Summer camps: Camp Invention and Camp Friends!

David returned to Camp Invention this year.  (Last year enrollment was really high, so they organized it differently, and I think it was a little more chaotic.  This year was back to "normal"--and it was great!)

On Friday we joined David for the Inventor's Showcase.

First up was the slide show.  There were some great shots of David in it!  Then it was on to see the inventions.


The highlight is the Take-Apart workshop.  The kids bring in something (like an old VCR or computer keyboard--there are guidelines), then work meticulously to take it apart using real tools and safety gear.  Then they create something new out of all the pieces in the workshop.  This year David took apart our not-so-old computer tower.

 I'm not sure what his new invention was, but this is what he had to say about it: "You can never use too much duct tape!"

With some extra time and supplies in the workshop, he also created this robot.  I think he mentioned it was to help me clean the house!

In another module, David and some friends were given real-life problems from around the world to solve.  They worked together to build this contraption that would help you survive a tsunami.

Now of course I can't remember the details, but it was quite well thought-out!  I was impressed.

This year they also built devices to launch rubber ducks (fun!) and learned a lot about geography and weather and ecosystems around the world (all of which is right up David's alley).

David is not as much interested in the actual hands-on construction part.  He's not a details guy.  But he has great ideas and a big imagination.  He also knows a lot about a lot of stuff.  And he's generally pretty enthusiastic.  He likes making new friends, and I love that he has a whole week of high-quality structure and fun.  Camp Invention has been a good fit.

Meanwhile, Mary had her own camp here at home!  It was best friend camp.  Mary got to spend a whole week with her best friend Brooke.  Brooke's mom is attending AMI-Montessori training in Milwaukee this whole summer.  So it's a busy summer for their family.  I persuaded them to let us have Brooke for a week while her dad was at work and her mom was in Milwaukee.  It made for a very special, unforgettable week.

These girls are pretty amazing together.  They can play and play and play.  It's not entirely without conflict, but they are wonderful problem solvers.  They always manage to work things out on their own.  I am always so impressed by the way they give and take and how they each seek to be peacemakers.

They had an idyllic week together.  They built forts, painted each other's nails, danced as ballerinas, baked a cake, enjoyed popsicles on the deck, curled up in blankets to watch movies, ran through the sprinklers, and spent hours and hours outside riding bikes and scooters and relaxing in the shade eating blueberries.  They had a few outings, like one to a splash pad and another to the Children's Museum, but for the most part they entertained themselves here.

A few pictures from the Children's Museum ...

One morning their other best friend, Abby, came over to join in the fun.  Those three are peas in a pod.  They must be the only kindergarten-age girls on the planet who can have a three-girl play date and not have it go south.  They get along so well!  (For those of you who don't know, normally having THREE kindergarten-age girls over to play is a recipe for disaster.) The girls had a marvelous morning together playing dress-up and doctor and house and babies.

Then, later in the week Abby's family had an emergency and Abby ended up spending the night with us.  Abby got here late at night, long after Mary had gone to bed, so Mary was so surprised to wake up and see one of her best friends asleep on her bedroom floor!  As soon as Brooke arrived the girls got to work painting nails and riding bikes.

It all made for a busy week.  (Mary was exhausted by the end!)  But it was a gift to have Brooke and Abby here.  Truly, these girls are special friends.  The trio is breaking up soon.  Mary is moving.  Brooke and Abby will be in different classrooms next year.  So glad we had this "friend" summer camp at our house!

A "summery" of what was

I really shouldn't still be posting about summer.  I should have moved on--the kids are back in school after all.  I should be posting about how David wants life to be like kindergarten again (I broke the bad news--it never will), or how how making lunches for my kids turns me into a grouch monster (but how they are amazingly eating them!), or how Mary gets no sleep and continues to function on adrenaline (why can't she sleep past 6 am?).

At the very least I should post about watching the Ironman racers whiz past our house yesterday...

(Another difference between me and Greg:  I look at the Ironmen and Ironwomen, think of the 2.4 mile swim they did that morning, the 112 mile bike ride they're in the middle of, and the stinking full 26.2 mile marathon they have yet to run, and I want to puke at the mere thought.  Whereas Greg looks at them with envy.)

or I could post about the last minute fun we squeezed in just before school started...

like a trip to the Children's Museum...

 with Bailey

or a trip to the zoo (with Dad)...

