Summer Break: Week Three

Summer has arrived in Houston and it was HOT this week. We did get outside, but we mostly filled our time with playdates, library visits and other indoor activities. Here are some highlights from our third week of summer break:

The boys helped Daddy mow last weekend. Using a push mower is harder than it looks!

Tuesday mornings are pretty quiet at our house. The boys entertained themselves with their dress-up clothes. These are some crazy new looks, though. Henry is a tiger-magician-knight-superhero while Will is a cowboy-pirate-astronaut-Darth Vader. 

On Tuesday, we also said goodbye to Daddy, who left for London (but is already back!).  

He left us notes, which we found when we got back from music lessons. I love that his notes are about reading! (Gene and Henry have been reading Junie B. Jones together, and the whole family ends up listening and laughing.)

Speaking of reading, we are obsessed with books this summer (much like last summer!). We went to the library four different times this week. Will just plows through books like crazy, and I can barely keep up. This stack is just some of what he read this week. His current favorite series are Geronimo Stilton and Secret Agent Jack Stalwart, but he reads pretty much everything from picture books and magazines to nonfiction about electricity and mummies. 

On one of our visits to the library, we caught a Magic Tree House program. Henry was excited because he and I have been reading the series. We are on book 5 and he just loves it!

The program was fun because it incorporated music, science and books -- all things we love!

The kids got to explore the hands-on activities after the program. Will is making a tornado in the bottle. All the activities corresponded to a Magic Tree House book. 

At the library, we also checked out a FLIP kit called Butterfly, Butterfly. 

We've done them in the past and they are so much fun! The kit contains a book and craft activities (all materials are included). 

This kit was perfect because we talk a lot about butterflies at our house. We went to the butterfly center last week, check out Aunt Jess's caterpillars and chrysalises, and even found a swallowtail caterpillar on our fennel plant in our own backyard!

This week we also found a cicada shell hanging off the garage at Gramma and Grampa's house. Since we like to learn about insects, we decided to bring it on home to examine more closely.

Bug-loving boy!

When we do get outside, it's usually for a bike ride or pool visit. The boys were excited to go to the neighborhood pool on Wednesday after swim lessons. They are best buddies for sure. 

Cooling off in the water!

We were back at the MFAH for their summer detective program on Thursday. The boys learned about Pre-Columbian art and sketched in the galleries, and then we checked out the James Turrell exhibit. They love the tunnel so I knew they would love the exhibit, and they did! 

We've been talking and reading about optical illusions a lot this summer, so the Turrell exhibit tied in nicely with that, as did this mirrored sculpture in the sculpture garden.

And finally, we had a couple of fun playdates with good friends this week. Even though we don't get to see Chloe and Bella often enough, I love that these kiddos just pick up right where they left off and have the best time playing together.

Despite the heat, we sure are loving summer! 

Food, Glorious Food

Have you seen Ice Age: The Meltdown? Whenever we watch it, the boys can't stop singing "Food, Glorious Food" just like Sid! And indeed, food is one of our family's favorite topics. We love everything about food, from going to the farmers market and chatting with the farmers about their veggies to searching for new recipes, cooking together, and, obviously, eating. My boys are pretty good eaters and are almost always willing to try something new.  

We have long been fans of local veggies, and in the past, we've gotten vegetables from our favorite CSA, but this summer, we have been enjoying visiting the Urban Harvest Farmers Market and the Pershing Middle School Garden Stand. Last weekend, we even came across a West U resident selling garden goodies on his front lawn. You know we had to turn the car around to get some dinosaur kale! 

Here are some snapshots of what we've been eating this week:

Gene bakes bread (often multiple loaves) almost every weekend. (I am so lucky!) This was a batch of delicious whole wheat pita that he made on Saturday afternoon.

We gobbled it up with some chicken kebabs (or sha-bobs, as Henry calls them), rice, grilled summer squash, onions and peppers, corn on the cob, and sliced tomatoes and purple carrots. We had picked out all the veggies at the farmers market that morning. It was a delicious meal!

For lunch on Tuesday, I whipped up a quick summer corn salad using corn and tomatoes from the farmers market (you don't even cook the corn, so it comes together in minutes!).

We ate it with market peppers, leftover pita and our favorite hummus (Grandma's hummus, which we stock up on at Whole Foods).

I found purple hull peas at the Pershing garden stand and chatted with the gardener about how she likes to prepare them. I modified the recipe only slightly, but she was right: purple hull peas are delicious! We ate them with fresh cornbread, sliced garden tomatoes, and a dinosaur kale and carrot salad. It was the perfect light summer supper, and my favorite meal of the week!

And you already know that this little boy loves to be in the kitchen. We still love reading books about food, finding recipes at the back, and cooking up a fun meal. We've made the pancake recipe from Hey, Pancakes! a couple times now and the boys love it. I follow the recipe exactly except for using about half whole wheat flour instead of all AP.   

Will eats his pancakes with butter and syrup, and fruit on the side, but Henry and I like ours topped with peanut butter, banana slices and chia seeds. I also threw on a bunch of local blueberries!

We are also loving all the summer fruit at the farmers market. Last weekend, we picked up a watermelon, a cantaloupe, blueberries, figs, and peaches. 

