The Saturday 7

We did it! We survived the last day of school and have officially started Summer Break. Woohoo! 

1. On Sunday, I decided to be a nice mom for once and took the kids to the park. Nova met us there, and all three had a blast in the splash pad.

Then of course, we had to get ice cream, because some marketing genius opened an ice cream shop right next to the park. 

2. Lena anxiety update: She did not want to go to school on Monday, but I was working in the library so I thought that might help. Spoiler alert: it did not. If anything, it made it worse because she had an easy out. She cried all morning, took one of her pills that's supposed to help immediately, then stood outside her classroom with me doing deep breaths for ten minutes until she got herself under control enough to go into class. She made it half an hour before she was back in my office freaking out. 🤦 I had a class about to come in, so I called my parents and my dad came and picked her up. 

On Tuesday, I had the day off of both my jobs, so I knew I'd be a phone call away if she needed me to come get her, but I didn't tell her that. I had hope that being off the school premises would force her to try a little harder. We went through the same rigmarole as the day before, but this time I dug down deep for some tough love and didn't give in. Let's just say I'm thankful I'm highly medicated because her response was not for the faint of heart. She literally wailed all morning at home. When we got to school, she refused to get out of the van. I had to drag her out as she sobbed, "No mommy! Please don't make me go! No mommy!" I got her outside her classroom again and we prayed and talked through all the things. Then I physically dragged her into her classroom as she begged me not to make her stay again. I plopped her down in her desk and literally ran out of the room before she could latch onto me. Ugh. It was brutal. I expected to get a call within half an hour of leaving, but never heard a peep. I finally texted her teacher at 11 and asked how she was doing. She responded that Lena was teary for the first half hour, but then started acting totally normal - laughing and talking with her friends, participating in class, attending her specials. She made it all day, and when she got in the car afterward I said, "You did it! How was it?" She rolled her eyes and said, "Fine." Lol. I wanted to shout, "I told you so!! I told you if you just powered through the scared feeling it would go away and you'd realize you were blowing it way out of proportion!" She was completely fine the rest of the week. She picked out outfits for the last three days of school, got up each morning without argument, and didn't bat an eyelash when I dropped her off every day!! Anxiety, man. It's so irrational. Thanks for your prayers!

3. Now that I'm done working at school, I can really shift my focus to Soccer Camp. This week, I worked on setting up an eye-catching display in the church foyer, hoping to entice people to donate snacks. I went to Dollar Tree and grabbed anything I thought might work - green table cloth, poster board, sparkly garland, and three random cork octagons that reminded me of the shapes on a soccer ball. Then I did what I do best: lay it all out and decide how to make it work together. The octagons had me stumped at first, but then I got the bright idea to "upholster" them with paper. 

It was really just wrapping, but I used a stapler instead of tape, so that makes it upholstery. 😁 #science

Voila!

4. On Wednesday evening we joined some of the cousins for Princess and Superhero Night in the Park. I didn't plan ahead very well and realized Wednesday morning that my kids had nothing to dress up as. And most stores aren't selling costumes right now. Lucky for them, I work at a children's store and have access to the merchandise as it comes in. A "Black Panther" costume in Levi's size came in while I was working Wednesday morning, so instead of putting it into a tote for backstock, I snapped that puppy up and bought it on the spot. Then I scoured the pajama section for a princess nightgown for Lena, since they look like dresses. Haha. (#ingenuity) At first, Levi was not happy with the Black Panther costume. He's never seen the movie, doesn't know the character, and was very concerned he was a bad guy. After a lot of whining and complaining, I finally let him watch the trailer on YouTube and he decided Black Panther was cool enough to dress up as . . . with the addition of homemade claws. He dug some cardboard out of the recycling bin, cut it into claws, and taped them onto a pair of gloves. Perfect for an 80 degree day. Lol. 

Cousin Crew!

5. Friday was the long-awaited last day of school. We did our traditional picture in front of the door so I could make a side-by-side for each kid. Those side-by-side pics are always mind-blowing to me. It's amazing how much they grow in 9 months! (Although I do think they're a little deceiving. If you look at the welcome mat, you can tell they're all standing a little closer to me in the last day pics than they were on the first day pics, so they look taller than they really are.)

This was the year Lucy learned how to tame her hair. If only she could tame whatever creature keeps ripping all her jeans. 🤦

Levi definitely changed the most this year!

This fall, I'll have a kid in elementary, middle school, and high school! 😱 We celebrated the last day with McDonald's for lunch, then swimming at Niki's. She was babysitting a bunch of the cousins, so it was a real party!

Levi always says he doesn't like babies, but now that Lainey smiles at him so freely, he's changed his tune. 💓

6. Lena and Levi love making summer bucket lists every year, but they always end up being the same few activities. So this year, we decided to challenge ourselves with an A-Z list. Some letters were definitely difficult! And I'm worried that doing it this way means we're spending more money than we usually would, because we're going to a lot of expensive places. But recognizing that I have a kid entering high school already reminds me that time is so fleeting and the memories are worth the money. This is what we ended up with:

Lena made this graphic almost completely by herself!

See where we stretched things a little? Lol. Yo-Fro is Yogurt that is Frozen of course. Video night will be an undertaking for me, but I think the kids will love it. I'm going to go back through years of videos I've taken on my phone and compile them somehow so we can watch them together. We actually only have 11 weeks of summer this year because we're starting really early in the fall (August 19!), so we're going to have to do a couple a week to make it in time! We checked off our first one this morning with Saturday Morning Soccer with friends at church:

7. Just a few memes this week:

I feel like there's money in this idea . . .

Oh great. Is this something else about old age I have to look forward to?

Justin took Levi to Fantastic Sam's for his last hair cut. Usually we see Gabby at the small town barbershop in Kent City. She knows everyone and everything and chats the whole time. After his Fantastic Sam's haircut, Levi said, "I like going to Gabby better. She talks the whole time. At Fantastic Sam's it's just quiet and boring." Lol. My poor extroverted child. 

Only the rich kids had basements like these. And they were the best!