new friends, adjusting to different environments, and learning and experiencing all kinds of cool stuff. I love seeing my kids grow.

But I'm also sad to think of how quiet it will be while they're gone. They are my little friends--they keep me company throughout the day and frequently help me clean up and keep Aaron entertained (some days that's a pretty tough job!) There are so many things we didn't get to do this summer. We never went on our adventure to check out the aquatic center near our house, we didn't have our picnic in the park, we never went to Lagoon (our boys have never even been there, how sad is that!) and we only visited the library once. Most of all, as much as I love to see my children grow it makes me so sad to watch them growing up. I wish they could just stay little--sweet, loving, naive, and cute--forever.

So, once again, I'm feeling torn. I know we'll adjust to this new schedule and the boys will love the time they spend in school. And I know I'll love having some time to myself and a window of time to run errands with just one boy. But best of all, in less than 10 months it'll be summer again and we'll have three whole months of time to laugh and play!

Summer Time

A few months ago Chad was organizing all of our digital photos and he said, "We have way more pictures from the winter seasons than we do from the summer. Does that mean we actually DO more in the winter?" I laughed. "No," I said, "It's because winter is so miserable that when you do something that's fun you feel like you need to document with a million pictures!"

And so it goes with bloging. I can't believe I haven't posted since May. Where has the summer gone?! It makes me sad to think that in just a few weeks the boys will be starting back to school and fall will be on its way. We've had such a wonderful but busy summer and it's just flown by so fast. We've spent countless hours putting in our yard (the last batch of sod was laid just last weekend!), went camping up at Lava Hot Springs, swimming at Bear Lake, and just celebrated our 10th anniversary with a "Chad and Andrea only" cruise down to Mexico. It's been an amazing summer.

So, no, we haven't been sucked into a big black hole the past few months. We've just been out enjoying life and loving every minute of it! ;)

This spring season was a particular rough one for playing soccer. The boys had a blast and did great, no doubt, but we had horrible weather and it either rained or snowed during most of their games this spring! Boys will be boys so of course they still played most of the games, but I didn't have a chance to take pictures until their final games last Saturday. Noah can't wait to play again in the fall and Ethan has decided to try baseball (is it t-ball at this age?) next year instead. Here are a few pics from the last day.