Summer break

This is a post about what happened during the summer, which seems like so long ago!

No summer would be complete without a trip to Menchie's.  The kids love Menchie's probably because of the overpriced candy you can top your frozen yogurt with.

Yummy!  Eliana goes more for the chocolatey candy where as Karina is more fond of the gummy ones.  Xiao likes things that are bright and colorful. 

At some point, we also went to Cold Stones.  Gabe wore his pajamas there.  This was actually our second try going to Cold Stones.  We had tried another evening a week earlier and the line was out the door.  We waited and waited and as we were able to get into the store, they announced that it was 10 minutes to closing and we weren't going to get any ice cream that day.  The kids were disappointed!

Also, Emily found out about a Shaved Ice van that you could request to come to your neighborhood.  Because of many events being cancelled, it didn't have things such as county fairs to go to.  So they came and we got shave ice right in front of our house!

The Nintendo Wii came out of storage in our garage during the summer.  Here Elvin is playing Mario Kart against Gabe.  This game makes Elvin very leery of when the kids turn 16 years of age.


Karina decided to make a treat for the chickens.  She used beef tallow and mixed it with a bunch of millet and flax seed and sunflower seeds.

She made a "pie shell" using oatmeal. 

She then put the filling into the shell and sprinkled fresh seeds on to.  We had to hold Lucky back who was very interested in the beef tallow.

The chickens loved it!

Karina also got to learn how to use a sewing machine.  Emily borrowed a sewing machine from a friend and showed Karina how to use it.

At first, it was time to practice.  Karina learned how to sew according to the patterns that Emily drew on a piece of paper.

Because some of the days were hot, we spent some time in the local pool as well.  


The pool has a water play area which was fun for the kids.

And they tried their hand at rock climbing again at the local gym.  

Here is Karina making her way up.

And here is Karina and Gabe both going up.

And sometimes Gabe would just boulder on the wall.

What other things kept the kids busy?  

Xiao spent plenty of time making mud pies and other concoctions using 'ingredients' that he would find in the backyard, such as leaves and sticks.

Gabe finally figured out how to blow bubbles out of bubble gum.

It was also berry season and the kids were on it this year with the raspberries.

Emily took them strawberry picking and they brought home quite a haul.

Many pounds of fruit!

What do you do with so many strawberries?  Make whipped cream, of course!

Gabe has other designs for whipped cream.  He got some chocolate and make shavings of it with a knife.  Then he mixed this all with whipped cream.

It was yummy!

We also went blueberry picking.

At one dollar a pound, it's a great price!

We watched the Olympics when it was on, especially all the soccer games.

And towards the end of summer, Xiao Yu had a summer program that our school district put on.  He would go to this camp-like activity from Monday to Friday for two weeks and he loved it!  It's to help kids get back into the swing of things with in person school.

We also decided to check out the bird houses that we had hung in the apple tree in the early spring.  We had seen chickadees fly in and out of the nesting box so we wanted to see what the next looked like.

It turns out that there was about two inches of nesting material inside, made out of leaves, moss, and even some of the rabbit fur that the rabbits had shed and the girls left out for the birds!

And...on one of the hotter days, one of our friends set up a slip-n-slide in his yard.  The kids had tons of fun going down it.
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They played for hours and hours!

That was our hot and fun-filled summer!