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