We had a great, albeit scorching hot, weekend filled with continued breakfast celebrations, a night out for Mom and her mom, breakfast in bed 🥰🥰🥰 and some family time on Sunday. We also marked the fourth anniversary of Elliott’s passing with a balloon release in her honor. She is so missed, now and forever 🩷

Friday, I worked from home, spoke with my therapist and finished Hamnet in my new hammock before Lori brought the kids home and then, once Joey was home, we all went to Little Wolf for dinner. I thought the food was really good but between our last visit and this one, they got rid of their kids menu? And the restaurant is in a family neighborhood, was half full with kids and has all kinds of games and coloring for them? Make it make sense. Anyway, got the kids back home and into bed and only had to get up eight times to re-put them to bed while trying to watch Big Brother. We’re more than ready for our 5.5 year old to finish up pre-school and stop taking a 2-HOUR NAP that he doesn’t need 😅

Joey was out for his run on Saturday morning and Lydi was still fast asleep, so Dempsey and I made French toast together and it was the best 🥹 Tasted good too! After breakfast, we headed over to the soccer field for much laying in the field, sitting on the soccer ball, whining to be held and a few seconds of participation 😂 One more week, thank goodness! Took the kids to Mess Fest at the children’s museum afterward and despite being a million degrees they had a great time! Mud was just okay, paint was pretty good, foam was a blast, but best of all: the kid carwash! 😂

Got home around 2:30 and we all vegged for a bit then everyone took a shower/bath and I headed out to pick my mom up for the Shakespeare Festival. She packed up a perfect little picnic for us and then we got to see the newly renovated Hellems building and it was unrecognizable! Wowza, it looked nice. Can’t say the combining of the men’s and women’s bathrooms into one bathroom but half the number of stalls was my favorite but what can you do? I think Twelfth Night is my favorite Shakespearean comedy or at least the one I’ve seen the most. The whole side plot with Sir Toby, Andrew Aguecheek, the jester, Maria and Malvolio is good stuff. We also both thought we might pass out from the heat just sitting there in the Mary Rippon Theater but we survived. Got home at 11:30 to a house full of sleeping people and crashed into bed myself!

I had my alarm set for 7:30 the next morning and kept dozing off until Joey and Dempsey came in with breakfast in bed 🥰🥹 They’re so sweet! Dempsey even shaped it into a butterfly for me. Lydia was less excited about being woken up but she eventually made it in too and we all ate in our bed. At 10:30 we went to the balloon release and the kids just wanted to play on the shade-less playground 😅😅 I got that sweet shot of Lydia holding the string of her balloon that I didn’t even remember taking and was really moved to see later. Dempsey asked me if I was crying and gave both me and Lori a big hug. We considered going to the pool but it was honestly too hot to be outside at all, so we headed to the movie theater. That dark air-conditioned space felt amazing and Minions and Monsters was cute too. It’s for film nerds, okay? The kids were telling us their favorite parts on the drive home and I loved that. Spent the rest of the day making salads, playing and staying inside but we were able to go out after dinner and that felt really nice.

I hope you all had a good weekend as well and if you’re in Colorado, I hope you find ways to stay cool this week! 🥵

Someone please tell me how to make it through a busy holiday weekend with young kids and not wind up completely exhausted by the end. All brain fog and tiredness aside, we had a really fun 4th of July! Kicked things off on Friday with a splash pad playdate, then saw fireworks at the Rockies game before having a lowkey start to the 4th that ended with a family BBQ and our own little fireworks show. Topped it all off with a very toasty picnic in Boulder to celebrate both my brother and I’s birthdays this week. Whew!

Since Dempsey was off from school on Friday, Hannah and I arranged to get together up in Dacono at the Clem Dufour splash pad. It was a really cool spot and wasn’t too busy, thank goodness! The 5-year olds are so fun to see together ❤️ We stayed for a while and even got some really good popsicles before packing it up and heading home around 2. Lydi fell asleep in the car immediately but woke up as soon as we got home. Still, some nap is better than no nap.

Felt like we were home for 5 minutes before it was time to get ready and head to Illegal Pete’s for dinner before the Rockies game. Kids were slightly crazy during the game and apparently it poured during my 8-minute trip to the bathroom with both of them! Rockies won and we eventually made our way to the field for the fireworks. They were both so excited to do this and then kind of lost interest in the show halfway through. I think they were both tired. Took forever to get out of the parking lot but then we got home and got the kids to bed. It was after 11 😱 so we went straight to bed too.

A very tired start to the 4th of July! Kids slept in, so Joey and I ate waffles all by ourselves. Once they were up, they ate and then played while Joey and I tried to clean up both the inside and outside of our house. Paused to watch the hot dog eating contest and why do I keep doing that? It’s so gross! Both kids were having a little meltdown around lunch time so we fed them then set up the projector in their room so they could have the excitement of a ceiling movie and Joey and I could get some stuff done. Around 3 I started to worry Lydi wouldn’t make it through the evening without a nap so she and I took a little car ride and she was out within five minutes. Even back at home, she wasn’t ready to wake up, so we got a little cuddle in 🥹🥰

I had baked ribs and cornbread earlier in the day so everything was ready to go by the time family started arriving around 4:30. Took Lydi a bit to warm up post-nap but then she was good to go! A quick little rainstorm right before we all ate but we were able to head right back out. Look at all that good food! We hung out then ate dessert and made our way to the front of the house for fireworks. Dempsey is such a pro by now! He lit all of the fireworks himself and started saying “Is everyone ready?? I can’t hear you!!” before each one. Where did he even get that from?? 😂 So sweet the way he would tell Landon and Lydi to cover their ears in case it was loud 🥹 Sometimes your five year old is making you carry them or crying over something and they seem so young still but other times they are looking out for younger kids and acting responsible and you realize they’re not a little baby anymore 😭 He had the best time and it was so fun watching the two bigger fountains they both picked out go off. Definitely the best finale we’ve had! Everyone took off shortly after and we got the kids to bed as quick as we could, though they did have to bless me with a bathroom glow stick show first 😂

I thought the kids slept in on Saturday but they SLEPT IN on Sunday! Lydia wasn’t up until 9:45!!!! I had slept in myself then snuck off to the farmers’ market solo and it was so nice. I was in and out before it got too crowded or too hot and I left with some good stuff too — coffee, naturally, but also flowers, honey, tomatoes, basil and pastries. We all shared those pastries then did who knows what until it was time to head into Boulder. No problem finding a shady spot at Chautauqua and good thing because it was HOT. The kids kept asking to go over to the playground and I don’t know how they could stand it over there! My mom had taken care of everything, including picking up fried chicken from The Post, making several other side dishes, assigning baked beans to my sister, getting dessert from Whole Foods and setting up a buffet table even! She’s the best. It was really nice catching up with my brother, sister-in-law, niece and nephew too ❤️ Headed home around 5, fed the kids dinner, gave Lydia a bath then got them to bed at a decent time (though many shenanigans, including the tossing of Bitty Baby around took place after we said good night). Then we busted out salads together and actually got to sit down and watch an episode of The Bear (don’t even get me started with the final season of this horrendous show).

Poor Lydi woke up screaming at 10 because she was having a nightmare about the dog from The Sandlot, which Joey had watched half of with the kids before bedtime. I showed her the ending this morning so she could see he was actually a nice doggy and hopefully that’s the end of that. I hope everyone had a fun weekend and isn’t feeling a tired as me 😅