Summer Happenings

Here's to being in the education profession:

Even though I'm currently teaching a class, it's fully online, so I don't have to go to Big Rapids all that often. That gives us the time to go pick raspberries, visit the zoo, get ice cream and play at the park. Having an infant throws a wrench into a lot of things, but we're fortunate to have a lot of freedom even so.

On the 4th of July we took the girls to see Ratatouille, which is deserving of all the good reviews that it's received. The big screen and big sound are still intimidating to the girls, but they mostly enjoyed themselves (although Abby will tell you she didn't like it). Crazily enough, though, we went in the afternoon and used a coupon to get popcorn and pop, and it still cost $30.50 for the four of us.

Later that night I took Annika to see the Sand Lake fireworks, near our house. We sat at an overpass of US 131, which put us about a kilometer away (based on a 3 second delay between seeing the firework and hearing the boom, and knowing that the speed of sound is more than 300 meters per second (thank you, physics degree)). It was just me and her, and we had a nice time, although it's hard to pass the time by playing "I spy" when it's dark out.

Other stuff:

Recently Jake has slept his longest nights yet, including a 9 and a half hour spell one night from 10pm to 7:30am between feedings. We had to pop a pacifier in twice, I think, but he never left his bed, and we weren't out for more than a few minutes. We couldn't be more pleased.

The other day Lisa had the perm taken out of her hair, so she' s curl-less for the first time since she was 8 years old. I think it looks a-good.

Annika tried to read the word "detective" on the cover of a book the other day, and it came out "deciphering." Of course, that's nowhere phonetically close, but I was impressed that she remembered hearing "deciphering" somewhere.

Finally, while Annika was at the counter on a barstool the other day, I poured her some Ice Blue Raspberry flavor Kool-Aid. She took a sip, and said "Creamy blue, sweet as a thousand seas." I busted out laughing.