Thursday, June 01, 2006

Here Comes Summer!

Well, in Arizona summer has been here for a month already, although not officially until mid June! We turned our a/c on a couple of weeks ago and won't turn it off again until sometime in October. Yikes! I have a summer schedule for the kids so they won't drive me crazy asking "what are we doing today?"

Here's our plan, so far:

Monday: Shopping/Errands
Tuesday: Library
Wednesday: Arts & Crafts
Thursday: Water Park (yes, Anthem has it's own)!!!
Friday: Gymnastics (at home)

Since my kids love Walmart, it's not too bad going shopping with the two older ones while baby J is taking her nap. With Dan working from home, I don't always have to take all three kids when I run my errands, and that's really nice! I do have to use bribery to keep them happy while shopping, but fortunately they are easily persuaded with 25 cents for gum!

We kicked off our summer vacation with a quick trip to Cali to see our friends over Memorial Day weekend. Everyone looked great, and we had a lot of great food (thanks Ken and Dianne!) As much fun as we had, and we wanted to stay longer, it was easy to see what motivated us to move out of the L.A. metropolis, the TRAFFIC! Dan and I both noticed how many cars there are all over the place all the time. In our little Anthem, we only leave town once a week at most. When summer comes, the snowbirds fly away and our population decreases by a third which greatly affects the traffic. Since we live on the same side of town as Walmart, we rarely drive more than 50 miles each week. It sure makes gas prices a lot less painful when you only fill up once a month!

We were able to visit our old church and it felt... different. We've been so blessed to get involved at our new Church in our ministries, but it made our visit to SH seem just that, a visit. I shouldn't have been surprised that I didn't feel like I was "at home" while we were there. So many people prayed for us to have a good transition to AZ, and I know that prayer has been fulfilled. We are so blessed to have our new Chursh feel like our home and we love it.

As for the water park, we haven't gone yet this season. I'm going to buy a new swim suit today and I've been psyching myself out for two days to go shopping. I'll try on every suit in Rob May until I find one I can live with. Being almost 40 and bearing 3 kids has given me some strict swim suit requirements. Hopefully I can find something under $150, but I'm not holding my breath! Ahh, the things you do for your kids.

4 comments:

Shawn White said...

shawn was here...

Laurie B said...

We were thrilled to see you. The kids have grown and were adorable. Your precious little Jill is a delight and let me hold her till my arms gave out. She even let me kiss her to pieces. I can't wait to be a Grandma!

I'm so happy you all love your new home but have to say, it doesn't feel as much like home to me anymore either without my closest friend here. But I would never change a thing for you. You are blessed beyond belief! I know that you are grateful and appreciate the gift you've been given. The only thing I might want is to someday join you in Anthem! So pray hard and maybe someday.....

Love and kisses to all the family,
Laurie

GAR said...

Love the pictures of your my cute nieces and nephews...:) Glad to hear you are doing well. We will post new pics from our neck o the woods soon! Love you-
Gayle

MDM said...

Your summer sounds very fun!!! I like your schedule idea. Well, our move in Aug. is most likely to another rental. Houses in Cave Creek are sitting on the market. The prices are inflated, so we are doing the "watch and see" thing. Risky? Yes. We are under the advice of people that have been there. Sometimes I do mourn our little Anthem loss. We do feel pulled to stay put, though. Darren can not logically work from home and his commute would be very tough on all of us. Maybe someday....what could change over night.....Let's plan something soon to hang out together.