The Cabin

Friday morning, we made the much anticipated trip to the cabin. We couldn't wait to get there and all five Vs were extra sad when we left because it was our final trip of the summer. We waved and blew kisses at Johnson Lake and promised it that we would be back next year!

Road construction continues to dog us wherever we go. (sidenote: I'm pretty sure every road I drive on to work and school pickups is under some level of construction. Also, I would like to have a word with whichever city planner thought "hey, let's tear up the main road that FOUR schools are on starting in late August. And ooops, it's taking longer than expected and the road won't be completed until October. Because that's fun will all the parents and all the buses.) So we got to take the woodsy detour to the cabin, complete with single lane dirt road. It was a fun adventure and well worth it to land ourselves on the shores of Johnson Lake.

Auntie had gotten into town the night before, so she joined us on the trek up and we met Anna, Otto, and Milo there. We were so hoping to also get Liv and Hux - but Huxey needed a nap to be able to party hearty with the cousins later that evening (see next blog post ... coming soon). I should have swapped our fair and cabin days. It was a little bit cooler on Friday and would have been more pleasant at the fair. It did not chill our fun however.

The girls happened to choose their matching suits for the cabin (they still enjoy the matching!). There were several moments where it was near impossible to tell them apart. When I saw Q lounging on the tube, I made Fiona come join her for a picture. The similarities were just too astounding ... and multiple people have been wrong in their guesses of which girl is which. For the record, the matching wedgies were not planned - or staged! Just lucky happenstance. [Oh, and Q is on the left and F is on the right.]

The girls, Dec, and Otto had the best time ever splashing around. Anna burned 8000 calories trying to keep Milo alive. It reminded me how happy I am when they hit 2 or so and have the smallest amount of common sense to go along with all that mobility. Quinn, Dec, and Mike were not helping Anna's calorie count as their favorite activity of the day was to run the length of the dock and barrel into the water at the end. Milo thought that looked like great fun. Anna disagreed.

We had so much fun that we almost forgot about lunch. When we did remember, we shoved PBJs in our mouths and got right back in the water. We were on a schedule and wanted to pack as much fun as possible in. Em and I even managed to get in a couple swims across the bay ... all the way to the other dock (through the overgrowth of weeds). We not so silently blamed our dad for our inexplicable need to touch the dock to "make the swim official." It's a thing. I promise. [Note: Anna did not feel the need and happily stayed out of the weeds. She's so smart.]

By the end of the day, Quinn was swimming out to the end of the dock with no life jacket (I felt a little like how Anna was feeling with Milo ... so stressful to know she is over her head and doesn't have a life jacket!). Mike quickly jumped in and just hung out in the water in the same area as her. It's like crossing the street solo ... we'll allow big milestones - with hovering.

Mike finished the day off with an encore of his physics-defying tube jumping water show - to the delight of all. We stayed in the water until the very last second possible - leaving ourselves no margin of error to throw a party (oh, did I mention that party was one we were hosting!?!?). But it was totally worth it. We are already dreaming of next summer, complete with brand new baby cousin and new not-so-baby pontoon.

The Fair and The Fish

[We are back to catching up on all.of.August ...]

Although the kids had already been having a ton of fun up north (operating under Grandma and Grandpa's rules, which they tell me are far better than mine), Mike and I were back and wanted in on the action! Thursday morning, we made plans to meet the cousins at the county fair. The day turned out to be much hotter and sunnier than we had expected. So instead of hanging at the fair, we sweated on each other at the fair.

The day started at the animal barns, where Quinn totally shocked us and willingly held a baby chick. For the record, so did I. I think I felt about the same as Q did about it, but I was trying to be brave to have her be brave. I'm not a fan of birds. Even super cute baby ones. It was pretty cute though ... We also got to see a baby chick hatch out of an egg, which was incredibly cool! We checked out some horses and watched Otto's auntie show her horse in competition. Fiona successfully campaigned to Ot's Nana and scored an invite to come out and ride horses in the spring. She's counting the days.

Then, it was lunch time so we stopped by the Corn Palace for the best corn on the cob, shakes, nachos, and other super healthy fare. When Quinn and Dec were done, I took them for a walk around the midway while everyone else finished up. Then we met up for rides. This whole tickets for rides thing continues to confound our children. They just do not understand why they can't have unlimited rides like they do at ValleyFair. I admit, I like that route better. Because trying to get the tickets to come out even is like calculus class all over again!

I lost all my street cred during the ride extravaganza. I had told them we were out of tickets, but Brenda had just gone to buy another book so all the kiddos could ride again. Then we used up our allotment of those and I told them we were done, when Anna gave me a handful more. So when I said "we're out" for the third time, Dec looked at me like I was the mom who cried no tickets and fully expected me to produce some more. I did not. He was not a fan.