But I have one last summer post in me.

I feel that I should point out that I seriously considered never posting a single thing about the summer.  It would have been simpler.  I do enjoy blogging--looking at pictures of what we did, writing about it.  But it, obviously, would have been much easier and less time consuming to pretend the summer never happened.  Then a few weeks ago David found a blurb book I made of some posts from my original blog.  He was obsessed with it!  He loved it!  He literally CRIED as I read to him stories of when he was little and Mary was a baby.  He thanked me again and again for taking pictures and writing down what we did, so he could "remember the good old days."  He told me, tears in his eyes, "I miss those days.  Thank you for helping me remember them."  I was taken aback by his reaction. (He cried with happiness!) After that, how could I leave an entire summer out of our family's record?  It wasn't the best summer ever, but who knows, maybe we'll look back with tears in our eyes and say, "I miss those days."  Even if we don't say that, it's still worth remembering.  Which is why my blog has been crammed the past few weeks with posts about summer.  And why I have one more.

I started off my summer summary posts with a list of what was not to be.  So I think I'd like to finish with a list of what was.

This was, believe it or not, a summer of schoolwork.  Despite how crummy I felt this summer, I was blessed with a couple of hours in the morning when I felt okay-ish.  How I would have loved to have spent the time blogging, or answering emails, or shopping, or wiping off the kitchen counter, or going on outings.  But I decided, early on, to dedicate that bit of time completely to David and Mary and their schoolwork.  I was seriously stressed that David wasn't where he could/should be at the end of first grade, and Mary loves nothing more than to sit and do workbooks.  So I knew this had to be my priority. We did a so-so summer bridge workbook (fyi, the P-K one stinks, we had to buy the K-1 book for Mary), Handwriting Without Tears cursive (recommended!), reading (Mary did this program, while David read "good fit" books from the library), and math facts with David and number recognition through 100 with Mary.  There was complaining from both David (too much work!) and Mary (not enough work!), but we managed some measure of consistency for a couple of months.  (I do not pretend at all that freshening up on some skills over the summer is akin to homeschooling.  But when I read this post from Deanna, I have to say that her advice really rang true for me--though everything was on a much smaller scale for me, of course.)  What's funny/sad is that by August, when I was feeling better, I pooped out on schoolwork.  Once I felt well enough to take on other responsibilities--like wiping the kitchen counter and answering emails--those responsibilities soon crowded out schoolwork, and I finally gave up completely.  Kind of sad.  But not too sad.  Summer vacation is summer vacation, after all.  (And David's biggest improvement in reading happened in his brain sometime between the time we stopped reading at home this summer and the time he started second grade.  Weird.  I guess we really do need breaks and a chance for our unconscious brain to work on stuff.)

This was a summer of Hannah Montana.  Last spring David was really interested in watching iCarly.  We watched a few episodes, and I decided I hated it.  The characters are snarky and mean to each other, I didn't like the premise (as if my kids need yet another reason to be fascinated with the Internet), and there are no parents.  I know there is much, much worse content out there--but how about something just a tiny bit more uplifting for my young kids?  As a consolation for Mom saying no to iCarly, we tried a few episodes of Hannah Montana.  It was a hit, and I like it enough to let my kids watch it regularly.  The first season in particular is sweet and cute.  Family is important in the world of the show, and Billy Ray Cyrus is great as Miley's on-screen dad.  (I can't comment on his role as her real-life dad.)  The whole premise--you're watching Miley Cyrus pretend to be Miley Stewart pretending to be the famous popstar Hannah Montana who does become a famous popstar because of the Disney machine but really the famous popstar Hannah Montana is the famous Miley Cyrus who is famous because of Hannah Montana--is kind of messy in a fun post-modern boundary blurring way.  After the first season, the jokes get a little snarkier, the female characters wear hooker amounts of make-up, and there is more and more of an emphasis on good looks, boyfriends, and materialism.  But it's still cute and has heart.  Besides, Mary is obsessed with it now.  OBSESSED!  She dances around the house singing Hannah Montana songs, constantly quotes lines from the show, and does spot-on impressions of the characters Rico and Roxy.  Her obsession drives us a little nuts.  No one more so than David--but David still loves the show, even though he won't openly admit it.  I still insist on watching "new" episodes with them, mostly because the content has gets slightly more mature (though there are still plenty of booger jokes). They can watch episodes we've already seen whenever they want--this is how Mary spent her summer.  So maybe insisting on watching "new" ones with them is a little helicopter-ish of me.  But it's not like I had a whole lot else to do this summer.  Besides, I relish the opportunity to brainwash my children early:  "Gee. Miley went on a date without telling her dad.  That was very very bad.  You will never ever ever go on a date without telling your mom or dad about it, will you?  Of course you won't."  (In fact, they quite enjoy pointing out when Miley doesn't "choose the right"--their Primary teachers would be proud.)  I never ever imagined that Hannah Montana would be such an important part of our lives.  You just never know what life (and trying to survive parenthood) will bring, I suppose.

