The summer nights we'll remember

This past week was a little nuts and in some ways just felt off. There seemed to be more crankiness in the air all around.

On Thursday I attempted a day of cooking. I followed the vegetarian recipe plan from the website, Once a Month Mom. The idea is that you cook a ton of meals in one day and then freeze them for the month. It's something that I've been wanting to try for a while now but logistically didn't happen until this past Thursday. So Wednesday night I feverishly chopped all sorts of vegetables, peeled sweet potatoes and boiled quinoa, rice and pasta. It took me about four hours. The next morning early, my mom arrived to help Jordyn care for the boys (thanks mom!). They all headed to the park and I poured myself a cup of coffee and got to work!

Now, I LOVE cooking for my family. Cooking is totally enjoyable for me and though the number of meals and the volume of food scared me a little, mostly I thought, "How hard can this be?"

Turn out people, it was really hard! For me at least, it was hard. It took me well over 12 hours and by the end I wanted NOTHING to do with the kitchen. I just wanted to collapse onto the couch! Time will tell if this ends up making our family life easier. I'll let you know :)

Oh and did I mention that the oven broke down during hour 4? I mean, seriously....

How excited does Chris look to be dealing with a broken oven?

Luckily our microwave is also a convection oven so that's what I ended up using. Not ideal but it worked.

So yes, it was a wonky kind of week and reinforced to Chris and I today, that we needed to get out and do something fun as a family.

So we packed a picnic dinner and headed to one of our favorite parks by the water.

It was JUST WHAT WE ALL NEEDED!

There were so many serendipitous moments, like when it just so happened that the Holland symphony was also there setting up and practicing for a concert tonight. The boys were so curious about the instruments and loved listening to the music. Or like when a fire truck pulled out of the fire station across the street. Or when a police man walked by and ended up stopping to chat with the boys for a few minutes (Rescue vehicles AND a real live police officer? So cool!)

The weather was beautiful tonight. We watched boats sail by, climbed the jungle gyms and ate dinner under a big oak tree while listening to songs like "Somewhere over the Rainbow" sung in the outdoor concert hall behind us.

Carter: "Firetruck!" 

On the way home, we stopped for some frozen yogurt. The boys loved being able to pull the lever themselves to serve themselves yogurt. Coolest thing ever. It's always the simple things with kids, isn't it?

Know this boys,
               
Your dad and I love hanging out with you. There's no group of people we'd rather be chillin' with on a Saturday night then you five. You're fun to be around, you make us laugh and you always keep things interesting!