The Slagh's: The BEGINNING of SUMMER BREAK!

"Let's start at the very beginning...a very good place to start...."

A line from one of my favorite movies, Sound of Music. :)

Before I can cover the fun we have had at the end of June, celebrating 4th of July, and being gone for a week, I need to capture what the start of our summer break was like!

We were supposed to have the end of school the first Friday of June, but a bunch of snow days pushed back our last day to the following Monday.

My classroom - pretty much ready to be closed up for summer.

One of my favorite end-of-the-year teacher gifts... from one of my favorite students this year. :)

After a half day with students, playing outside all morning with a fun 'water carnival', we had a final teacher gathering, and then I went with two teacher friends - Mary and Megan - to get 'beginning of summer' pedicures. :)

The first full day of summer break was a lot of fun on Tuesday.

First up was BAGELS. I took the girls out to breakfast at Big Apple Bagel for a bit of a treat - they really love cream cheese. :)

From there, we headed to Velo City Cycles - a bike shop where I used to work years ago - to get all three of us ready for some fun summer biking. I had a flat that needed to be repaired, Taylor's first bike needed a little TLC so Camryn could ride it, and we bought Taylor a new, bigger bike!

We have had many many afternoons and evenings since then with the girls riding their bikes around. :)

I also got to ride with my workout bestie, Katie - although she had to help me fix a flat first (I think I am finally done with flat tires for the summer - knock on wood!) :)

Katie and I have also had some more time at the gym so far... we showed up like twins one Saturday morning. :)

The girls came with me one morning to a workout - and they got to hang out with another CFLE kiddo, Toriana.

They like playing around afterward, too. :)

I did have to do two days of summer curriculum work the first week of break - this is what our kindergarten madness looked like! :-o

One thing I really LOVE about summer break is more relaxed, yummy breakfasts that aren't eaten on the run!

The weather finally started to FEEL like summer. So there was lots of water play.

We need a bigger pool. :)

Taylor and I hang out outside a lot during Camryn's afternoon nap time.

I also introduced Taylor to Perler beads (they have bigger beads for little kids, which is so neat!). She had some fun creating this fish.

Camryn discovered a love for bubble gum this summer - and also singing along to songs in the car - especially when a microphone is included. :)

The girls also had some fun with shaving cream one afternoon - after doing it with my kindergarteners, I thought the girls might get a kick out of it, too. :)

The girls also started a little habit of sneaking into each others rooms during those first two weeks. We would hear giggling and whispers WAY past their bedtime, and so after a few nights, I decided to camp out between their rooms to intercept their little game.

It only took one night to stop the fun. ;)

There have been trips to Starbucks,

play dates with Ty and Addi (and Bennett, too :))

Kindergarten summer homework with Taylor

Creating a self portrait :)

landscaping projects

and watching little baby birds grow and also escape the nest near the front of our house. (we are hoping this little guy made it!)

playing at the park

and going to Ryan's softball games (often there are My Little Ponies brought along to the games that the girls play with)

We went to a Whitecaps game with Ryan's financial group through Haworth. The girls didn't watch much of the game, but they had fun eating junk food and playing with the big foam fingers. :)

I went to a "Favorite Things" party, hosted by my teaching partner, Jill, and it was a lot of fun! A picture of all the Blue Star friends who made it! :)