This was a summer of the Olympics.  The Olympics were my salvation this summer!  People, the most exciting thing in my life during July was watching Miley Stewart start high school.  I needed the Olympics. Between the night class Greg had this summer and the nights he was gone for Boy Scouts, I was on my own in the evenings a little (a lot!) more than I would have liked, especially with as little energy as I had.  But every evening the kids and I would head downstairs to watch the prime time coverage of the Olympics.  The three of us would watch and discuss and predict.  Eventually the kids would pass out dead asleep on the couch.  Greg would come home late and carry them each to their beds.  (Best bedtime routine ever!!! By the time the Olympics were over I couldn't even remember how to put my kids to bed anymore.)  The Olympics were so fun because David and Mary were old enough to get into them.  Mary, not surprisingly, decided that she is going to be an Olympic gymnast and that I will be so proud to see her on T.V.  (I didn't break the news that she's already too old for those dreams to have a chance of coming true.)  David, meanwhile, is going to be an archer, a shooter, and a cyclist.  (Poor David.  His favorite events weren't covered much on prime time.  But he did love all the beach volleyball!)  My kids are so young.  They were devastated to learn how long it will be until there is another Olympics.  (David informed me this summer that at age 10 your life is half over.)  There is something so magical about the Olympics and your own Olympic dreams when you're a child and an entire universe of possibilities is open to you.  I loved sharing that magic with my kids.

Mary catching up on some gymnastics the day after.
 (Sometimes it was hard staying awake long enough to see it all.)

This a summer of Harry Potter.  Early in the summer I read Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone to David at bedtime.  I was selfish about it, insisting that I got to read it to him, not Greg.  I loved sharing the book with David.  (Though it was always weird to me that he had already experienced the whole story in Lego via the Wii.  Times sure are different.)  When we finished the book, David, his dad, and I watched the movie together.  I'm not a big fan of the first two movies, but it was so fun to share it with David.    Then we read Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets and watched that movie.  Again, it so great to have a kid old enough to share stuff like this with! (Watching Star Wars with your kid for the first time is the best!!) I loved watching him build Hogwarts out of his Legos, fantasize about Quidditch, and reconnect with a Harry Potter-obsessed friend.  We're taking a break from good old Harry for a little while.  I wouldn't mind him being a little older before we tackle the third book.  Besides, right now we're having plenty of fun with Bunnicula and friends and Encyclopedia Brown.


This was a summer of a brother-sister friendship.  David and Mary do not "click."  For years I kept waiting for them to start playing together.  But they rarely did--and never in the way I had seen other young siblings interact together.  It eventually became evident that they don't have the right personalities to naturally get along. Their opposite but not complimentary personalities don't lend themselves to the kind of dynamics that leads to easy play. They simply do not play together. (Early in the summer, a friend of mine was observing my kids at the pool and noted, "Wow. Your kids totally do not play together!"  So true.)   I know they are still young, and I hadn't given up complete hope.  But I also stopped holding my breath, waiting for them to become the best of friends.  But this summer it happened.  They were forced to rely on each other for companionship.  David and Mary spent literally hours and hours every day in the basement watching T.V., left to fend  for themselves.  Since there are really only so many hours a kid can stand to watch T.V., eventually they began to look to each other for entertainment.  They would get out board games, build elaborate train tracks, play hide and seek.  Sure, they bicker like crazy.  (Oh the bickering!!!)  But at least they are learning to see one another as a potential companion and even a friend.  Three months ago you could take them to the park and they would both whine about being bored and want to go home.  Now if you take them to the park, they will look to each other and immediately play hide and seek.  Then they'll push each other on the swings or even begin an elaborate game of pretend airport or Hogwarts.  Of all of the good things this summer (and, despite my complaining, there were plenty), this was the best.  David and Mary as play mates.

