Waterfilled Weekend

My mother in law is still hanging on strong. We try to visit her as much as possible. It's hard not knowing how much time is left. Visiting her makes me think a lot about death and life (but so does Game of Thrones, and Toy Story, and my quickly growing babies). When death is around you, so many stressful and hard things seem unimportant. And at the same time, the happy and fun things seem so very important. You have to revel in the joys of this earthly life and shrug off the negative.

And there are oh so many joys. My kids have the unique ability to fill my life with so much joy (odd that they can bring just as much hard work and frustration as well....let's just say I'm never one to disparage Mondays).

This is an old photo that I didn't get to share last week, but for Father's Day last week I asked Jacob to make a card. He made this, all of his own mind and creation. This kid is pretty awesome:

Ever since Mother's Day and Father's Day has come and passed, Ryan has been wishing us all Happy Mother's and Father's Day at random times. While I was putting Jon down for a nap this afternoon, I heard him say, "Happy Mother's Day, Jacob!"

Friday night on an act of spontanaiety (my favorite kind!), we ate dinner early and then the five of us walked down to our local movie theater to see Inside Out. We are fortunate to live less than a mile from this new theater (and a month ago, a new arcade popped in across the street from it). The place we live kinda has a bad rap (Sir Mix-A-Lot calls us Bremerlos). But in the past couple years, it's been an amazing place for kids with brand new parks, new streets and sidewalks, movie theater, arcade, etc). How many people can just walk their three young kids to the movies at 7:00pm?

I had second thought about taking a baby to a movie theater. But he did great. I popped him in the Baby Bjorn and he enjoyed the first ten minutes, kicking excitedly at the big screen, before passing out for the rest of the show. Ryan has been talking about the move ever since. Personally, I thought it kinda sucked. It was exhausting, and not in a good way. But I had fun hanging out with the kids and enjoying it through them. 

We've been experiencing a crazy heatwave up here in the northwest. Like most of our neighbors, we are ill-equipped for the hot weather. This has been our house for the past five nights (notice that the time is 9:33pm):

In anticipation of the freaking hotness, I shuffled the kids out of the house early on Saturday morning so that we could wait in line to get into the only outdoor wave pool in Washington (that I know of). We got there at 11:20, 40 minutes before it opened, and there was already a line. It was worth the wait though. This place is freaking awesome.

To kill wait time, I tried to very thoroughly apply sunscreen to all three of the kids (did I mention, I did this adventure solo- yeah, I'm brave). I discovered that applying sunscreen to a baby is kind of difficult. Good thing they have dark skin and don't burn (none of my children have ever had a sunburn, even though I've forgotten sunscreen several times).

Wave pools. They rock.

Here is Jacob, ready to tackle whatever wave the pool throws at him. The water is heated. So even I went in the pool (AND had fun!).

Ryan stayed exclusively in the kiddie pool. Which was fine with me because I hadn't figured out how to chase after a three year old in a large pool while holding on to a squirmy baby who desperately wants to jump into the water.

Everytime I put Jon down, he immediately crawled for the pool. I kept having to redirect him back to the shallow end, where he would happily splash the water over and over and over. I haven't tested this theory yet but I'm sure he'd continue splashing forever if I let him. He loves water.

SPLASH!

I had to give him a shoe to chew on to distract him from the tempting depths of the wave pool. 

So, I had imagined that my solo trip with three kids to the wave pool would be heaven on earth, especially considering the heat wave. HA HA HA. Within one hour of being there, Jon had sneakily attempted to eat many things. I pulled from his mouth: a tiny rock, several shoes, several leafs, and a candy wrapper. After I applied sunscreen to Ryan, he demanded that I remove all of it at once and had a 45 minute screaming fest when I couldn't find a way to un-apply the sunscreen seeping into every inch of his skin. Jacob kept rushing off from pool to pool and getting lost among the crowds. Jon was trying to squirm away and drown. I had to do everything with one hand, including purchasing, carrying, and serving hot dogs to the big kids. I got ketchup all over my suit and my wallet fell into the pool as a result. It was a little crazy. But to be absolutely honest, I actually love it. I love being overwhelmed by and lost in the craziness of children. I hate it too. But I also love it. Makes perfect sense right?

Glorious nap time. Mostly.

We survived Saturday's adventure and when Sunday morning came, we all lounged around and caught our breath. Except for Ryan. He dressed up like an underwear Power Ranger and did his part to save the world. 

I love lazy days at home. For thirty minutes. Then the kids get cooped up and literally start behaving like animals. This doesn't really work when you have a tiny house.

So we spend a lot of time outside. 

Before I sign off, I have to share the magical discovery I made last weekend. GROCERY. DELIVERY. It's amazing. I LOVE grocery shopping. It is seriously my favorite thing to do ever. I love to browse the aisles and look at the products, and pop completely unnecessary snack food into my cart. But shopping with three kids is not always fun. And it takes a long time. And involved buckling and unbuckling three car seats several times. 

I've been tempted to try grocery delivery for years. I finally pulled the trigger. And not only do the friendly delivery people bring my groceries to my DOOR (no hauling grocery bags in the car/in the house), but with the 2 hours I saves shopping, driving kids around, and bringing everything into the house, I did all the laundry and the dishes and more. It was pretty fantastic. I didn't just buy groceries. I bought TIME. WEEKEND TIME. I'm sold. 

Also, I saved a shit ton of money by not perusing the aisles and buying at least 15 items I don't even need.

All my groceries....hand delivered to my front door!