July Photos

 Tornado Warning playing in the basement- Windows open in July!- Lego Room!

Bible Study- Brotherly Fun- Lego creation and tan arms

Movie Night- Chatting by the pool- Love our house!

Book reading lists completed-Puzzle Races-Baking with Mimi

Books lists-Flying to VA!-New computer family member

You Pick Draw game-Little People fun!-Wyatt swimming with a noodle!

Zona Rosa Fountains

Last year, my mom took the boys to play in the fountains at Zona Rosa. They've remembered it clearly and knew that had to be one of our items on our Summer Bucket list. I love a free and fun outing!! So I found a great day to head out there late morning and then planned to meet up with my mom for lunch, since she works close by! Doesn't get much better than that for a fun summer day!

9th Anniversary

If I had to count the amount of anniversary's Levi was home to celebrate, I think it would be maybe half. He just always seems to be gone around that time! But its okay, he always makes up for it in some way or another. And I'm not the type that needs to be showered with lavish gifts or dates or anything like that. We did get to do alot of special things on my trip to Virginia, so that pretty much made up for not celebrating all these years!! On our actual anniversary, my parents took me out to dinner and the boys gave me extra cuddly snuggles, all of which were exactly the kind of things I like!! Hopefully, from this point on, we will never have to be apart on another anniversary ever again!

 My mom had the boys pick up these flowers for me when they picked me up from the airport the day before, so they did double duty as anniversary flowers!! Wyatt wanted to get me tulips because he knows they're my favorite, but since they're out of season, he chose a rose because he thought it looked similar to a tulip. And Grant picked out the daisy because he liked it, so he was excited when I told him those were the flowers we had in our wedding!! They were so special!!

My cousin Courtney shared this picture with me on our anniversary and I had never seen it before! It was such a treat to see this!!! 

Washington DC, Part I

On the Friday of my trip to Virginia, we decided to spend the weekend in Washington DC. Neither of us had ever been before, so it was a great time to check out the sites without children! DC traffic is no joke! I don't know how people deal with that every day! We finally made it to our hotel late afternoon on Friday. Our hotel was in the heart of the city and it was beautiful!! And thank goodness for valet parking! We quickly got settled and then headed out to explore for the few hours we had left in the day! 

 We went to Natural History Muesum first. I felt like I stepped foot into the Night at the Museum movie! It was an incredible sight! We saw lots of dead animals and naturally gross things- like spiders as big as my hand! But it was a cool place. Super crowded so it was hard to really get a good view of things. I mostly just admired the architecture of the building. 

 Then we headed over to the Museum of American History. This was probably one of our favorite museums. They had some amazing treasures there!

 A few days before we got there, there was a group of people who gathered to make this USA flag out of Legos. Its 9.5ft by 14ft in size and is made up of over 100,000 Legos! It weighs 546lbs and took 16 hours to build! I knew that would be Grant's favorite thing if he was with us! It's hard to even tell the scale

 Some of my favorite things from this museum was Lincoln's actual top-hat he wore the night he died, as well as a suit worn by George Washington.

After the muesum, we trekked down to the Washington Monument. It was so breathtaking to see how huge it truly is! And to know it was built in 1848 is just astounding.

 All of the flags were at half-mast because of the shootings at the recruiting center in Tennessee. 

 The scenery around the monument is just so incredible. The stone structures and fountains and flags all around- you just can't help but be in awe!

 You can see part of the World War II Memorial here.  Then we walked past the Reflecting Pool towards the Lincoln Memorial, which is so incredibly long. It doesn't seem that long in pictures, but as you're walking next to it, it feels like it never ends.

Here is the Washington Monument from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial! The Lincoln Memorial is HUGE. The building was huge. Lincoln was huge. Just breath-taking!

 By this time, our feet were already killing us, so we hailed a cab back to the hotel to enjoy a nice dinner at the hotel restaurant and rest our feet for our big day of exploring tomorrow!

VA Sunset Cruise

After our dinner downtown, we hopped aboard the American Rover sailboat for a sunset cruise. It was a three-masted top sail schooner that looked like something from a history book. It was pretty, and once we got moving, it felt so good to feel the wind through our hair (remember, it was the hottest and most humid day the entire trip!). We met up with another couple that Merritt knew and enjoyed an evening sunset sail through the waters of downtown Norfolk.

 It was a beautiful evening to be outside and watch the sunset next to my favorite person!!

NAS Norfolk and USS Wisconsin

On our first full day in Virginia, Levi had to go to work for some of the morning. I enjoyed that time by not fixing any kids breakfast and by not starting on any chores!! I got hotel breakfast and watched Netflix!! Fantastic! But when Levi got home, we had plans to explore some of the city with his friend, Merritt. (Merritt was with Levi in Bahrain and came back to the states to separate from the Navy as well. He didn't have transportation out there, so he palled around with us alot.) So Merritt had planned a bus tour of NAS Norfolk for the afternoon. His sister was coming in from DC so it was going to be a touristy day for us all! 

NAS Norfolk is probably one of the bigger bases I have seen. It's also a very historic base, so it was neat to see and hear about the history. 

After the tour of the naval station, we headed downtown to explore the USS Wisconsin. It was a battleship from WWII. We probably picked the hottest and most humid day of our entire trip to walk around and check this thing out, but it was pretty cool!!