Summery--when Grammy saved the day!

With his wife pretty much down for the count, Greg was left alone to bear the burden of, well, everything this summer.  I tried, I really tried!  

Greg already does the dishes every night, so I feel it my do or die duty to create the mess he cleans up each evening.  I tried to keep making dinner...I had the best of intentions.  But things got worse and worse. Until, for the third day in a row when the kids asked, "What are we having for dinner?" I answered, "Toast."  Greg, who had been patiently watching me try and desperately hoping I would rally (and eating lots of toast), volunteered to start making dinner.  At first I resisted.  But I could see the look in his eyes, "Man cannot live on toast alone."  So I relented, much relieved.  Greg, being the kind of man he is, promptly took over all the shopping, inventoried the pantry, and looked up fabulous new recipes online.  We ate better than we had in months.  (Or at least he and the kids did.)

Greg also took on about every other household duty you could think of (and this was on top of everything he already does).  Greg found himself doing all of the shopping, cooking, and cleaning, as well as putting the kids to bed every night. I nominally retained responsibility of the laundry, which pretty much meant not doing laundry (but everyone had clean underwear!).  Fortunately, Greg has broad shoulders.

Unfortunately, the timing was a little bad.  Greg had an important dissertation deadline just around the corner.  He needed to finish his research proposal.  He had been telling me all spring, "You know, Alisa, I'm going to be really busy the first part of the summer writing my proposal."  I was like "Oh, okay, whatever."  You see, when I thought "research proposal" I thought of the paragraph my ninth graders would scribble onto a piece of scratch paper in response to the assignment to tell me what they wanted to do their six-page research paper on.  At most, I thought of the two or three page "research proposals" I was required to turn into my graduate school professors before embarking on major research papers.  I figured since my research proposals were two pages long, and getting a PhD in Systems Engineering is, I estimated, four or fives times harder than getting a master's in English Lit, then his research proposal would have to be, say, ten pages long.  Sheesh! How hard is it to crank out ten pages?

Finally, when I decided to be a better listener, I gathered the reality of the situation.  Greg's research proposal was the document for his prelims, an oral exam where he presents his research ideas and his committee grills him on the topic for two hours.  The "research proposal" is a tad more than a 10 page document.  It's 150 pages.  Ouch.  No wonder he was stressing.

I was stressing too!  How could Greg take care of every single aspect of our family and home, as well as complete the proposal on time?  I mean, I knew he could do it.  Heck, he was doing it! But it was a big burden.  And we both knew he would be thankful for a little help.

So he asked his mom.  Vicky has seven children, seventeen grandchildren, parents, siblings, nieces and nephews, and dear friends spread out across the continent.  When summer comes, and she is not teaching seminary and piano, she makes the most of it, criss-crossing the country and racking up the frequent flier miles. The week we desperately hoped she could come help was the one week she was going to be home.  I'm sure she had plans to catch her breath, can peaches, work in the garden, and relax.  But she was willing to come help us instead.  

She spent a week with us, cooking delicious meals, stocking our freezer, hosting playgroup at our house, cleaning, keeping me company (it's nice to have someone around to talk to--it helps keeps your mind off how crummy you feel) and, most importantly, playing with the kids.  I retreated to my bedroom, and Greg chugged along on his writing, while Grammy entertained the kids and kept the house running.  It was a week of rest and work Greg and I both, respectively, needed.

Like I mentioned before, I was lucky enough to generally feel okay for a while each morning, so I tagged along on a couple of outings.  But mostly Grammy's visit was quiet and spent playing at home, where Grammy and the kids built forts and played games.

