picnics, chore charts, art festival

We've been busy since returning from our camping trip.

We had our annual 4th of July picnic/family reunion at Uncle Jim and Aunt Pat's house again this year. Cousin Jennifer flew out from Missouri, so it was nice to see her again. The kids had fun playing catch and croquet, and of course eating dessert. Bryan took the kids to the neighbor's picnic while I did more unpacking and cleaning up from vacation.

The next day my friend Jessica (since 2nd grade) and her 8 year old daughter, Aubree came to visit. We went to the Arts and Heritage Festival at Twin Lakes. This is the first time I had been to the festival without kids in 5 years, and it was wonderful! Its was also my first time going out with a friend for the day since having kids, too! It felt SO GOOD to get out and just be me for awhile. Having Jess there was a blast too, I desperately needed some girl time. I hope I can get more days like that in the future. It was a nice recharge. (THANK YOU, BRYAN!!!!)

My goal was to find some beautiful pottery coffee mugs for tea. I found some!
Plus, they were super cheap, especially compared to the other pottery vendors. I like the green cup in particular. I wish they had more, I'd have bought a set.

I bought the kids their own hiking sticks. They are very unique, hand carved and a whistle carved into them!

On Sunday morning, Jess, Aubree, Brayden and I went to the flea market while Bryan and Rylan slept. We had fun there, too. Much better prices ;) Brayden was excited to find a Ninja Turtle for him and Rylan.

Yesterday began the game season of summer T ball. The kids did great, even though Brayden was upset about having to use the T.

During our camp trip, I read the book, "Accountable Kids", and when we got home, we implemented the system I bought in a co-op last month. Here's the site: http://www.accountablekids.com/
So far so good. We had been previously using a similar ticket system I developed. All kids love tickets, right? This one is different in that its a bit more strict, and more time management. I tweaked it a bit to suit us and our parenting style, and I think it'll be a success.
Brayden is very "into it" so far. For the past few days, he's had all his morning chores done and working on bonus jobs before Rylan has even woken up! Brayden has lost no tickets for bad behavior as of yet, and Rylan has only lost one this morning for yelling at Brayden.

I think Brayden is realizing how much I do for them now that he is taking on more responsibility around the house. He asked me to make dinner at 4:30 today, and this is what I found when I came into the kitchen: