A Day in the Life: July 12th

These are always so interesting to put together and read later!  I don't think I really had one of these for a summer day before so this is nice to see what things are like when we aren't in school.

5:30  Time to wake up!  I get dressed in my workout clothes and grab a banana and my water bottle

5:35  I study about Saul on the road to Damascus from the Come, Follow Me manual.  I especially loved the extra talk about conversion that was linked.  I always read mine on my phone because it's so nice to be able to directly get the scriptures and talks.

5:52 Off to the gym!

6:00 Time for HIGH Fitness!  HIGH is a cardio/aerobics class with a lot of jumping and it's so much fun.  It's also always so much sweat and I am pretty much dripping by the time class is done.

7:00 I chat with some friends in the class on the way out to my car

7:05 Check the mail...it's all junk mail.

7:08 Elliott greets me as I walk in the door.  Apparently, I am the coolest mom ever because I get to work out on the top floor of the rec center.  Elliott loves the top floor because you can see down to the main floor.  I let him pick his daily flavor of Cheerios.

7:10 Miles joins us but I ask him to get his own breakfast because I NEED a shower ASAP.

7:12 I take a very quick shower and pull on my stretchy jeans and a v-neck t-shirt.

7:20 I head back downstairs to find Miles lying on the ground with a math book on top of him.  I don't even know.  Elliott wants to know where Molly is and I beg him not to wake her up while I check my email.

7:25  Molly is awake now so that was a moot point.  Why, oh why, do my kids wake up so early all summer when I have to drag them out of bed the entire school year?!?!?

7:30  I have one email about how to cite a video in ASA style and 4 emails asking where their peer review paper is. 

7:35  I am now assigning all the peer reviews.  In fairness, they were do at midnight the night before and I was waiting for people to actually turn them in.  The kids chat to to me intermittently while they eat breakfast and work on math workbooks.

7:45 This week's discussion board is about grit and it's my favorite.  It reminds me to talk to Molly about how much she has improved at swimming whether she passes her level today or not.

7:55 I'm still working on discussion boards but everyone is talking to me about where they want to go on vacation.  Molly wants to go to Bear World, Elliott wants to go to Legoland, and Gerrit wants to go to Universal Studios.

8:05 I'm done with work for now so I do a quick check of the newspaper and NPR.  Interesting headlines include Utah County being one of the highest areas for job growth and that the first condor chick was confirmed at Zion.  Gerrit:  This sounds like the plot to Jurassic Park and it's not a good thing unless you like getting your face pecked off.

8:10  I'm moving on to my crossword!  Chickasaw is a cool clue and SLC is a gimme.  The northwest corner kills me because one answer was in English (I thought it was in Latin) and one answer was in Greek (I thought it was in English).

8:15 Read a few blogs and brose the Nordstrom sale to see if there are any good back to school clothes.  There might be some contenders for Molly.

8:40 Breakfast at last!  I'm eating oatmeal with protein powder while I send a few church-related text messages.

9:00 I tell the kids to get their swimsuits on for lessons and I help them put on sunscreen.

9:10 We've gotten ready too fast and now we're just waiting on the couch

9:15 Leave for the pool, still too early

9:20 Now we are chilling poolside for 10 minutes until they can get in the water

9:30 It's slide day!  Each kid gets 10 minutes at the slides and the rest of the time to play. Some very generous (or maybe lazy) teachers let Molly go down the slide by herself even though she's two inches too short.

10:00 Miles and Molly both passed their levels!  Molly has taken level 2 several times so this is a really awesome achievement for her.  Elliott's teacher accidentally left his paper at home so now we're waiting for her mom to bring the papers to the pool.

10:15  Elliott passed his level too!  Everyone passed!

10:30 The kids get changed back into clothes while I sign them up for the next session of swim now that I know what levels they need.  I have even more emails about the peer review assignment.  We clearly need to update our instructions.

10:35 It's our earth science theme day!  We do a Google Earth quiz where we answer questions about cool pictures on Google Earth.  Molly tries to turn on the TV and I have to take away the remote.

