Summer Family Fun List

Summer is officially here in out house. The kids have, for the most part, finished school for the year. There's still a little bit of history and reading to be finished up, but for now we are in full summer mode.

Needless to say, the professor and I tend to try to cram as many projects into this time of year as we possibly can. In an attempt to not let the summer go by without the kids getting to choose some fun things to do, we sat down and made a list together as a family of all the fun things we would like to get to this summer. I wrote it all out on posterboard for us to cross off as we get to them.

In case you can't read what's on our list, here's what it says:

Bike ride

Fishing

S'mores

Discover a new park

Zoo

Picnic

Fly kites

Have a water balloon fight

Treats from the ice cream truck

Camping

Berry picking

Lemonade stand

Driveway chalk drawing

Sprinkler

Putt-putt

Geocaching

Swimming in the pool at The Professor's workplace

Gigantic bubbles

Go to the "beach" at one of the local parks

Have an ice cream sundae party

Make popsicles

Museum

Backyard obstacle course

Wash the car

This should keep us pretty busy having fun this summer. I hope your summer is just as fun filled as ours should be.

Random Pics of the Kids

Petie's 5th Birthday

A new guitar

Swinging buddies

(and no, I don't make my kids wear helmets to swing)

Trip to the zoo

The night I found all the beds empty and all the kids sleeping on the floor :)

Matching Dresses for the Girls

So here's the real reason my kids didn't have cute matching outfits for Easter. I've been working on these for a few weeks and finally got them finished yesterday. I picked up several yards of these coordinating fabrics on clearance a while back at Jo-Ann's and had just enough to make these three dresses. I think they turned out pretty cute. The girl's just love them and couldn't wait to wear them to church today.

For Penny's, I used McCall's M4427 pattern. I bought it about seven years ago, so I don't even know if it's still around. The pattern just has the plain bodice and the coordinating band at the bottom. I thought that was a little too plain, and I needed a way to bring in the blue fabric, so using some ideas from this blog, I added the ruffle to the top part of the dress. I love how this dress turned out!

For Peanut's dress, the pattern I used was Simplicity 5695. I love this pattern because it was so easy to use, and it's really basic, so with a few changes you could use it over and over again and have a completely different looking dress each time. I'll definitely be using this one again. I do think her's turned out a little big and for some reason it reminds me of a muumuu, but I like it anyway. I think the big bold print was definitely the right pick for Peanut's dress, and her personality.

And finally, for Patty's dress the pattern I used was Simplicity 2677. Her dress was slightly more challenging than Peanut's, but overall not bad. This was the first time I had ever used bias tape, and only the second time I've ever had to put in a zipper. Zipper's still aren't my favorite things to sew, but I'm always surprised at how much easier it is than I think it's going to be. I think with a little more practice I won't think twice about adding one to a garment. The only thing I had trouble with was the sleeves. I still don't know what I was doing wrong, but I eventually just decided to leave them off and do the sleeveless version of the dress. She loves it, and I think it turned out pretty cute.