Montana - Day 7

 Just joining us for the Montana recap?  Check out all of the posts here!

The week absolutely flew by. We were leaving early Friday evening, because the cost difference between Friday evening and anytime on Saturday was insane...and saving anything on a plane ticket when you're buying for 4 people makes a big difference!  But it was nice because we still had a good portion of the day on Friday to enjoy the lake and family before leaving!

Last sunrise on the deck with my coffee

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jake thought putting on an adult sized wetsuit was hilarious:

What's a family vacation without some pictures in matching outfits??  Sandy and Dave were kind enough to give everyone "Fox Farm" tshirts (the name of the house) and the kids each got a little stuffed fox.

 

 

 

 

After a very tearful goodbye (for just about everyone!) we had to head to the airport.  5 minutes into the drive, this was Liam...yes, those are crumbs stuck to his face, he fell asleep eating goldfish.

Then this was poor Jake, about 10 minutes into the flight...inconsolable about vacation being over!  It was heartbreaking.

Liam was too busy showing his new fox friend all of the sights from the airplane window to be sad, at least right then....

Thankfully, they both fell asleep on the 2nd flight and we got back to our house around 2:30am.

  It took days to get everyone back on track as far as sleeping (and even eating meals, we were eating at the strangest times!) and I think the kids are still trying to recover from the emotional damage of having to come home! 

It was a great vacation; the perfect balance of stuff to do along with plenty of downtime.  As I said before, this is not a vacation I would have ever planned for us had the opportunity not fallen in our laps, but I'm so grateful it did.  I went completely out of my comfort zone, and lived to tell the tale :)  I think it's good for the kids to see us doing new things and realizing that not everyone succeeds on the first try...this was evidenced by their father repeatedly falling off the paddle board :)  But, he got back on and tried again!  and maybe, just maybe, I got some bonus "cool mom" points for trying this new stuff, too.

We miss you, Montana!!  

August: how are you almost gone??

We are just a few days out from September, so I figured I should do some type of wrap up post to salute the end of summer!

As I've already posted about excessively, one week of August for us was spent in Montana, which you can read more about here.

We've kept busy, but we've had plenty of downtime for just playing and hanging out, too.  As you can see, when Liam wants to play Jake and the Neverland Pirates, he fully commits to getting into character!

 

We've made our rounds this month to various doctors, including the orthodontist (for Jake-he got expanders put in!), dentist (both boys), and eye doctor (both boys, Liam's first time)  Liam was so good for his eye exam, the doctor couldn't believe it was his first time.  And when it came time to do the drop for dilation, the doctor said both boys handled it better than some grown men he sees :)

The dilation was so strong...they had to wear shades. (sing it in your head, it sounds better)

We've had a few hot weekends, so we busted out the slip and slides and sprinklers, always a hit:

 

 

 The boys have been anxiously awaiting a treehouse camp out all summer, and that day finally came last Saturday!  Obviously, it's not a camping excursion unless s'mores are involved:

 

 

 

"Boys, can we get a picture together??"  Gee, thanks.

We played on the swingset while the fire died down and Brian hauled all of the stuff up to the treehouse:

 

Then it was time!!

 

 

Not pictured: Brian on the floor, in his sleeping bag :)

I hung out for a few minutes, then gave goodnight hugs and kisses, gathered up the dog, and retreated back into the house :)  Hey, someone had to hold down the fort inside!  It worked out well, because the premiere of this piece of work happened to be on that night....

 I had the remote to myself, and my dog by my side...I was all set for the night! The boys loved the camp out and slept all night; Brian slept off and on for a few hours.  Apparently, he was on high alert what with being outside and all...and the sound of swishing sleeping bags and boys snoring/talking in their sleep throughout the night kept them up.  But they had a good time, and I'm sure they will do it again!

Also, this pretty much sums up my thoughts on camping....

And last, the big thing we had going on in August was the post-summer camp shuffle. Summer camp ended the first week of August (which is mind-boggling to me, but that's a post for another time) so once we came back from vacation we didn't have a camp option for Jake.  Fortunately, he was going to camp with a few of his friends from preschool and baseball, and I happen to be friends with those moms, so we had worked out at the beginning of summer a schedule where one mom would have all 5 boys for 2 days....10 days without camp would then be covered by all of us.

