The Last Week of Summer Break & A Visit from Ken and Linda

Samantha: 99 Months, Week 1
Aedan: 64 Months, Week 4
Owen: 23 Months, Week 1

I am trying really hard to catch up up my blog, but summertime was just so busy, that I am still about a month behind as I write this blog post. I am going to attempt to write about each week with as much detail as I remember, but try to move along and get caught up so that way I can remember and write about each current week as they happen, which, after all, is the goal of this blog.

I don't remember much about this Sunday, so I will skip to Monday. This was the kids' last week of summer break before school starts next Monday, so we tried to take advantage of the time we had together. I always like to cram a lot of fun things into the last week of summer. On Monday, Ben stayed home from campus and we decided to go to Rickett's Glen State Park to go on a hike, see a waterfall, and give the kids a chance to play on the beach and go swimming again.

The hike we went on was easy, short, and manageable for the kids. They love doing this sort of thing, and we don't do it nearly enough. Here are some pictures of the beautiful nature we got to see during our hike. This state park sure it beautiful. We carried Owen during some of the steep steps, but for the most part he walked on his own while holding one of our hands.

Even though I don't normally like to be in pictures because I feel self-conscious sometimes, I'm glad that Ben thought to take some pictures of the kids and me.

I just love these two. They are looking so grown-up lately. I can't believe we are going to now have two school-aged kids. Aedan is looking so much older lately, and has lost a lot of his baby look. Samantha is growing like a weed and has gotten so tall. They are looking forward to being able to go to school together this year, but have really enjoyed having all this time this summer to bond and play.

Owen was very interested in pointing things out to us that he saw along the way.

The kids stopped at this fallen down tree and looked around and discovered things for quite awhile. Ben and I enjoyed standing there and watching them interact with each other. I love their curiosity and desire to explore.

Here's my beautiful girl, with our old video camera slung around her shoulder so that she could take her own pictures and videos of what she found interesting.

Aedan still loves playing with sticks, (he used to be a collector of sticks when he was younger, always finding one while we were out and wanting to bring it home with him), and here he is scraping the moss off the bark of a tree.

In these next two pictures we are looking at something high up in a tree, but I forget what it was.

After finishing up our hike, we got back in the car and headed for the beach. The kids were very excited to get their bathing suits on and play in the water. It was a warmer day than the previous time we came to this beach, so Aedan and Owen were very eager to join in the swimming as well. In fact, Owen was a little wild boy, just throwing himself into the water with no fear at all. In fact, he would stand up on the beach, and then come running at me in the water, falling flat on his belly (he had his floatie on of course), and then get right back up and do it again. Samantha loved swimming all over the place in the lake and going on adventures with Aedan. They love to pretend play, acting like different characters or animals, and always have a great time using their imaginations. The kids had a blast that morning, and I'm glad that we decided to do this family outing together. Summer is coming to an end, and this was a perfect (free) morning out together. We will definitely come back to Lake Jean again in the future.

After getting the kids' bunk beds put up over the weekend, the next step in the process was reorganizing their closets and toys so that it felt like both their room, and not just Aedan sleeping in Samantha's room. The house came with these cool closet organizers, but they weren't really meeting our needs. Especially with Samantha and Aedan sharing this closet, we knew this wasn't going to work, so we decided to take it out of her closet and sell it locally. I took a few pictures of it before we disassembled it, and I got several people interested in it within that same day.

Then, Ben and I spent the rest of the afternoon putting up the new shelving system (which took some adjusting), as well as Ben putting together the new bookshelves for underneath the window, and I organized their toys and clothes into their new spaces. It took quite a bit of time on both our parts, but we were happy with how it worked out and pleasantly surprised by how well everything fit and how much space they would still have individually.

I found this picture, and I'm not sure which kid took it, but I think it's a pretty good one of the man I love. He faithfully prepares breakfast for us most mornings, and I admire his servant's heart that is always focused on serving our family.

I imagine this picture was also taken by one of the kids, but it shows one of Izzy's favorite places to lay. She can look out the window but can also keep her eyes on anything happening in the house.

Tuesday was a big day for Aedan, as it was his time for Kindergarten Orientation. He had a half an hour window of time, just before lunch, to come into the school, see his classroom, meet his teacher, and go over some general instructions for the first day of school. We made a family trip out of it because we thought it would be good for Samantha to be able to see their new school as well. I didn't get a picture of Aedan sitting at his table in his classroom, but here he is standing in the lobby of the school. He was super excited about going to school that day, and he kept asking about it all morning, as he knew it was coming and couldn't wait.

I love this picture of Aedan. Doesn't he just look so grown up? He has grown so much in the last year, both in physical and mental development. He has such a sweet, sensitive spirit, and I can't wait to see all that Kindergarten holds for him, even though I will miss him tremendously.

We got to meet his teacher, Mrs. Weaver, and see his classroom and his cubby that he will keep his backpack in. We got a little information about what to bring for the first day/week of school, as well as information about pick up and drop off. Since we are new to this school, we didn't know too much about the whole process, so we were glad for the information. The president of the PTO also gave us a tour of the building, and we were able to see the two 3rd grade classrooms. One teacher, Mr. Feinauer, was in his room getting things ready, but we didn't know which teacher Samantha was assigned to yet. It was good for everyone to be able to see the school and get acclimated a little regarding where things are located so it wasn't so scary walking in on the first day.

The only thing we needed to figure out was transportation because Aedan was listed as a van rider, and we didn't know what that meant. I called Transportation and was told that there will be a van that will pick the kids up at Lakeside Skillet, the restaurant just a block away from our house at about 8:45 every morning and drop them off about 3:55 every afternoon. That sounded like a good plan to me because they would not ride on the van any longer than if I were to drive them myself, and I had assumed that I might have to drive them to school and pick them up since they are going to a different school than where we are located in the district boundaries. However, I was pleasantly surprised that these accommodations were already taken care of. Everything with getting situated at Lehman-Jackson has been so smooth and easy. I am thankful that the kids are there together, that Samantha gets to be in the gifted program, and that the kids can have the experience of a good, educationally successful school.

That afternoon while Owen was napping, Samantha and Aedan decided to enjoy their new room by playing with Legos together. I took some pictures of the finished room, and I was glad it all turned out so nice. The tall bookshelf is Samantha's, and the two small bookshelves are Aedan's. We got them for a good price at Big Lots, and they are perfect for fitting under the window and are a good size for Aedan to access.

Right now we have Samantha on the top and Aedan on the bottom, so we will see if we keep it like that, or if they switch back and forth occasionally. Samantha still has room in the corner for her Kit stuff, and the closet fits the dresser very nicely with two drawers for each kid, plus plenty of space to hang clothes with Samantha using the top and Aedan using the bottom. Here's to the start of their adventures sharing a room!

With school starting in a week, I decided it would be a good idea to go to the store together to let the kids pick their own school supplies. We tried to eat and clean up dinner as quickly as possible, but it was later than we wanted when we left for Walmart. The one downside to where we live is that there is no big box store that is close to us. There is a Target and Walmart in Wilkes-Barre, which is about 30 minutes away, and there is another Walmart in Tunkhannock, which is about 27 minutes away. I have been going grocery shopping there most weeks, as it is good prices and more convenient one stop shopping. Anyways, that was where we went for shopping and school supplies that night, but Aedan was just too tired and was having a hard time listening. We got two carts so that Ben could get some groceries while I helped the kids get their supplies. Samantha had to get quite a few notebooks and folders, so we started there first. Aedan was getting impatient (as he often does lately when he has to wait for anything). He was right at the end of the aisle with me, and then the next minute, when we were ready to move to the next aisle, he was gone. I couldn't find him anywhere in the school supply section and started to get really scared that he had wandered off or even that he was taken by strangers. I called Ben frantically, saying that I couldn't find him. I didn't want to leave the school supply section in case he came back looking for me, so Ben started walking the perimeter of the store, looking up and down every aisle. I talked to a Walmart employee, saying that I couldn't find my son, and he had just called over a manager to call a "Code Adam" when I saw Ben walking towards us, and he had Aedan with him. I was so relieved when I saw him because all my worst fears were going through my mind, and I honestly thought I could have lost him forever in that moment. It was all I could do to hold back my tears when I was frantically looking around for him. Ben told me later, that Aedan was halfway across the store, looking at bedding. When he found him, Aedan started crying, and later he said that he thought he saw someone that looked like me go around a corner and then followed them. But then when he realized it was the wrong person, he didn't know where he was or how to get back to me. I'm sure he was really scared as well, and we had a conversation after that about how he always needs to stay with an adult, especially in a public place, and that there are bad people out there that like to take kids. It was a bad combination of Aedan being really tired and then bored of waiting for Samantha, but still, it was the most scared I've ever been in my life for one of my children.