 

 It might possibly be the last Navy ship Levi will ever set foot on, unless we become touristy again some other place! Walking around inside and seeing the bunks and chow line, I don't think he will miss that part!! 

The rest of the evening was spent grabbing dinner downtown before heading off to a sunset cruise...

376 Days

I had said goodbye to Levi 376 days ago. Well, technically it had been 203 days since I said goodbye right after his Christmas visit. Either way- that was a loooooong time to go without seeing his face in person! I heard a lot of people say over the past year, "I don't know how you do it" or "I could never do that!" or "I can't stand when my husband is gone, even for a weekend." But its funny because I have said all those things since we got married. I could never imagine what it would be like for Levi to go on a deployment- until he went on one. I could never imagine being able to raise two children without their dad- until I had to. I could never imagine not seeing my husband for over year- until I did. And we all survived every second of it. We are stronger. We are better. It wasn't always easy, it wasn't always fun, but that was the life we were given and I'd like to think we lived it to the fullest.

So, when we found out Levi was going to be arriving stateside, but couldn't come home for a few weeks, I knew I couldn't wait a second longer to go see him. We originally thought of the boys and me flying out for an extended stay in Virginia, but after looking at air fares, and not really knowing what Levi's schedule would look like, we decided it would be best for me to fly out alone. Plus, we haven't had a vacation together in 9 years!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Seriously- not a weekend, not even a night- unless you count a night at the Best Western in KC, but I don't count that. So it was a very very very VERY well-deserved trip that was extremely long overdue. Sure, I was sad about leaving the boys for that long- I'd never left them for more than 48 hours in their entire life!!! So 9 days was going to be long! But I knew they would be having soooo much fun with Mimi and PawPaw and their cousins, so that definitely took the pressure off of my mommy guilt. So I packed my bags and hopped a plane!!

And talk about butterflies in my stomach! After landing in Virginia, and walking through the terminal and seeing Levi at the end of the walkway, it was like a Hallmark movie! Hugging him, touching him, smelling him. It was just the best feeling!!!

We were ready to spend 9 whole days together!! 

Mommy Moment

Power Rangers have become the new Star Wars. They have had a mild obsession this summer! Lots of our conversations and play has revolved around Power Rangers. So one evening, walking out of a store, I look at the clouds and what do I see- a cloud in the shape of a zord. Really, that was the first thing I saw!! And almost at the exact same time, the boys both shouted out, "That looks like the T-Rex zord!" Just goes to show we all have had Power Rangers on the brain!

See, it really did look like a zord!!!

Scheels

A while back, I had seen this HUGE building being constructed with a sign that said Scheels on it. I had never heard of one, and had no idea what it was. But looking at the size of the building, I had a feeling it was going to be something pretty darn cool. Fast forward to this month when Scheels opened its doors. Turns out- its a humongous sporting goods store!! But its far more than that- it really is a tourist attraction!!!! And its a store that the boys actually ask to go to, so they definitely have won us over!

We needed to do some back to school shoe shopping, so we thought it would be a great time for us to get out there and check it out! It was early one Monday morning and we practically had the whole store to ourselves!!! Of course, we didn't do any shopping until we explored about every corner possible!

First things first, we rode the ferris wheel. I absolutely dislike ferris wheels, but they couldn't go unless I went and I just couldn't say no to these faces! But we did get stopped at the very top so another set of passengers could get on, and of course the boys were moving all over going, "Look over there!" "No, look over there!" I was all- "Nobody move!!!" But it did give us a birds eye view of the store so I knew where the shoe department was when we were ready for it!

 We played with fish pillows. Literally, they were "this big!"

 And drove some monster trucks!

 And ran into this guy- we "bearly" made a quick getaway!! Get it?!

 And we bought some shoes, a KU penant because we HAD to have it, and a mini Chiefs football helmet. And they now have a new favorite date morning place with Dad on the weekends! Way to go Scheels!!!!

4th of July Bike Parade

Our neighborhood is so awesome!!! We love it here so much!! We weren't involved in anything around the neighborhood last summer, since we just moved in and hadn't started school yet. So when 4th of July was approaching and there was talk of a bike parade, I got so excited!! We used to do something similar when I was young and those are such fun memories!!! A few days prior, we went over to the Scalise's and had a bike decorating party! They really went to town and decked their bikes all out!

 So the morning of the 4th, they got their patriotic clothes on and hit the streets! We all gathered at one of the intersections and seeing everyone's bikes all decorated was just so much fun!

 Then, all the kids took off lightning fast! The walkers made it a few houses down before the kids were already on their way back down the street!

 So we decided to make an entire loop down Long St. At one point, Wyatt rode back towards me, as I was walking, and he was in tears because his legs were so tired! He kept trying to catch up with the Hoskins and hitch a ride on their golf cart, but he just couldn't quite make it. So for a while, I pushed his bike while his little legs got a rest from riding. It was alot of riding for such a little guy!!

I loved this man in his tractor bringing up the rear of the parade!! 

 Once everyone made their way around the loop, it was time for Bomb Pops!

A bunch of us headed up to the school to play at the playground and baseball field! It was such a fun morning surrounded by friendly neighbors and having some old school patriotic fun!!!!