Mason, Rylan, and Elli
First, I don’t even know what to say about why it has taken me so ridiculously long to get this month’s letter done. I’ve had a hard time with routine this summer, so that has made it hard to get my regular things done. After finally getting our budget up to date (after months of being behind on that), I think I finally have the momentum to get this done too!
June went by so quickly. The first two weeks were spent with me recovering from my bike injury, so I couldn’t do a lot of regular things. Then we had two weeks of swimming lessons with lots of other appointments thrown in. And the last two weeks were also spent getting our patio and shop ready to host my class’s 15 year high school reunion!
This is out of order, since the reunion was at the end of the month, but since I already mentioned it — it went really well! Katherine and her family stayed with us on Friday and Saturday night, and they helped us get all ready for Saturday. We had 8 graduates and their families come (28 people total I think…or 29?). We had tables set up in the shop to eat, and everyone hung out and talked while the kids played. It was nice to see people who we hadn’t seen in years, and it was fun to watch all the kids play together.
Rebecca’s wedding was right at the beginning of June, so I was still on crutches at the wedding. All of you had fun after the initial issue of getting Rylan dressed. The whole way there, Ry, you cried very emotionally about your outfit, and you screamed that everyone would think you looked weird and would laugh at you. I think it was because you woke up at a weird time in your nap, but you definitely acted like we were torturing you by making you get dressed.
We spent one weekend in Pennsylvania and went to the Marion festival that Saturday. I got my stitches out in Harrisonburg on the way up there.
One weekend in the middle of the month, Daddy and I had an anniversary date all alone where we spent the night at a cool Inn near Wintergreen. Y’all got to stay with Nonni and Poppy that night, so you had a lot of fun too.
Ry, we celebrated your birthday at the drive-in and watched Toy Story 4 with Nonni, Poppy, Aunt Michele, Uncle Wesley, Jill, and most of our life group. On your actual birthday, Nonni went to swimming lessons with us, and then we went to Sweet Frog afterwards. You also got to pick out a new outfit at Ross with Nike shorts, a Nike shirt, new shoes, and Batman socks. You were a happy guy.
Mason, you got to go to a skating birthday party for the first time, which you thought was awesome. You also ran your first 5k and you did so great! You didn’t even decide to do it until the night before; we had just gotten back from Williamsburg. It’s like it wasn’t even hard for you to get up and run 3 miles for the first time! (Rylan ran across the finish line with you and Daddy and then told people that he ran the race too.)
One fun adventure that I had just with you, Mason, was going to do the sleep study in Charlottesville- just to make sure everything was normal with your breathing while sleeping. It was like a whole Mommy/Mason date together, and besides the electrodes covering you while we slept, it was almost like a little vacation. We got to watch a little baseball on the tv in the room, read some books, and then go to sleep. In the morning we found a tiny little restaurant to eat breakfast where you got a waffle and I got a chicken sandwich. (Oh and the results came back all clear for the sleep study!) Also, you did an amazing job while we were there; you let her cover you in electrodes and then do your “mummy wrap” while barely moving; plus you didn’t rip it off of you while sleeping! She said you were the best!
Elli you had about a thousand appointments this month between speech and ears, and Mason you got to meet with Mr. Zach several times. Mommy’s brain almost couldn’t handle so many appointments, but somehow we made it to all of them. Elli, you’re steadily adding to your vocabulary, and we like to hear you say new things. You still speak possessively about the people you love, “my Daddy,” “my Bubby,” “my boys,” etc.
Ry, we had a date day to Big Lotts and then to Waffle House again (your new favorite date place- I think you want to go there again for our July date!) You paid the bill again, and we both got the same food as last time. It’s fun hanging out with you, buddy!
Our 100 Days of Summer Fun has turned into “However many days we can fit in….” because we lost count and I have done a terrible job of documenting the fun days with pictures like I planned to. But some of the fun days we did this month were: roasting marshmallows under the broiler, pizza night across from the counselor’s office, snow cones at the pool, free slurpees after swimming lessons, Sweet Dreams day, rope climbing at night, family baseball day, and more things that I can’t think of right now.
Here are some quotes from the month!
“Hiii seahorse!!”
“Daddy, UFO stands for Unidentical Flying Object!”
“Mommy’s house??”
“I think Uncle Ian and Aunt Heidi celebrate Friday because their last name is Fry.”
“Daddy, bleaches are really bad!”
“You should have just asked for kitty stitches. ”
“Basically Elli’s friends are babies. Why would a person’s friends be dolls?”