This is a picture of true Christlike service:

One morning we managed a visit to the children's museum...

David and Mary each worked on their own version of Hogwart's.

David and Mary worked together to build a house out of a variety of materials.

One day Greg even emerged from his office cave long enough to visit Little Norway with us.

I'm related to the original Norwegian settlers somehow (I just can't remember how).

 I'm also related to her...

This was more than Mary getting in touch with her inner Viking.  This is more about how much she wants long, blonde locks.  (Sorry, hon.  You always want what you don't have.)

What a blessing it was to have Grammy here!  Greg made so much progress that week--it was amazing.  I am humbled by Vicky's willingness to drop everything to help us.  What a great example of love and service. We will ever be so, so grateful for the sacrifice she made to be here.

Summery--visitors!

Thankfully, near the end of June we had visitors to break up the monotony of our summer.  Hooray!  Best of all, it was the Thompsons!  Gina and I both moved to Dayton, Ohio the same week--and we immediately became good friends.  We left Ohio at the same time too.  They moved to Colorado, and we went to Texas, then onto Wisconsin.  During the summers that I criss-crossed the West, I managed to see her a couple of times.  But it'd been a long time since then, so I was thrilled to learn they would be stopping here for a few days during their grand summer road-trip.

Nephi and Gina and their boys were so kind, patient, and accommodating during their stay.  We weren't exactly the best hosts ever.  Greg had an important deadline just around the corner, so he was often gone to campus, and, even though I wasn't battling headaches anymore, I didn't feel 100%.  (But I felt closer to 100% than I had all summer!  There was something about talking to Gina and being with her boys that was calming, distracting, and reenergizing--just what I needed.)

I love Wisconsin, and I am pretty obsessed with showing it off.  If I had been my normal self, I would have dragged the Thompsons to every restored European immigrant site within a 50-mile radius.  This time I preferred to sit around all morning in my pajamas chatting while the kids played Wii and/or worked on construction projects in the sandbox--which, come to think of it, was probably a huge blessing for the Thompson boys because, as my kids know too well, you can only see so many old barns.

But we did manage a few things (none of which involved an old barn) like, for instance...

a cookout at Picnic Point on Lake Mendota...

 (This ash-covered sweetie is Benjamin, the littlest Thompson.  I finally got to meet him, and he is a heart breaker.  So darling and gentle.)


and a visit to the Children's Museum...

Isaac and Mary getting their hair set.  (What, your children's museum doesn't have vintage hair dryers?)

We were so sad to see them go.  Boo hoo!  The morning they were trying to leave I kept following Gina around the house talking.  I couldn't stop.  They'd been here three days, but I still had four thousand things I wanted to discuss with her in depth.  Oh well.  The comforting thing is that I know we are the kind of friends who can pick up right where we left off.  (Looking back at Ohio, it seems almost too easy.  Who clicks with someone who will become a lifelong friend the first week you move somewhere?  Me!  Lucky me!)

Mary still talks about "when our cousins were here," and I love the thought that Gina and Nephi and their boys are part of our extended family!  I have no doubt our paths will cross again--I just hope it's sooner rather than later.

Thankful

I am thankful for my children.  And before this month of Thanksgiving is up, I am determined to write updates about my two kiddos.  It seems like it's time.  And my heart is full of gratitude for them.

In the meantime, here are some pictures of our Wednesday morning trip to the Children's Museum. We had a wonderful time. David and Mary were well-behaved, and they were patient as they took turns choosing what activity was next. 

We could have spent another hour or two at the museum, but we had a lunch date with Daddy on State Street.  Greg walked over from campus, and we walked over from the far side of the Capitol, and we met in the middle for noodles.  The kids loved seeing their dad.  He is very busy, but we get to see a lot of him nevertheless.  And for that I am very thankful.



This is David and Mary after Greg said good-bye.  They are watching him from the window while he waits for a bus.

They love their daddy.



Speaking of daddies, my dad is busy posting about his trip with my mom to Germany and Switzerland.  I am definitely my parent's daughter.  My mom picks exactly the same kind of hotels as me!  And my dad is like me--he finds suburban housing, indoor plumbing, and contintental breakfast just as interesting as Baroque cathedrals.