All six cousins had the best time on the rides. Poor Anna is not a huge ride person and Ot and Milo totally are! I'm pretty sure that if Milo could figure out how to work stilts, he'd be on the big roller coaster. Ot wanted to ride the kid roller coaster more than anything, so Anna recruited Fiona to ride with him. They had the very best time and Bugs was a great partner. Otto's wide eyes and their shrieks of glee had us all laughing. Otto wanted to go on whatever Dec went on, so I tended to have four blonds in tow. Hux and Quinn were excellent partners on the car ride. They were all so sweet with each other. It was awesome!

After we had really used up all the ride tickets, it was time to call it. Everyone was overheating (but especially Fiona) and we needed to restore body temperatures to regular levels. We relaxed at Gma and Gpa's and watched Descendants 2 to cool down and get in the mood for the upcoming birthday celebration. Plus, Gma and Gpa needed to know what on earth the kids were talking about with all their Descendants talk.

It was still a pretty warm afternoon, so we decided to wander down the road to Blandin Beach to take a quick swim. We had such a fun time goofing around in the water. We didn't stay long because we needed to head back up the hill for showers and pizza. Grandpa was taking us fishing after dinner and we wanted to make sure we had plenty of time for that!

It was such a great evening to be out on the lake. Other than an actual bump where we dropped the boat at the landing (oooops!), it was the perfect night out. The kids all did some fishing (although I did most of Dec's) and caught fish. Grandpa kept dropping their fish in the boat, which always got a shriek or three. He pretended it was an accident each time, but he seemed to find it pretty entertaining.

Just as we were getting ready to leave, Mike hooked a really nice large mouth bass. It put up a good fight as he was reeling it in and the kids had a blast watching him land it. A memorable ending to a busy day!

Two-thirds of Mike's fish ...
I got him perfectly centered in the frame.
Doesn't a girl get credit for that ...?!?!
Ooooops ....

It's Finally the First Day of School

It was finally the first day of school for the girls today. If you are thinking "Dude, it's practically October ....", well, you aren't the only one feeling that way! S-town is trying a new thing this year called "Connect and Assess Days," where on Tues/Wed, we had a 30 minute meeting with each kid's teacher to learn about the year and to do some quick assessments on math and reading levels. The meetings replaced the usual Open House night and the Parent Information Nights.

While we found the more personal teacher meetings to be more helpful and less overwhelming, we would have preferred them to be last week. Our summer nanny was back to school, the girls were ready, and it was just weird to drag it out until today. Their little bonus was that when they went to work with Mike yesterday, they lucked out and got to watch the matinee of Newsies (they'd already seen it once and LOVED it. That blog post is coming. Someday. I'm so behind ...). Not the worst way to spend the last day of summer vacation.

At their Connect and Assess meetings, they both showed off their personalities to their teachers. I had asked Q's teacher which line she should go to on the first day. Mrs. H said Line 10. I flashed both hands at Q (10 fingers). Q said, "5+5. Or 6+4. Or 7+3. Or 8+2." Her teacher raised an eyebrow at me. I laughed and said "welcome to Quinn." I hope Mrs. H brings her A game this year!

Fiona showed off her skills during her reading assessment and her teacher proclaimed her "quite the reader." F was SO proud! She also did such a good job starting to explain spina bifida to her teacher. There was a point where she wanted me to take over ... but she willingly started the conversation. We are starting to work on our advocacy skills and this was an awesome step!

On Tuesday (while I worked from home and tried to contain the fighting to a small scale war), the girls were discussing lunch and how they typically don't like to sit by people because then they get distracted and don't get to eat their food. This conversation took place during lunch. When they were distracting each other from eating. The irony was not lost on me.

That brings us to today. Where the only tears shed were Declan's. Because I pulled the underwear that are too small for him out of his bin and made him wear underwear that fit. I suspect the tears were 10% underwear and 90% that he wants to go to kindergarten this year. He's not a fan of the rule that you have to be five. Hopefully the new Avengers underwear in his bin will ease the 10%.

We went to the bus stop as a family for the first day and had so much fun seeing them off. Fiona popped out of their line up as the bus came down the road to give Mike and me hugs and tell us that she loves us. Quinn managed to give us an indifferent head nod (only turning her head slightly) after Mike called to her. Girl was ready to get it and needed us to stop distracting her.

They were incredibly tired tonight. Fiona started sobbing and told me that she had no idea why she was crying. Tired, baby. You are tired. But despite the exhaustion, they reported that the day was great. And they are ready to go back tomorrow. Lucky for them, it's already Friday. Second grade and first grade ... here we come!

Quinn is Six

In the days immediately after Quinn turned six (oh so many days ago), she held a live baby chick (of her own volition) and swam to the ladder at the end of the cabin dock without a life jacket … so to say six agrees with her is an understatement.

