Random Acts of Rays

Lots of little things going on around here.  Summer is upon us and I'm doing my best to ensure the survival of all of my kiddos.  They need protection from me.....they are making me crazy!!!!  

Benny learned to ride his bike without training wheels!  He looks so cute on his little Spiderman bike.  It only took him about five minutes.  It helps that his little feet reach the ground when he's sitting on the seat.  

I love watching him ride around like a champ.  The first week he started, there was a lot of yelling.  Things like, "Benny!  You HAVE to stop at the stop sign and look for cars!"  We had a few close calls.  

Sully is up and crawling like a champ, too.  Loves to climb on whatever he can.  Luckily, he can't do stairs yet.  We need to put up some gates before that skill is mastered.  

These cute kids put together a little training program that they did for a few days.  They ran a half mile and then rode a mile.  Too cute.  Graham insisted he's not a runner, so he only did the bike part.  

These two superheroes are my morning wake-up call and breakfast buddies.  Every morning around 6:00 am, we hear little Sullivan calling for us.  Benny is never far behind and usually by that point, he is in bed with us.  Good thing they are cute.  

This is a common occurence here in Sicily.  Sheep.....lots of sheep.  It's interesting watching the shepherds lead them from one field to the next.  

Like I said before, summer is here in full swing.  We have quite the hood full of kids, so that makes for some full days of play.  This was a waterfight day followed by lunch on the carport.  Good times!

Lucy and I escaped for a girls night out a couple weeks ago.  We went to our favorite gelato shop and chatted for a while.  It was nice having some quiet time with just the two of us.  I need to do this more often with each of my sweeties.  

Poor Lucy had to get four teeth pulled last week in preparation for braces.  She had the brackets put on weeks ago, but not the wires yet.  Right after the teeth were out, we walked down the hall to the orthodontist and he put the wires in.  Youch!  Quite the day for sweet Lucy.  We LOVE her dentist!  Brook Jones is in our ward and he's just about the nicest guy we've ever met.  He gave us tons of gauze to help with the bleeding, but as we were leaving the base, there was a security drill going on and they wouldn't let us off.  Lucy was hurting and her entire mouth was numb.  Her saliva was mixing with the little bit of blood she had in her mouth and she was slobbering it all over the place.  It It looked much worse than it was with all the bloody spit (gross, I know) and she was miserable.  We headed back to the clinic and Dr. Jones loaded us up with more cloth.  We finally made it home and she rested for the remainder of the day.  She's still hurting, but getting much better.  

So, this laminated sheet of paper is my attempt at structure for the summer.  You would think I was pulling off their fingernails with the amount of weeping and wailing I get every morning when I remind them to start on their list.  Take a second look.....breakfast and getting dressed are on it....how hard can it possibly be?

Wish me luck!  Only 8 more weeks of summer!