Again, in the spirit of celebrating our last week of summer together, I decided to take the kids to the Please Touch Museum in Philadelphia on Wednesday. It's about a two hour drive down there, and we didn't get to the museum until after 11:00. Owen had been acting fine that morning, but when we got to the museum, he was burning up and I could tell that he had a fever. I wasn't sure what to do since we had just gotten there, so I decided to pile everyone back in the car and drive to a Rite Aid to buy some medicine to bring down his fever. Once we got back to the museum, we decided to watch a magic show, and Owen had very little energy. He just sat, cuddled up on my lap, resting his head on my shoulder. Poor little guy, he just felt so bad. Samantha and Aedan really enjoyed the magic show though, and it was a good chance to allow Owen's medicine to start working on bringing down his fever.

After the magic show, we went upstairs to the tables to eat our lunch before starting to play again. Owen wasn't interested in eating too much, but once we got some food, he was ready to start playing, and was acting much more like himself. The kids had a great time at the museum that afternoon. They have a lot of areas for pretend play, which is perfect for what Samantha, Aedan, and Owen like to do. Here they are serving ice cream at an ice cream parlor.

Here they are working as a team and laying bricks on a conveyor belt.

Here's Owen peeking out through the glass at me.

Owen particularly likes pretending to drive vehicles, so here he is on a bus and another little car.

There was a section of the museum we hadn't noticed the last time we were there that focused on the Middle East. In the back of this area, there was this whole room that looked like outer space with foam rockets you could shoot off, and this was by far their favorite room in the museum. They could have been in here for an hour, and they did a great job taking turns and having their rockets race to see whose could go the farthest. It was great hearing them squeal with delight.

And here is Samantha dressed up like an astronaut, giving me a firm, serious look.

Here is Owen posing for me on top of an elephant statue.

Once Owen saw the carousel, he made a beeline for it, saying "Horsey! Horsey!" He wasn't going to be okay with waiting until the end of the our day to go on the carousel. He certainly enjoys riding up and down on a carousel.

We ended our time by doing some pretend play in the grocery store. They love this area as well, but it's hard for Owen to understand that he has to share the shopping carts with the other kids that are there. However, there were a couple nice older kids that saw Owen looking around at carts longing, and willingly gave up their carts to him.

With the late start to our day, we stayed a little longer than normal, it was probably close to 4:00 by the time we left to go back home. Owen and Aedan both fell asleep in the car, which I was glad for, and Samantha actually nodded off for a little while as well, which is unheard of for her. We got back a little late that evening, but we had a good day of a lot of fun, and Ben was able to make dinner and have it ready for when we got home.

Here's a picture of little Owen from after dinner that night. You can tell in his eyes and face that wasn't feeling very good. His fever had definitely come back, and I felt bad for the little guy.

Owen had a rough night of sleeping that night because of his fever. I think Ben and I each went to his room two times, alternating, throughout the night, trying to comfort him and help him get back to sleep. That Thursday I debated whether or not to take him in to get his ears checked because with the fever and not wanting to lay down to sleep, those are his typical signs when he has an ear infection. I looked in his ears myself with the otoscope, and I didn't see any redness. However, even though he was super tired, he didn't take a good nap on Thursday either, so I decided to take him to a walk-in clinic while Ben took Samantha and Aedan to pick up Ken and Linda at the airport. Owen and I had to wait for awhile to be seen at the clinic, but he did a fairly good job being patient. The doctor checked his ears and they were all clear; however, he looked in his throat and noticed that it was very red and irritated. He suggested that we do a throat culture to test for strep, and that was not a fun experience to put Owen through. He was not happy about being held down and gagged, and he cried pretty hard afterwards. When the doctor came back in the room, Owen wouldn't even look at him and certainly didn't want him to touch him anymore. The quick culture came back negative, but they were going to send it out to the lab as well. However, they did prescribe him with antibiotics because he wanted Owen to feel some relief and get some help for his symptoms, so we left with some antibiotics, and I hoped that we would have a better night's sleep that night.

