With a limited number of weeks left until school started, we soaked in every minute we could!
Some days we grabbed friends and met at the pool.
Lovin' pool life
We adore these sweet neighbors and friends of ours!
This guy keeping warm after doing the high dive a million times!
#bffs #justchillin
I took about a million pictures of them because I just can't get enough of this six year old cuteness right here.
They were warming themselves up on the hot pavement! Ha ha.
Why does she look twelve? This girl is all legs!
Kerigan did an ice skating camp for a week in August
Then they had this show for us at the end of the week
We were so impressed! She learned a lot and got so good at ice skating!
Here is her sweet group- she's in the second row towards the right
She'd been wanting to do this wind tunnel they have at the mall and this day she talked Daddy into it since she did so good at her ice skating show! Ha!
Then this happened (not because of the wind tunnel! ha!) She had one of her ears get infected so she needed it pierced again since we had let it grow shut. She was not happy about this! But I refused to let her go to school with one earring in and one out. She just wanted to take the other one out and I wouldn't let her do that because I knew she would want her ears pierced eventually and that she wouldn't want to do both all over again.
But she had her biggest fans. These guys are pretty much wrapped around her finger. She wanted to hold her bubba's hand and sit on Daddy's lap. #done Whatever she wants!
In the middle of the summer our sweet kitty started acting like she was coughing. I thought it was a hairball but nothing ever came out (sorry for the tmi!) so I made her an appointment at the vet.
It turned out she had a lot of fluid around her lungs! To make a long story short, they pulled the fluid and tested it. They did all kinds of testing and ended up sending us to an emergency clinic, where they redid the testing and found basically nothing.
So we ended up taking her to the Vet med clinic at Iowa State, which is the top veterinary place you can go around here ($$$). We weren't planning on spending our savings on our cat, but this little girl loves her kitty so much, and she has become part of our family!
We had to crack up when we saw this posted on her cage! Haha! This is the sweetest cat in the whole world who lets the kids drag her around by her tail for heaven's sake! Angry cat just made us LAUGH!
These signs were cracking us up. She clearly let the vets know how she feels about being there! They all wore gloves and used extreme caution when dealing with her. Then our family came in to visit her and we took her right out of the cage and cuddled her. The doctors all stood around looking dumbfounded. HA! Belle just didn't like them! By the way the findings were inconclusive, we didn't want to spend more money on surgery for her. They recommended giving her a vitamin called Rutin, which I have to order on Amazon because no pharmacy has ever heard of it! Update: It must be helping because she's doing so well! We had the fluid pulled again in October, and I think she may need it pulled again now (May 2018) but she's still acting like her normal, fiesty self!
We decided to throw one last day of waterpark fun into August before heading back to school! So we met cousins at Lost Island, a waterpark about 45 minutes from where we live.
A couple of excited cousins right here
This was such a fun place!
They had these awesome tube slides!
Here are the boys!
Kerigan loved the slides too!
And of course, the water monkey bars are a hit for her!
She still loves these little slides too!
We were walking around and saw a real mermaid! I love her hands up by her mouth, she was in complete awe.
Evie and Kerigan heading out on the lazy river!
Side note here in case you are wondering- Andrew usually wears his wetsuit at waterparks and some swimming pools if they are too cold because his circulation isn't the best with his heart defect. His lips get blue whenever he gets cold and he wears out quicker. He loves the wet suit because it keeps him warm!
Cousin race!
Just a little lunch break chillin with Daddy!
The best day with family! We want to make this an annual thing!
The waterpark also had a mini golf course so of course we couldn't leave without playing!
Kerigan did really good!
She even got a hole in one!
So then her brother had to show her up and get one too! Ha!
Afterwards we headed out for dinner and then everyone came back to spend the night at our house! We had so much fun together!
Then we found a weekend in mid-August that Kerigan's besties from our old town could come and celebrate her birthday.
She had been wanting to do Build A Bear so we thought this was the perfect opportunity.
I always struggle while planning her birthday parties with who to invite, as this kid makes friends wherever she goes. Lily and Annika are so special, as are their mamas, so I thought it would be better to have them come a different time than her regular party, so we could all give them more attention and have more time to spend together!
It worked just perfect and they brought their brothers along to play together too! We took everyone to the Emoji movie!
Then we went ice skating!
Here's the boys!
Our crew!
We had to stop at Hurts donut to take donuts home for the morning (and let's face it, probably a late night snack too! Ha!)
We had cake and sang, even though her birthday was a month ago! Ha!
The kids cozied up and watched a movie while the mamas and I chatted!
Here's where they ended up sleeping. Kerigan sandwiched between two sweet girls who mean the world to her!
The week before school started we had regular dental appointments that turned into Kerigan having to have her other front tooth extracted! I was freaking out, but she did great! She had an infection on her gums above her tooth that she didn't even know about! Scary! And a coincedence that their appointment was in perfect timing.
I wasn't sure I wanted both of her teeth missing right before her first day of school pictures! She already looked grown up and this aged her all the more! But I had to admit it was adorable.
The day before school we had to check out the eclipse. Afterwards we realized we should've driven to Missouri because it really wasn't all that exciting from here. All the neighbors were out on their decks and we were all like "what's supposed to happen here?" Ha!
I flew through those summer updates! Whew! First day of school coming up!