Overall, this worked out really well...obviously, it was more convenient than trying to figure out what to do for those two weeks and/or burn a bunch of vacation time between me and Brian.  And the boys had a blast for the most part..they even did a few sleepovers, which they thought was super cool!  During week 2, some of the sibling-like bickering kicked in, but on the last day they were all sad to leave each other.  We'll see how next year goes and what we'll end up doing, but it's definitely so nice to have other parents to rely on and be able to offer help to as well. It really does take a village!!

August is nearly gone, which means we are one step closer to my favorite season...

image courtesy of thebuckheadbetties.com

Montana: Day 6

Just joining us for the Montana recap?  Check out all of the posts here!

Day 6: we were on a boat...again!  A different boat this time, we took a pontoon out for the day! We also still had the jet ski, so the kids took that for a spin with Uncle Ben before we loaded up the boat for the day:

 Quick dancing break while getting ready that morning!

 The original plan was to head to Wild Horse Island; however, the weather had a different idea.  We made it about 20 minutes into the hour and a 1/2 ride by boat over to the island, and had to stop due to the winds/crazy waves.  Honestly, the normally very peaceful lake all of a sudden looked like we were in the middle of the ocean!  Water was sloshing all into the boat and the nose kept dipping up and down dramatically.  Our captain (Ben's dad, Dave) made an executive decision that the safer idea would be to turn around which would put us riding with the waves instead of against them, and head over to Bigfork instead. We knew nothing about this place, but at that point, anything seemed like a better option than what we had been doing!

 

Berkley, the co captain of the boat :)

Amy and Ben were riding the jet ski along side the boat (Amy gets super seasick) and took turns letting the boys on the jet ski.

 

 

We made it to Big Fork (as the waves grew bigger and bigger and the wind kept picking up) and enjoyed a picnic lunch before exploring.  I wish I had taken more pictures of the little town square area itself, because it was very cute and very much "wild west" theme. 

 

 

 

 

They thought this was hysterical!

After walking around a few shops and studios, we decided to take a break and grab some coffee and pastries, and sit outside and enjoy the weather (it was much cooler this day, probably in the upper 60s/lower 70s). The kids found some other kids to run around with, as well as rocks to jump off of, so they were happy to hang out there while the rest of us enjoyed our coffee and snacks.

We headed back to our boat while Dave tried to make an executive decision about how to get home.  The choices were to brave the winds/waves OR send 2 people back on the jet ski to then pick up 2 cars and drive (about 45 minutes) to come pick us all up.

He decided in the end that we could try the boat. It was definitely the better decision as far as being less of a pain that all of the hassle of going to pick up multiple cars while the rest of us waited there, but it ended up being quite the adventure!!  Since the front of the boat had kept dipping under on the way there, he wanted to put the heaviest people (and the kids, for their safety) in the back of the boat.  That left myself, Sally, and Ben's sister, Kelly, in the front of the boat, bracing ourselves against the waves (Ben's mom was also in the back, because she'd been drenched on the way over to Bigfork, being stuck in the front at that time).  Let's just say it was a looooooong ride home that resulted in me being blue in my limbs by the time we were done, and Amy said that the boat was rocking with waves crashing so hard that we looked like we were in an episode of Deadliest Catch.

Forcing some smiles in between waves!

Somehow, in the midst of all the chaos, Liam fell asleep on PopPop :)

 

We finally got to a point where the water was calm enough to let the boys off the boat and into the tube to tow them the rest of the way home

Look at those mountains in the back!

Even though I was freezing, I did take the jet ski out for a spin with Brian when we got back....and after that, it was straight into the shower and cozy WARM clothes for me the rest of the night!!  It was our last night (sniff, sniff) so there was another fire and Kelly's husband decided to introduce the kids to "snipe" hunting.  Not familiar with snipes?  Don't feel bad...most people aren't :)  Turns out, snipes "come out at night" and "live in wood piles" and can "break through paper bags" :)  The kids had a BLAST with him!!

Dave's mom, Sandy, with Jake, Liam and Brian

Snipe hunting time!! 

That was our last full day...I'll do a wrap up post next!