2020 :: week 23

May 31

We had such a great day with the Salazars. They arrived late in the evening on Saturday and we hoped that Lucas would sleep in a bit Sunday morning. Unfortunately, he hates sleeping in like his John cousins and after waking up in the night was up for the day at 6am. Hillary and Ben took turns napping while we all visited and played. We did our Sacrament meeting and then Anthony made smash burgers and I made chocolate chip cookies. After dinner we walked to the creek and played for a bit. Kingsley loved running around in the water, and the John kids tried to skip rocks.

June 1

Renee sent me this picture of Elliott, Bennett and Blaise helping her shuck corn. These three are smart, imaginative...and a little sneaky. Sometimes that means they have epic adventures and sometimes Elliott has to come inside and cool down because he is so angry. Thankfully this was a good day.

June 2

The Sutherlins bought a huge pack of water balloons and the kids soaked each other in about five minutes. It is starting to get hot and without the pool we are finding creative ways to cool off.

June 3

Miles spends so much time at our doors and windows whining, waiting and wishing the big kids or mom will take him outside. I always want to sing the Jack Johnson song " Sitting, Waiting, Wishing" that was all over Provo in 2005 when I see him parked there. I'd be more lenient about letting him out if he was a little more discriminating about what objects he puts in his mouth.

June 4

By midweek we were getting really hot and wishing we had our bigger pool set up. While Anthony was busy strategizing the best way to do this, I found this pool in our garage. We had last used it eight years ago when the Nielsons visited. I remembered it feeling a bit larger last time. Regardless, the kids loved having a place to cool off, even if it was small.

June 5

Friday morning Dana noticed that our HVAC unit in the basement was dripping. It is not uncommon for there to be a little condensation on the unit, especially on humid days, but there was enough that water was collecting on the top and dripping into the filter. I called our HVAC company and they said they would send someone out in the afternoon. In the meantime I wanted to get a new filter because the one we had in there was drenched. I loaded up the kids and we stopped at Lamar's to get free doughnuts on the way to the hardware store because it was "National Doughnut Day." We haven't been going out of the house much, and for some reason this felt overwhelming. Social distancing was observed, and we waited on little spots spaced 6 feet apart and then each group went into the store one at a time to choose their doughnuts. Then we took our doughnuts to the car and the kids ate theirs while I ran into the store and bought new filters. One thing that is nice about having older kids is that I feel comfortable letting them wait in the car while I run in places. I was able to go in, find the filter and pay in about two minutes. It would have taken me at least that long to get everyone out and then Miles into a cart. When the technician came that afternoon he cleaned up the condensation and ascertained that we needed more freon. He filled us up and the AC has been running smoothly ever since.

June 6

My dad came over early Saturday morning and he and Anthony spent a few hours building this platform for our pool. Our yard is fairly level, but off by about 9 inches over the fifteen feet required by our pool. We feel mostly confident that this platform they built will work. It was a very hot Saturday. Will's baseball team practiced from 11:30-1pm. They ended up calling practice early because one kid threw up, presumably heat related.