Playing Outside

The kids love playing outside these days. Even with the heat they love to be out there for a good part of the day. Ben likes to climb and hang on a couple of the trees in the backyard. They all love to play with the dog. They will go out to the screen porch first thing in the morning and hold him and run around with him. He can really get their giggles going. We set up a decent sized blow up pool and they love to play out in the water every chance they get. A few times they have tried to get Bruno to go in with them - so far he hasn't complied.

Bruno

We originally had plans to go to a family reunion over the week of the 4th of July, but Sean didn't feel like he could leave work for the whole week, so we decided to take a little trip of our own. Despite our intentions of leaving on Thursday night, we didn't actually leave town until Saturday morning. We spent the 4th of July at home swimming in our little blow up pool and bar-b-queing and making homemade ice cream. We put a mattress in the bed of the truck and drove to a clear spot to watch the Kingman fireworks, which were surprisingly good (considering being a small town). We headed over to Flagstaff (just a short little journey) - we wanted to get out of Kingman and escape the heat. We took a long route there and stopped at the Grand Canyon Caverns (some dry caves). We went and saw Wall-E, and swam in the hotel swimming pool and just relaxed. The next day we found church to go to and then made our way home. We stopped outside of Williams at a deer farm, where the kids fed the deer and saw all sorts of other neat animals. They loved it. It was a fun family trip, which we all needed (even if only for a day). On our trip to Flagstaff over the 4th, we heard about some puppies that were being given away at a nearby RV park. Sean wanted to go and check them out.... and we ended up taking one home. This is Bruno. He is part Lab and part Rottweiler (we think - they aren't sure who the father was). He made a good first impression - traveled very well on our ride home with no potty accidents in the car. Good puppy! The kids LOVE him, and he is pretty fond of them too. He is especially drawn to Megan (maybe it's because they are similar in size). So far he has been a good little pup. He is young so we are trying to teach him all sorts of things that puppies need to learn, but he is getting the hang of things. We are happy to have a new addition to our family.

Sleeping

Ben is not a big napper. He hasn't napped regularly for almost a year (he stopped when he was 2 years old). I still put him in bed for quiet time every day, but most of the time he just plays in bed. I'm impressed that he'll still stay in his bed for the hour that he is in there. I'll hear humming or talking and sometimes he'll have a couple of toys with him, but he doesn't regularly fall asleep. In fact it is probably once or twice a week that he sleeps. He is also the last one to sleep at night. Caelan usually falls to sleep pretty quickly at bedtime, but an hour or sometimes even two later we will still hear little noises from Ben in his room. He must be a boy that doesn't need tons of sleep because most of the time he is happy and in good spirits even without the naps.