Simple Summer

Our dear friends moved to Arizona almost a year ago.  They didn't want to move everything across the country so they gave us their enclosed trampoline.  To say that the kids love playing on it each morning is an understatement.  Most mornings we have to tell them to wait to play outside until at least 7:45 because it's frowned upon to be loud outside any earlier.

I took all of these pictures through the kitchen window one morning.

While we have been working through our summer bucket list, we have had so many indoor picnics I've lost count.

We had a great rainstorm that the kids loved playing in until we heard thunder.

(Sorry all the pictures are slightly blurry.  My camera lens kept fogging up.)

Ella and the horsey swing -- I could say a million things about it but I'll sum it up by saying that she loves this horse so much that she goes out to swing on the porch by herself and a half hour later when I tell her to come inside she puts up a good fight.  Yesterday afternoon I heard her crying as she was riding it.  I walked out to the porch to find out what was wrong.  She told me she got hurt.  Lo and behold she has blisters all over the bottom of her feet from riding it.  So there she was going back and forth, crying from the pain, and refusing to get off.  That is love.

P.S. I love how she sometimes holds the ropes under the handles like reins.

One of my favorite things: Ella says "Weeeeeee-haw" instead of "Yeehaw."

Simple summers are a beautiful thing, especially when you have a bajillion birthdays to celebrate in the meantime.  Some things that I have loved about this summer:

• Lily and Skyler doing morning chores and even learning how to unload the dishwasher.  This. Is. Huge.
• Going to the pool
• $1 kid movies at our local theater
• Free weekly zumba classes at our stake center
• NO HOMEWORK!!!  No weekly folders!  No reading logs!  No spelling test practices!  No fundraisers!