Summer

It has been a good summer so far, Sophie learned to swim front and back stroke. She is no longer afraid of the deep end. She is doing well in tennis. Soccer is about to start. She is now 10! We are working on renovating our bathroom. Ben is talking more. Will is reading more words. School is going to start in a few weeks. I can't wait for things to go back to normal. The kids don't really enjoy shopping with me anyways. My parents made it back from Iran okay. My Mom made it through hip surgery. I am glad.

Superior Chimney

They had pressured us to seal and waterproof the chimney. We had to act now or lose the "discount". They did a lot of other work. Just over 1 year later, we have a leak. I called to get something scheduled on Saturday, they told me the supervisor would have to call me back on Monday. The supervisor said that it was probably the flashing which wasn't covered since they only partially replaced the flashing. It doesn't make sense since it is leaking not from the roof but from the 1st level of a 2 story house. The supervisor made an appointment for the next day (Tuesday) between 12-4pm. I got a call from the tech saying he wasn't sure when he could come and he would call later. He called again saying he wouldn't be able to make it. The lady called me to reschedule for Tuesday. The guy called me at 12 saying he couldn't make it, they were going to call to send someone else. 1 1/2 hours later the company didn't call me so I called to see what was going on and they said that the other tech would be coming today "guaranteed". It was after 4pm. I called a different company to make an appointment with free estimates. I called the company again to cancel, and the lady told me that the tech had just called a few minutes ago to say he couldn't come today. They are not so superior!! I would not use them!

Summer time

We have been keeping pretty busy so far. Week 1 was a lot of bike riding/exercising to the park. Last week we went camping at governor Dodge's state park in Wisconsin. The kids roasted marshmallows. We camped out in the car. It poured and thundered. In the morning, it was nice. The rain probably helped the waterfall look even more spectacular. The kids have started swimming. Sophie and Nicholas are getting closer to swimming without floating devices.

Brookfield Zoo / Weekend

Went to the Brookfield Zoo a weekend too early. They are opening sting ray bay this coming weekend. They didn't have the bears. They are opening a new bear house soon. Sophie wanted to go to the butterfly tent. The kids really liked it. They had about 7-10 varieties. They landed on us a lot.

Sunday, we were going to the library. They hadn't changed their website to reflect their change in hours (it is now changed). It was closed. We decided to go and play some mini-golf since we were out. The kids really liked it. Nicholas and Sophie got frustrated at the golf range at scout-o-rama. The only thing I didn't like was fishing out the ball from the mini algae pond. It made the ball smell a little bad. I think by the end, they got the hang of it.

Scout-o-rama

I took Nicholas and Sophia to a huge boy scouting event at Cantigny. I wish we would have gotten there earlier. The event was so big, we didn't make it through the whole thing. It was a great learning/fun event. The kids made a basket with a marshmallow shooter, they had a bean bag toss, haunted house. They shot a ping pong with a rubber band gun into some hole targets. Sophie has wanted to try archery. She got her chance. She said that she did well. Nicholas got to try a BB gun. He missed the first two shots, but hit the bulls-eye on the third one. They tried to start a fire with a magnesium or flint rod and a metal striker. They had the old fashion rubbing 2 sticks together but they didn't try it. They did try to send signals to each other using morse code and a lightbulb. Nicholas seemed very interested in the semaphore flags. They had the radio morse code signal version but they didn't try it. They went into some tee-pees. They were very cool. They were firing cannons, twice, ever hour. It made me jump every time. The kids also had fun with the rain gutter boat races. You had to race and blow the boats down the gutter. They had rope making, rope bridge climbing. A huge line about 1 hour wait for the human sphere (like a human hamster ball), where the older scouts will push and roll the ball around. We didn't have time to wait for that one. It was an awesome time.

Mother's Day

Nicholas planned to make a big breakfast spread for me the night before. He is very sweet. He was planning on making me toaster waffles. Mother's Day morning, Sophie had started to make me pancakes. Nicholas helped and I finished. I made some raspberry sauce and some fresh whipped cream. They each made a card (except for Benjamin). We played outside most of the day. Went to the park in the evening. The best part of the day was when Michael kissed me and told Ben he loved me to which Ben said, "I love you." and he gave me a kiss on the cheek. What a great mother's day present from Ben.

The kids are getting older.

Nicholas has shown some major milestones in maturity. I hope it lasts. The other day, they were fighting over playing wii. While eating lunch, he told Sophie that it is ridiculous to fight and they should work things out. I was so proud of him. He is also more responsible at times. He is helping out more and sometimes without me asking him to. Sophie on the other hand has some more work to do. She likes to look after and play with her younger brothers. She doesn't yet act responsible enough but with time, her maturity will grow. I'm not looking forward to the teenage years, she is already acting like a pre-teen. We are working on those issues now.