Once Crazy Summer

School starts next week.  That's impossible!  Summer just started.  I went out to Utah at the end of May to help my dad.  P was able to take some time off work so he handled everything, everything, with the kids while I was away.  The remaining summer has been a blur of handling things for my dad and we went up to Virginia for the last 2 weeks to handle more things for my dad.  I can't believe this summer has gone by so quickly.

While in Virginia we did spend some awesome times with my sister MJ.  She came with her kids and we had fun.  The kids got to walk to Mason District park and to the Green Springs Garden.  

We'd never really explored the walkable area around my dad's house.  It was really nice.  I brought a blow up pool and the kids had fun in that one day. 

Then it rained and we took it down until the next week when we set it up and it rained with hail!

Mary brought a cotton candy machine!

We went downtown and spent time at the Natural History museum.  There was a Maori art display and a dance troop there doing traditional dances.  It was really cool! 

 It was nice to spend time with my sister's family and my dad. 

My dad gets annoyed by children running around and possibly damaging the house.  But there were several sweet moments like this where he took time to be kind.  He was trying to show L how to spin the fidgit spinner.

Another time these 3 rascals were fighting on the couch and my dad said "Don't fight, don't fight" very sweetly instead of yelling...  These 3 boys are 1 year apart each and it was my little L that was often dictating the craziness level.  L also liked to climb up into MJ's lap and say "Mine" just to drive her son crazy.

Later in the week we met up with P's gator band friend M and his family.  The playground we went to in Arlington was amazing!  We'll definitely go again.

We also went to the Medical museum at Walter Reed that afternoon.  It was intense but I'd like to make it a regular visit.

  Seeing those body parts and medical history was really different than anything I'd ever seen.  Then we went up to the temple visitor's center and had a nice visit there.

We still haven't done school shopping!  Now we're back in the coastal town and hopefully we'll have time to get to the beach.  Hopefully.