She spent her day up north with Gma and Gpa - and I'm pretty sure that everyone wants Gma to be in charge of the birthday spoiling. She got to help make her cake, went out to lunch (where they sang to her), went to the Children's Museum and got to play with her cousins, got a special birthday dinner ... and then Mom and Dad showed up in time for cake with her birthday balloon in tow! She said it was a great day - which made us so happy since we felt bad about missing part of it. Let me tell you that Mom and Dad made good time on their trip north to see their birthday girl!

This has been the year of confidence for Quinn. As she headed toward Kindergarten a year ago, we hoped that our shy, hesitant-to-separate child would find some success. She found more success than we could have ever hoped for and is a new, more confident version of herself. Don't get us wrong - she still has an inner circle that is "invitation only" and she doesn't open up to just anyone. But she is more open to new experiences and no longer wants to miss out because she is afraid.

She still can't sit still and I almost weekly tell Mike to build more stuff for her to climb on. She starts gymnastics on Thursday in an actual gym and she cannot wait! She's also super pumped to play floor hockey again year - and is excited that Dec will be joining her. Mike also talked her into trying out a couple sessions of open hockey to see if she has any interest in the "ice" version of the game. At the moment, she's much more interested in gymnastics - but time will tell.

At the beginning of the summer, Quinn asked me to get her a couple pepper plants. She had just started getting into eating bell peppers and wanted to try her hand at growing one. Mike upped the ante and told her that if she kept her peppers alive all summer, he and Gpa V would build her a vegetable garden next spring. The yellow pepper we ate last weekend and the red pepper that I'm planning to throw in our pasta salad this week tell me that Mike and Gpa better start planning.

Quinn is so ready for school to start (one more day, thank the Lord!). Today, I told the girls that they needed to start cleaning up in 20 minutes. Q asked me what time that would be, so I said 2:30. She then grinned at me slyly and informed me that 2:30 was actually 19 minutes away. Which, of course, it was. Math is her sweet spot and she's coming into her own with reading. I think we'll see a big jump in that this year (right now, if she doesn't know a word, she just blazes on through). Once she gets a bit more vocabulary under her belt, I think she'll be off to the races like her sister. We think she'll be our non-fiction reader - and I suspect the math correction of earlier today will not be the last time Quinn and her steel trap of a mind tell me that I'm wrong.

We bought her gym shoes that simply seem WAY too big and that I fear won't last the full year - because they are not too big at all. She and Fiona have converged at the same size in all things (except socks and shoes, where Q is bigger). Sorting their laundry into the correct drawers is how I keep my memory sharp. At her well check this year, she was 44.5" tall (36%) and 41 lbs (28%). She is about a quarter inch taller than her sister ... but we aren't mentioning that yet.

Our biggest hope is that year six continues to bring her confidence and joy as she finds herself and whom she wants to be. Finally, to welcome in year six, here are the answers to her annual birthday questions:

Favorite color: Orange
Favorite friend: Bella
Favorite show: Nature Cat
Favorite book: The Night Before Thanksgiving
Favorite food: Cheese quesadillas
Favorite thing to do: Paint
Be when you grow up: Chef

The Gala

Several weeks ago, Mike mentioned that there would be a big gala at the theatre to celebrate their 50th anniversary. Not only were the tickets really expensive, we figured we would need to get a babysitter. So we didn't give it much thought. Then the epic "Kids spend a week up north" plan came to fruition and we realized that we were home and kidless on the night of the gala. I still hesitated because 1) crazy expensive and 2) getting home from camping that day. Then Mike texted me and asked if Amy Adams' presence would change my mind (she is an alum of the theatre). It did. It also help me recruit my sister and Cheryl to our foursome.

It really was the tale of two extremes that day. We left the campground sweaty, dirty, smelly, and gross. We made good time back to the cities, although the car felt awfully quiet without the kids. We managed to make it home before traffic got too bad - thank goodness! We unloaded the camper and started the laundry. Then all three showers in our house were employed! Em said she felt so gross that she washed her hair twice!

I used Rent the Runway for the first time (and gambled quite a bit with my dressed being delivered on Monday ... they were guaranteed by 8pm. The gala started at 6. They were delivered before we got home from Duluth ... whew!) and ended up using my back up dress. As I carried laundry baskets up and down the stairs in my fancy dress, I told my sister it was the epitome of "real life."

While Amy Adams' schedule ended up prohibiting her from attending (she did send a voice message), the four of us had a blast. We had a lovely dinner and enjoyed the entertainment. I gave Mike my notes on the show when we got home and he told me that when he listened in on the marketing department's meeting the next day, they had the same notes. We went to the reception for a little bit after the show, but realized that we were all so tired (some of us had spent the last few nights in the great outdoors) ... so we headed out fairly early.

Everyone asked us how our time without the kids was ... and honestly, it was fast. We worked most of it. But we did really enjoy getting to adult in a fancy way for a night with a couple of our favorite dates!