Summer Fun Club 8 and 9

I think my theme for this summer is going to be "Life Happens."  Or perhaps "The Best Laid Plans Fall to Crap."  Maybe "Just Give Up Now?"

Monday this week went great.  Swimming lessons, lunch and down time as planned, and a picture-perfect, fun-filled Summer Fun Club.  Then Monday night Hazel got sick.  And it all went downhill from there.

Unfortunately, we had a lot planned this week.  Fun extra stuff like movie at the library, afternoon pool & picnic with friends, at least two playdates, and lunch at Chick-Fil-A (the good one with a play area.)  Cancelled, all cancelled, as one after the other of us came down with Mystery Bug.  It wasn't even that bad; just enough that we couldn't in good conscience be around other people, especially since all our besties are pregnant or have new babies.  So Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, home we stayed.

Luckily, staying home doesn't inhibit Summer Fun Club; it's written into the bylaws.  But being sick does.  Tuesday everyone just napped or rested and we didn't really do anything.  But Monday and Wednesday were pretty good.

8 - Hazel came up with this one on the fly over the weekend: "Mom, I want to learn how to make paper snowflakes."  Done.  No new materials required, love that.  During Monday swimming lessons I watched a couple of quickie YouTube tutorials, just to brush up (I liked this one best), and Monday afternoon we went snow-crazy.

These...

...became these:

Quick press with a dry iron on low:

Ready to decorate!  Dude, I even broke out the glitter.

Voila!

Monday was also the day Ginger lost TWO teeth - one at the grocery store in the morning, another just before bedtime.  

9 - On Wednesday, Poppy was sick in the morning.  Which meant none of us were going anywhere, not even swimming. And that makes a Very. Long. Day.  In the house.  Luckily I was pathetically behind on my housework and the living room was not yet put back together from the baby shower last weekend.  Which meant only one thing: blanket fort.

As we gathered our supplies, I explained to the girls the Three Things need to make a great blanket fort:

1 - Tall chairs (we used our counter stools and the dining chairs that are on Kaboosts.)

2 - Big blankets (we used Neat Sheets, some old curtains, and a few tablecloths.)

3 - Strong clamps.  As any blanket fort veteran knows, clothes pins and chip clips don't cut it.  I invested ten bucks in a set of these beauts from Home Depot.  Wicked strong.  Never a weak fort again!

Ponies, dolls, and books were immediately moved in, and the morning was spent eating goldfish in the fort, and poring over the first Halloween costume catalogs that have come in the mail.

Our afternoon "official" Summer Fun Club activity was playing board games in the fort.  The girls played a Princess and the Pea game.

Then I taught them how to play Rack-O.  Our selection of adult games sucks almost as much as our kids' game collection.  But the thought of playing Zingo one more time, or even - make it stop! - Candyland, makes me want to scrape my own eyeballs out with a grapefruit spoon.  So we're transversing the gap from preschool games to older kid, and in some cases, big kid /adult games, just so I can enjoy playing with the kids!  Rack-O is easy and only requires being able to read two-digit numbers and put them in order.  We played two and a half rounds until everyone was getting bored between turns.  

The overall success of the afternoon led me to go hunting online for some more next-level games for our family - things with limited reading but more thinking and strategy than the likes of - oh, nails-on-the-chalkboard! - SORRY! and such mind-numbing dice-dependent games of luck that never, ever, end.  We can do better.  I'll make it a blog post if we find some good ones.