Samantha and Aedan were super excited about Ken and Linda coming to our house to visit. We were glad they took the time to come see us in our new house, and we were excited for this extended time we had together. Here are Samantha and Aedan waiting for them at the airport.

Thursday night ended up being kind of a late night with everything that was going on, but we got the kids to bed and then were able to just talk and catch up with Ken and Linda. After awhile, Owen woke up crying, and something happened that truly touched my heart. Without any prompting whatsoever, Ken got up to go to Owen's bedroom to help him calm down and get back to sleep. We could hear Owen crying for a few minutes longer, but Ken didn't give up and come down to get one of us, he stuck with him and stayed in his room for a long time, just letting him get it all out, until he stopped crying and fell asleep. And do you know what happened? Owen then slept through the entire night. I was amazed, and this full night's sleep was such a relief after the rough night and day we had with him. Ken and Owen definitely have a special bond, and I love that he isn't afraid to get in there and be with him, even when it's hard and he's crying and doesn't feel well. It meant so much to me to see someone else love my little Owen so much.

On Friday we decided to take Ken and Linda to a local amusement park called Knoebels. We hadn't been there yet ourselves, but we have heard great things about it from people that live here. You don't have to pay to park or to get in, you just buy tickets and give tickets to ride any ride that you want to go on, kind of like a fair. The kids were really excited and couldn't wait to go on their first ride together. Here they are, sitting together and ready to go! (Owen wasn't quite sure what he thought of it at first.)

The next ride they went on was this hot air balloon ride. Samantha and Aedan rode together, and Ben rode with Owen. It actually got going a lot faster than you would expect!

Samantha and I rode on another ride that spun you around and around, and I took a picture of the two of us before we started. I love these pictures of the two of us because I can see so many similarities between the two of us with our face shape, cheeks, hair, and squinty eyes (sorry Samantha!).

We went on tons of rides at Knoebels, and there's no way I can remember them all, but we had such a fun day. We brought our lunch in to eat, and basically let the kids decide which rides looked fun to try out. Owen, of course, requested the carousel. (Aedan said he didn't want to ride, so he sat this one out, but then changed his mind about halfway through the ride when it was too late to go on.) The cool thing about the rides here is that they really were pretty long. It wasn't a go around once or twice and be done type thing, which was nice. This carousel ride was particularly long!

Samantha and Aedan were interested in going on a little roller coaster with Ken and Linda, so while they were waiting in line for that, Ben and I took Owen to the little kid section and let him ride on a few things by himself, like this boat ride where they went around and around and he could ring the bell.

And this horse carriage ride where he got to hold his horse's reigns. Owen really likes horses right now, so he was really excited about this ride.

Samantha, Ken, and I went on the bumper cars together, and Samantha was really excited for this one, exclaiming, "I've always wanted to go on the bumper cars!" She had a little trouble learning how to steer and how to reverse to get herself unstuck, but she still had a lot of fun. She loved trying to chase Ken and me and hit us as hard as she could.

Since Aedan wasn't tall enough to go on the bumper cars, Ben and Linda took Aedan and Owen back over to the kiddie ride section so they could do some of the rides that Samantha would be too tall to do. It's kind of nice that they have it laid out this way, and there are just SO many rides that there is no way you could do all of them in one day. Here are a few pictures and a video of the boys riding in the police helicopter.

And then Aedan got to drive Daddy around the track in a little car. He was very intent on his steering wheel.

Linda and I often talk about how much we mean to each other. She (and Ken) have been such a big support to us over the last year and a half that we've known them. They love us like we are their family, and I was so honored that they didn't just talk about coming to visit us, but actually took the time to come out. The kids loved the attention, and really think of them as another set of grandparents. Owen often will call Ken "Papa," which is really sweet.

It was getting later in the afternoon, and there was still so much of the park that we hadn't seen, so we decided to skip to the back section to ride some of the bigger rides. Everyone was very excited for the log ride, and I was so proud of Aedan for being brave in going on this with us. He was a little nervous, but he just screamed and squealed with delight as we plummeted down the hill and got splashed by the water. He wanted to go right back on and do it again. :) This reminds me of someone else I know (Me!). Feel free to ask my dad for a story about my first time on a log ride. :) Samantha loved it as well and was all smiles, for that's the kind of ride she loves.

