You Had Spring Break, We Had Summer

There were some plans to go to CA over Spring Break, but sadly they didn't pan out. Instead, we bumped them towards the summer and we are planning to go visit then. While the kids were making summer plans, they were actually bummed about a week being taken up in CA. (Not that they don't want to visit family and spend time in CA...they just want as many activities as they can cram into summer.) I told them that we could still plan that week of summer and then transplant it into Spring Break.

We did all the 'days' we plan to do over Summer. We started with Stations each morning. I'll go into more detail about those as we get into actual Summer. (We already have to rearrange them because of extra curricular activities.) But if you want to remember the basics of how we do Stations, you can go HERE.

Also, we have our allotted days ready to go for this year. This is how it is shaking down.

Monday - Craft Day
Tuesday - Library Day
Wednesday - Swimming Day
Thursday - Treat Day
Friday - Field Trip Day
Saturday (Maybe) - Movie Day

Let's see how our bonus week of Summer went:

Monday: Already we had to move some things around. My mom and sister were arriving on Monday evening, and we had already decided to color eggs for our craft, so we switched the days and went to the library on this day instead. We are trying something new this year. We are spending an hour AT the library and finding a corner in which to read. The only problem I see is Pearl, who is not quite at the reading-by-herself-for-an-hour stage. We mixed it up and took turns reading with her, but I'm not sure what we will actually do for the summer. We even played the witch game at the end, but that can get pretty intense and sure enough, we ended once Ivory caught the edge of a stone and went down hard. This is our one library day picture:

Tuesday: This became Craft Day and we had a lot of fun decorating eggs and having our family Crack Off. I already posted about this. You can see it again HERE. I think those are the only pictures I have with Miranda the whole time she was here. Which means that I was enjoying myself again instead of taking pictures.

Wednesday: Likewise, no pictures on Swimming day, but that is because cameras and water don't go well together. Daisy wasn't feeling well, so she stayed home with Miranda, and I think Grandma spent the day out at Color Me Mine. Pearl managed to injure herself at the pool, bringing our grand total of hurt knees to 3. (Daisy had a run in with the pavement earlier and was sporting a nice bandaged knee along with Ivory.)

Thursday: Treat day, and a personal favorite of mine. We made Cheesecake Cupcakes. I'm sure there are many recipes out there, but we opted for this one. There was plenty of debate about whether we should do strawberry or caramel topping. We were split right down the middle, so we just made both.

First though, you need to make the cupcakes. As usual, the girls were such good helpers. Here is Pearl filling the cups with graham cracker crust to be pressed down.

Ivory is cracking eggs while we put together the cheesecake filling.

Look at these lovely mini cheesecake wonders.

Now add just the right amount of your choice of delicious topping and you are good to go.

These were yummed right up by our crew. I especially like the homemade caramel sauce. I'll have to make that again in the future.

Friday: Our field trip was out to play miniature golf. Sadly, there aren't a lot of convenient places to play anymore. The closest one to use is at Boondocks Fun Center. It was a pain to get going. There are so many of us, and the cards they gave us didn't work right. It was pretty crowded and we decided to stay together as a group, but seven people is a bit much for one team. In fact, the online score card only accepts six. Miranda opted to stay home and it was a good decision, because although it was fun, it was very hot and slow going on the course. I think the kids had a good time and Grandma was a trooper.

And I got several holes in one. Even one at the end, but on the last hole, you could tell it was broken. The hole was filled with balls and it may be that in the past, something was supposed to happen if you made the shot, but clearly nothing was happening now. A little anticlimactic if you ask me. Oh well. Still a fun day with family.

Saturday: The kids liked the idea of keeping our movie day, but we don't have a set day for it, so we are going to try and sneak them in on Saturday. We got Pan to watch with the Dargans and I really liked it. Although, it is hard for me to dislike any movie with Hugh Jackman.

We played lots of games with Grandma and Miranda while they were here. Miranda read a LOT to the kids. I think she read all of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe to them, along with The Horse and His Boy. Miranda is one of the few people I enjoy listening to read aloud. I also got to spend some sister time with her, although it was cut short by Tyler spraining his ankle. (Poor Tyler.)

Another fun event during the week was a visit from the Neilsen's. We thought we were going to miss them, but when we remained in town, we got to see them after all. They are some of our favorite people. Here Eric is teasing Pearl. He looks pretty serious, but I know he is holding back a grin right behind that stern facade.

Love my gal Camille. She announced she is expecting another little Neilsen around December. I am so excited for her family. Her boys are adorable, so I'm assuming the next baby will fit right in.

The only thing I'm not sure about is whether the Neilsen's love us more...or our water? It is probably us, although they made sure to fill up a gallon to take on the road.

Who am I kidding? I love our water too.

I think that wraps up Spring Break. Ahem, I mean, our week of early Summer. Utah was very kind and the weather was gorgeous. We were spoiled to have family visit, and we hope to see the Dargans again soon.