10:45 We learn about the rock cycle using chocolate.  Elliott prefers cataclysmic events like eating all of his rocks.

11:00 Baking soda volcanoes are always a hit!

11:10 We have 20 minutes of reading.  Elliott and I read together while Molly and Miles read on their own and Molly tries to turn on the TV yet again.

11:30  We move on to 20 minutes of math. Molly does addition on her own,but Miles doesn't remember how to do long division or complicated multiplication so I sit with him.  Elliott is now trying to turn on the TV.  Elliott rips up my list of long-term projects.  Sigh...

11:50 Molly wants me to check her wrok.  Molly missed one question out of tons because she misunderstood a direction, so she throws a giant tantrum.  It looks like I will not be able to finish lunch before my Zoom meeting :(  I finally coerce her into coming down so I can try to explain what that direction meant.  She was fine until Miles started talking and now she's throwing another tantrum.

11:59 I desparately grab some Greek salad and gazpacho and hope my boss is okay with it being a lunch meeting.

12:02 Why oh why won't my Zoom load?!?!? It's like it can tell I'm running late.  The kids get set up with My Little Pony

12:05 I have a video meeting with my boss.  She doesn't mention my furtive spoonfuls of gazpacho so I feel better.  We discuss many issues about students and instructors and Elliott only manages to hijack the meeting twice.

12:55 Meeting done!  I grade one piece of late work so I can just be done with grading for the day.

1:10  I browse the Nordstrom sale one more time and decide there isn't anything I really want to buy.

1:20  My sewing for the day is to cut out a new short-sleeve shirt from a white linen-rayon blend.

1:50 The kids need to turn off the TV.  Molly is not happy about this.  Miles just grabs his Perplexus and starts to play.  Elliott is so proud of his swimming that he shows me his card several times.

2:00 My kids are having an argument about what constitutes the "deep end" of the pool that ends with Molly screaming very, very loudly.  I send her to her room to cool down for a while

2:05 Laudnry time!  Sorting laundry takes so long.  Molly is having fun now because she's realized that she can yell to her brothers through the vents.  This gives all three kids a good hour of fun finding all of our vents and talking to each other.

2:25 I put in my first cold load and read a book called Peacock Emporium on the couch.  It's an older Jojo Moyes family drama that got re-published after the success of some of her other books.

3:15 I move my first cold load into the dryer and put in my second cold load, and then take everything that hang dries upstairs.

3:20  I look at my now-ripped up project list and figure out what days I want to do the projects.  I send the kids to drop something off for me at one of our neighbor's houses and now one of my projects is done!

3:30 Miles gets his computer hour and Molly and Elliott decide to watch him.

3:35 I work on meal planning for the next week and my grocery list.

4:30 The kids get off the computer to play with toys. I fold and put away the first cold load, put the second cold load in the dryer, and put the whites in the washing machine

4:40 It seems early, but it's time to start boiling noodles and making cheese sauce for our family's favorite slow-cooker mac and cheese.  I've tried a lot of recipes but this is the one that the kids love so it's the one I make most of the time. I'm making a double batch so we can have it for lunches, too.

5:00 Read some more of my book

5:30  Oh look, the laundry strikes again.  Now I'm folding and putting away my second cold load, putting the whites in the dryer, and putting the pants in the washing machine.

6:00 I cut up and steam some broccoli so we can have dinner as soon as Gerrit gets home from work.

6:25 Gerrit is finally home!  We all gather to the table for macaroni and cheese and to tell Gerrit all about swim lessons and talk about what they were most excited to learn this session.  I get a text about, what else, the peer review assignment.  It turns out that Canvas changed the student view so all of our directions are obsolete.  Fun!

6:40 The return of the laundry.  The whites are far and away my least favorite load to sort and put away because there are so many small items and they belong to so many people.

7:00 Time for a little more of my book.  Gerrit has let the kids back on the computer and TV while I was working on laundry but I'm too tired to care at this point.

7:30 At last, the final laundry is done!  I put away the pants and yell at everyone to get ready to head out.