Gene thinks I'm slightly obsessed with local produce (okay, I am), but I say I'm just raising good, healthy eaters with an appreciation for food, glorious food and where it comes from!

Summer Break: Week Two

People keep asking me how my summer is going, how we are managing the L-O-N-G, hot days, and how many camps the boys are signed up for :) So far, summer has been great (with the exception of a couple moody hours on Thursday afternoon) even though the boys haven't gone to a single camp yet and are with me day in and day out! 

Our secret to a fun summer is to plan the week in advance and fill it up with a mix of activities and down time. We have lazy times when we sit around and read, craft, paint, or play games; we run errands; we hang out at the pool with friends; we check out stacks and stacks of books at the library; we keep our minds busy with writing, math practice, and our instruments; we get out and move our bodies with biking, swimming and karate; and we visit museums a couple times a week. Even with all our activities, the boys sometimes "don't know what to do" but for the most part, we are busy and happy and really enjoying our break from school!  

Here are some of the highlights of week two:

We are enjoying all kinds of fruit, like grapes, cantaloupe, figs, watermelon, and blueberries!

We went to the science museum in Sugar Land on Tuesday.

The boys love the dig pit

and were excited to explore the new paleontology section.

We found fossilized poop! 

Tuesday is also music lesson day. After Henry's violin lesson but before Will's piano lesson, we had a little break and decided to the best way to use the time was to eat frozen yogurt. We tried out a new-to-us spot, Orange Leaf. It was delicious!

On Wednesday, we had swim lessons and spent a couple of hours at the pool with some friends. In the afternoon, we went to the library for our second visit of the week because we needed more books and because the boys had both read ten books and could get their summer reading certificates and put their names on the reading wall upstairs. They also got to choose their free books!

We also tried out a karate class at The Little Gym.

Punching and kicking is FUN!

Thursday morning was full of errands. We went to the doctor and Whole Foods and then came home to meet the plumber. That afternoon the crankies hit hard, but an early dinner and a bike-walk cured everything and the day ended on a high note.

Check out Will's new big bike! He loves it and is so speedy!

On Friday, we met the cousins at the science museum for our first visit of the summer.  

Walk like an Egyptian on the big caterpillar?

After lunch and a few hours of downtime at home, the boys decided that we should visit the Children's Museum too!

Two museums in one day? I thought I might be crazy to try it, but it actually worked out perfectly. We got there a little after 4, and it wasn't very crowded (which is my biggest issue with the Children's Museum). The boys had a blast and were extremely well-behaved. We closed down the museum at 6. You can bet our next visit to the Children's Museum will be at 4 p.m. too!

Next week's schedule is already planned and full of lots more fun activities!

Father's Day

Our Father's Day was pretty relaxed this year. Gene was supposed to be in Singapore, but his trip was cancelled at the last minute, so instead we went to Nana and Pop's to play with the cousins!

The three big cousins

Gene and Pop 

The three dads

Gene and his boys

Gene is such a good dad to Will and Henry. I love watching him with our boys and am so thankful they have such a wonderful dad.

Our Hawk

Our hawk hung around our house for a good two weeks. We heard him all day long and could see him hanging out in the trees in front, on the wires in back, or on the neighbors roof.  Isn't he beautiful?

The boys and I really had fun watching him while he was here. We think he is a Cooper's hawk.

The blue jays absolutely hated our hawk! They squawked at him, chased him, and flew at him until he would finally leave.

It was fun to watch the birds because once the hawk flew off, the blue jays would wait about 20 seconds before flying off in another direction.  

Even though he's gone now, the boys and I certainly enjoyed our new bird-watching experience in our own backyard!

Summer Break: Week One

Our first week of summer break has been fabulous! I didn't take pictures of everything we did this week, but we spent lots of time with cousin Mary, found free and cheap activities everywhere ($1 movies, kids eat free at Ikea on Tuesdays, and concerts galore!), checked out more books from the library, had our music lessons, visited museums, went to two concerts, and got outside to ride bikes and play, despite the heat.

The boys started swim lessons again this week. After swim, it's fun to play at the covered playground next to the rec center. They pretend to be spiders in the web. I'm the fly, so I get captured and eaten!

The Houston Symphony had a free community concert at the middle school close to our house. There was no way my music-loving boys would miss that! The instrument petting zoo is always a hit.

The MFAH's summer Art Detectives program for kids is fantastic. You search for specific art works, learn about the art (this week we learned about portraits), and then do some sketching in the galleries!

We spent our visit at the art museum with Henry's buddy Ainsley.  

The art program ended with a concert by Paragon Brass Ensemble. They were fantastic and completely won over the boys when they played Sousa's "Washington Post March."

We also visited the Health Museum.

The exhibit, "Backyard Monsters," is all about bugs 

and features several robotic bugs, like this praying mantis.

The boys are always up for the brain teasers in the main hallway.

We hadn't see this game before. Basically, you hook up sensors to the forehead and then try to relax. Whoever is the most relaxed sends a ball toward his opponent and wins. Henry was our winner!

And even though the heat of summer is upon us, we're still trying to get outside every day.

Fortunately, bubbles are still lots of fun for the boys!

The best way to replenish after an hour outside? With an ice-cold smoothie, of course!

Despite our busy days, there is still plenty of downtime at home too for games like Solitaire.

We love summer break!