Summer Vacation

On a Saturday morning at the end of June, with our van packed to the gills, we headed out on our 8 day family summer vacation. It was a road trip, of course, because that how we Gilberts do it best.

We drove three and a half hours to our first destination of Lake McConaughy, a big lake outside of Ogallala, NE known for it's nice sand beaches and camping (in Nebraska, crazy, I know!). My parents went with us and we camped for two nights. It's amazing how much work goes into sleeping on the ground and eating outside for two days! This was our first real camping trip as a family and it went really well. The weather was gorgeous for us, despite the massive amount of rain they've had this year that has washed out a lot of the beach. We spent most of the time playing by the shore for the two days we were there, with a bit of time at the campground playground, and of course at our campsite cooking and eating. Lots of fun memories made in two short days!

{One of my favorite memories being a pretty classic quote from Sydney. While waiting for breakfast after our first night of sleeping in the tent, she says, "I feel old." To which I responded, "Oh, yeah, what does that feel like?" Her response? "Icky."}

We left Lake McConaughy on Monday morning to make the 5 hour drive to Omaha where we spent the night to break up the trip a bit more. Our overnight there was remarkable only for finding the best hotel deal ever! We decided to take our chances and find a hotel last minute on a travel deal website. We got a cheap rate on a hotel with a pool, so basically it fit what we were looking for. When we arrived, we learned that our room was a full suite, that the hotel offered a free dinner complete with free beer and wine, and a full hot complimentary breakfast. We never even left the hotel!

Tuesday morning we took off to make the 4 hour drive to Cedar Falls to visit my grandparents. We also got the treat of seeing my Uncle David, Aunt Nancy, cousins Shaina and Nicole, and to meet Shaina's new baby. We spent Tuesday catching up with family and topped off the night watching the Cedar Falls band in Overman Park.

 My beautiful grandparents.

Overman Park

On Wednesday, Sydney and I made the trip to Dubuque along with my parents, grandparents, and Uncle David to meet up with Nel and her mom. Nel was home from Jerusalem for the week, and it was so special to be able to see her, especially as she is nearing her due date. We are anxiously awaiting the arrival of our newest niece/cousin!

On Thursday we left for Fort Dodge and spent the long July 4th weekend with the Gilbert side. The cousins had a lot of playtime, we had a chance to catch up with some of Gilby's cousins, aunt, uncle, and grandparents, Gilby and I ran a 5K in Webster City while Grandma and Grandpa hung out with the kids, we went to a 4th of July parade, Gilby went kayaking with his dad and brother, and we overall had a great time catching up with everyone and enjoying each others' company. We kept busy and left a bit tired, but the time with family was fulfilling and lots of memories were made.

Cousin Time!

Pile on Grandpa!

Gilbert adult cousins in front of a shed bought for a school in need with funds from Grandma and Grandpa's estate. 

Firecracker 5K

 Jim, Shawn, and Gilby kayaking

Quick Cousin Visit

A couple of days before we left on our summer family trip, Aunt Siri and Raum were in town from California. We were lucky to be able to play with them for a day! The kids LOVE any chance they get to be with family!

Wicked

My mom graciously took me to the musical, Wicked, while it was recently in Denver. We started our date eating out downtown and walked over to the theater for the show, which was so good! We both thoroughly enjoyed the production and had a great time together!

My mom is awesome for so, so many reasons. She is always supporting us, helping with the kids, and a fun friend for me to hang out with. She's especially awesome at this very moment for offering to spend the afternoon with the kids while I escaped to Starbucks to catch up on this blog! It's important to me to document our family memories, but I've struggled to find the time and energy to keep up on it this summer. Thank you, Mom, for giving me the precious gift of time!

Glenwood Springs

Last month, Gilby and I took an awesome and much needed overnight trip to Glenwood Springs...without kids! We LOVE our kids, but it's nice to get a little break once in awhile.

We spent the first day hiking Hanging Lake, which was indeed beautiful just as everyone said it would be.

The next day we lounged at the Glenwood Springs Hot Springs, a resort created around naturally occurring mineral hot springs.

It was really great to just be together without the chaos that the kids can bring, and it was so quiet without our VERY LOUD children. Plus, we were able to enjoy another beautiful area of Colorado.

The Colorado River as seen from my morning run. Nature is my happy place.

I think the kids had just as much fun spending a couple of days with two of their favorite people - Grandma and Grandpa!

Backyard Camping

In preparation for our actual summer camping trip, we spent a night "backyard camping," which primarily just consisted of sleeping in the tent. Gilby and I aren't so sure about sleeping on the ground anymore (it used to be so fun!), but the kids did great!