8:00 We're at the rec center for their outdoor movie night.  The movies always go too late but they have games for the hour before. I'm not thrilled to let my kids watch How to Train Your Dragon 3 until 11 PM, but games until 9? That I can handle. Molly  makes this cute light fury puppet, and we also have fun doing a fishing game for prizes and running around with ping pong balls.  We finish games about 30 minutes before they'll announce the candy guess winners, so Miles runs through the bleachers and Molly and Elliott roll down the hill.

G Mountain is beautiful from the bleachers!

9:20 We didn't win any candy guesses.  Elliott is very sad about the lack of Skittles in his life but now we need to head home.

9:30 I'm battling an old hip injury that doesn't feel great, so I read on the couch while Gerrit finishes getting the kids to bed.

9:45 We watch an episode of Agents of Shield.  Gerrit totally calls a plot point that I am very excited about.

10:45 Bedtime!

A Day Around Park City

We had a great day finishing off the rest of our Connect Pass and a few things on our Female Foodie Card!  It was like taking a big vacation day even though we were never more than an hour from home.

We started out with what I thought was lunch at Protein Foundry and Gerrit thought was a snack.  We shared a snickerdoodle protein shake, an acai bowl, and three different kinds of toast (avocado, strawberry and honey, and red pepper hummus with veggies). All delicious!

Next up we drove up Little Cottonwood Canyon to Snowbird to ride on their tram.  It was a beautiful day up the canyon!

Miles and Elliott with the tram mechanical room.

 Utah is so gorgeous.

I don't know why Molly is making this face while we were waiting for the tram.  No one knows why Molly is making this face, possibly including Molly.

The view up the mountain.  I really thought this was where we were headed, but we were actually going to a higher mountain behind this mountain.

                                               

There's still a LOT of snow at 11,000 feet in July.

Check out that view!

From there, we had to drive around the mountains to get to Park City.  Poor Miles had so much trouble with his ears on the drive back from the altitude change, but we were finally able to find some methods that would help him pop his ears.

The Utah Olympic Park was officially the last stop on our Connect Pass!  We started out at the main building looking at their ski history museum.

Adorable Olympic mascots and props from the Opening Ceremonies.

We played this pinball-like ski slope game many, many times.  At one point I couldn't find Elliott and he had run back to this game.

The main activity was for us to go on the obstacle courses.  The Olympic Park has a ton of different activities like a tower jump, extreme tubing, and zipline, but the obstacle course was the only one on our pass.  I planned to go on the easiest one with Molly and Elliott while Gerrit took Miles on the intermediate one.

 All suited up!  As soon as it was time to climb Elliott promptly freaked out and refused to go on the obstacle course so he stayed at the playground with Gerrit and Miles.  That turned out to be very much for the best because it was actually pretty challenging.

 Molly and I both loved doing the zipline at the end!

 Make sure you look both high and low in this picture of the playground.


 The line for the intermediate ropes course was very, very long.  I tried to wait in the shade with Molly and Elliott for the whole time, but it was hot and they needed to go to the bathroom, so we went back to the main building to buy ice cream and look at the Olympics museum for a while.

 They had a little display with all of the Olympic pins from 2002.  At one point, I definitely owned that little honey bear pin!  I have no idea where it is now so it is probably long since gone.

 The kids and I got back to the obstacle course just in time to watch Gerrit and Miles.  Both of them would like me to write down that it was not actually more fun, just very very high and mostly kind of scary and hard.  Also, at one point Gerrit managed to lose his shoe and one of the workers had to go down and retrieve it for him.

 The younger two and I found a much nicer shady spot on a trail to watch the obstacle course.  We went back to the main building after to let Miles buy an ice cream and let Gerrit see the Olympics museum.

 The last stop for the day was dinner at Freshies Lobster Co.!  I haven't had much lobster but I'd heard great reviews of their lobster rolls. They bring their lobster in from Maine every day! The lobster rolls were in fact buttery and tender and not fishy at all, and we added coleslaw, brown butter corn, and a slice of blueberry pie.