The first half of July

July has been a busy month.  We have settled in to a routine that gets us out of the house a bit, and yet still gives us time at home to clean and just relax.  Mondays there are outings with friends and t-ball practice.  Tuesday mornings there have been some great programs at the library and then we stay after and spend a bit of time checking out books and videos.  Kai has discovered Bill Nye the Science Guy this month and he loves them!  They are geared for 4th grade and up, but he still eats it all up and takes it all in.  Even Finn has enjoyed watching them.  Anyway, Wednesday afternoons the boys have gymnastics and we normally use that morning to do our weekly grocery shopping.  Thursday morning is playgroup.  And finally Friday, we have been doing a bit of our own trips and exploration.  It's been a great routine for us for the last couple of weeks.  At the end of this week I was physically exhausted.  When I looked through the pictures I realized why.  It's been a busy few weeks and this past week was especially busy.  I sat down and wrote out our schedule for the next 4 1/2 weeks and it is just as busy.....right up until school starts.  Hope I can keep up!  (Oh and be prepared for picture overload!)

Ok, technically this was June 30th.  But close enough.

The kids spent a couple of hours playing at Monkey Bizness.  It was not what I expected and definitely overpriced.  I much preferred House of Bounce that we visited earlier in June.  

Bree's first time in pigtails on July 1st

The first library program we attended.  This is Dr. Dee Struction and her assistant.  Really they were uninhibited librarians who put on a comedy routine and taught the kids about science at the same time.  My boys enjoyed it.

The kids' parade before the big 4th of July parade

It was just me and these two for the parade.  We had a good time riding the bus into town and finding a place to squeeze ourselves in along the parade route. 

The cannons that started the parade

Don't be fooled--it was definitely in the 90 degree zone!

Monument knows how to throw a parade!  We look forward to this every year.

Sunday afternoon (July 6th) sugar cookie making

The first couple of Mondays our adventures with friends kept falling through.  So on the 7th we decided to go Geocaching instead.  It was our first time and I decided the boys would enjoy finding the treasure right behind their elementary school.  Turns out we are going to have to do this again because I had two little boys who complained about weeds the whole time.  In fact they stopped at one point and told me to go on myself, find the treasure, and take a picture of it, and then come back and show them.  No, I did not do that.  That is the treasure in Finn's hand.

Finn is a climber!  On the 10th we went to the park in the afternoon since we had Kai's physical in the morning and could not make it to playgroup.  Finn scaled right up this 10 foot wall, over it, and then down the other side.  Talk about causing my heart to skip a few beats.  He wants to go to a real rock-climbing gym.  I found a Groupon for a gym that will teach kids to climb, so sometime soon he will go give that a try with his dad.

Friday the 11th we took an adventure to the Colorado Railroad Museum.  It was different than I had expected.  I guess now we can say we've been and we have no need to go back.  The drive was quite long so we played at the kids' area for a while just to unwind first and there was these two older ladies who came in after us and got quite grumpy with me.  Honestly, I've never had anyone be that rude about my children before.  It kind of shook me up for the rest of our visit.

Here's Kai with some of the model trains.

A Galloping Goose

A really neat model train village outside.  It wasn't running unfortunately.

Posing outside one of the cars you could explore

It was impossible to get the boys to pose for a picture.  Either Kai didn't look at the camera or Finn had his shirt in his mouth.  Ahhhhh!

Playing inside the model train in the museum.  This was the beginning of the end.  Finn was tired and grumpy and threw a massive fit.  It was embarrassing.  We eventually left and stopped at Sonic for treats on the way home.  It took us nearly two hours to make the drive back to our house.  

Ice Skating for the first time on July 14th--Kai's first few tentative steps

Finn took off with a new found friend, Reese.  She is Kai's age but was so sweet with Finn.

getting more confident

The library program on the 8th was a professional magician.  He was a lot of fun and the boys enjoyed his 45 minute show.  Bree wouldn't sit still for it and so I have no pictures.  The program on the 15th was called Cathy's Critters.  Here Kai is sitting with his t-ball friend Sawyer and watching a hedgehog run around with a toilet paper roll on his head.

Friday the 18th we went up to the Denver Zoo.  Here is Kai and Sawyer with a polar bear!

Finn posing

Bree checking out a turtle.  This is before she got horribly sick and threw up EVERYTHING she had eaten all over herself and her stroller.  She ended up getting a super expensive onesie from the gift shop as a souvenir.

Kai and Sawyer with the biggest turtle I have ever seen

Sawyer (who is about 15 months younger than Kai and 14 months older than Finn), Finn, Jude (just turned three), and Kai in front of the flamingos.