Sydney's Pre-K Graduation

Although she is definitely ready for it, I cannot believe that Sydney is already moving onto kindergarten! Sydney made tremendous gains, socially, academically, and emotionally, during her year and a half at The Village. She was a bit sad to leave her friends there, but is having a good time with Myles at the school age summer program.

Photos from her Pre-K graduation -

Sydney and one of her Pre-K teachers, Miss Kitt

Sydney and her other Pre-K teacher, Miss Elizabeth

Myles' End of School Festivities

The end of the school year is already buzzing with activities. Here are some highlights from the end of Myles' kindergarten year.

Kindergarten Concert
Before last year's concert, I was a little anxious about how Myles would do, but he was a rock star, so when it came to this year I had no worries. He did great! He stood with his class, sung many of the words, did the actions, and spent a lot of time waving to us in the crowd. It was super cute.

Field Day
Ryker, Sydney, and I went to watch Myles at his Field Day. Thankfully, the weather was perfect despite having the rainiest spring ever. Myles had fun at all the various activities, and of course his brother and Sydney joined in for most of them. Sweet Myles did spend a lot of time running after his brother, worried that he would get away from us (he's a runner nowadays!). Myles talks about his family a lot at school, but several teachers commented on how seeing Myles with his siblings really gave them an idea how much he loves them, and why he talks about them so much.

Myles and his best school friend, Jasper, messing around on Field Day. Myles has many friends at school, but Jasper is one of the few that you can tell really, really doesn't care that Myles is different in some ways. He genuinely enjoys Myles' company. At Jasper's recent karate birthday party, he chose Myles to be his partner and told everyone that Myles was his best buddy. He's so great.

Birthday Celebration
Being that Myles has a summer birthday, we celebrated with his class during the last week of school. He got 7 hugs from Mrs. Collier, the class sang Happy Birthday, he told the class (with my help) about all of his favorite things, each classmate drew him a picture that was put into a birthday book, and Myles handed out a play-doh gift to each of his friends. He felt really special!

Myles and his fabulous kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Collier.

I had to include these pictures of Ryker. He was so funny when we were at Myles' school for Field Day and his birthday. Ryker had those kindergarten boys following him everywhere and didn't want me to stay by him at all. Just observing the situation, people would have thought he was one of the kindergarten students! This boy will definitely be ready for elementary school in a few years!

Spring Soccer

Myles and Sydney played their first season of soccer this past spring and thankfully both had a great experience!

We learned quickly that soccer can be a bit intense! I was hoping that Sydney could do 6 or so weeks of Saturday practice/games, but she was already in the age group that practices once a week and has a game each Saturday for 8 weeks. I love to see my kids experience new activities, but I've been in a bit of denial that we are already at the age where these activities will fill up our schedule!

Sydney had six girls on her team and each game was 3-on-3. Being that Sydney has a spotty track record for participation in group activities, I was a bit nervous to see how she would do. She showed us just how much she has matured, was immediately comfortable with her teammates, and gave 100% effort. I was pleased to see how hard she was trying, how respectful she was of her coach, and how nice she was to her teammates, but her actual soccer skills didn't seem to be coming along very quickly. She would run her little heart out during each game (and she's fast!), but she rarely touched the ball. Her smile though - she had an ear to ear grin the whole time she was on the field, so we felt like the experience was successful even if she wasn't that good at the actual sport. But then, week 5 came along and she had her breakout game! She was aggressive, played defense and offense with some skill, and scored 3 times! And all with the same huge smile. She built up some confidence and from that game on was one of the better players.

Look at that smile!

Goal!

Myles was in the TOPS league, which is geared toward kids with disabilities. They played every Saturday afternoon with a core group of the same coaches in addition to a different volunteer high school team each week. Myles absolutely loved it! He was so motivated during the sessions and took direction well from his coaches. They would typically do some soccer drills for the first half and then have a scrimmage at the end, although with very loose rules to accommodate the players. Although most of the kids just came in tennis shoes and gym clothes (no shin guards or cleats), Myles was adamant about wearing the same official uniform as his sister, so we had them share and he wore his sister's each week. (Those uniforms are too expensive for this frugal mama to buy two!!) It made me chuckle to see him all suited up amongst his friends in their less official outfits, I can only imagine that some other parents thought we were a bit too intense, but it was genuinely all Myles.

We look forward to a great fall season for both of them just around the corner!

 Grandma was our #1 fan and came to almost every game!

Daddy vs. the kids. Ryker can't wait until he's old enough to play - he's been known to say, "I older NOW, Mom!"