After the log ride, we convinced Samantha and Aedan to go on a wooden roller coaster called the Phoenix. Not knowing anything about it, we thought it would be fairly harmless, but it was pretty intense. The lap bar did not go down far enough to hold the kids firmly in their seats, so every time we went over a hill, they raised up out of the seat a little bit, which they did not like. I was riding with Aedan, and I ended up putting my arm around him to hold him against me and try to keep him grounded and not flopping around as much. It was a fun ride for Ben and I, but it was a little too much for the kids. It was not like "The Seven Dwarfs Mine Ride" at Magic Kingdom, but hey, you live and you learn, and we made sure to tell them how proud we were of them.

While we were on the roller coaster, Ken was holding Owen and he fell asleep on his shoulder. We decided it was time to eat some dinner, so while we were eating, we laid Owen down in the stroller to continue sleeping. It was already 6:15 at this point, so a nap was long overdue for the poor little guy. He was a trooper though and was having too much fun to fall asleep earlier. He was so cute and peaceful sleeping in the stroller that I had to snap a couple pictures of him.

From there I think we went on a couple more rides and then decided to call it a day since we still had to drive the hour and a half back home and had been riding rides at Knoebels all day. The kids chose a wooden bobsled type ride as their last ride, and I went on it with them. It was a great ride to end the day because it was a smaller roller coaster type ride, but much more tame, and Samantha and Aedan just loved it. 

Here is Owen amusing himself by a tree while waiting for us get off the ride. We had a wonderful day at Knoebels as a family with Ken and Linda, and we were so glad to be able to share this experience with them. We will definitely have to come back to Knoebels again, as there are many more rides to try. Samantha remarked how great it is to have a mini-Disney World so close to our new house. :)

On the way home we hoped everyone would fall asleep in the car, as we were leaving at the time they normally are in bed. Aedan fell asleep as soon as everyone stopped talking and the car was quiet. Samantha leaned her head up against my shoulder, since I was sitting next to her in the back of the car, and she fell asleep as well. (I also fell asleep for awhile because the car was so dark and quiet.) You know the only one who didn't fall asleep? Owen, the silly boy. It probably was his late nap that threw him off, but luckily, he was content to quietly play with toys while his older brother and sister rested from a fun day out.

After a busy day out all day on Friday, we took it easy on Saturday. The weather was gorgeous, so we spent a lot of the morning playing outside and just relaxing with Ken and Linda. At one point, Owen was pushing himself around on his giraffe bike, got stuck, and decided to just push harder to get himself unstuck. However, doing that made him tip over the front handlebars of his giraffe bike, falling face first into the rock wall. He immediately started crying the cry he does when he really gets hurt. Ken felt terrible that he didn't stop him, although it wasn't his fault at all. I took a couple pictures of Owen's face close up as you could see that his nose got scraped up, and he was starting to get some bruising across the bridge of his nose and his right eye. Our guess is that this was going to turn into a pretty good black eye with little Owen.

Ken and Linda offered to let Ben and I go on a date while they babysat the kids for us, so after getting Owen settled down for his nap, we took off for Williamsport to go out to eat at Olive Garden together before watching the Williamsport Crosscutters play. It wasn't that we necessarily were dying to see that team play, but we hadn't been to a baseball game for quite awhile, and the Wilkes-Barre RailRiders were out of town that night. Ben and I had a good time having uninterrupted conversation in the car on the way there and back, we enjoyed a delicious dinner at Olive Garden where we could eat hot food without having to cut up a kids' food or make sure they were sitting down, and it was fun to go to a baseball game together and ask Ben questions about the game and hear his expertise about sports. Sometimes I forget how much he enjoys sports, especially baseball. With having a job and a family, he doesn't have much time to watch, enjoy, or participate in sports anymore, so this was a fun way to enjoy a hobby of his together. (I like going to games more for the company and quality time, than for the sake of watching a game.) It was so fun being able to go on an extended date night with Ben, and we knew the kids were in good hands while we were gone. We were so appreciative of this opportunity, and it's so important to our marriage relationship to have this time together.

(Blog about August 18-24, 2019)