We've been Camp Mommy-ing for a couple of weeks now. 
We have done this before and I have always found it very enjoyable and yet very challenging. This time, however, we've thrown a pool into the mix. A real-honest-to-goodness-not-a-baby-pool. I mean, don't get me wrong, it's not a real pool by any stretch of the imagination - it's one of those hard sided pools from Walmart but I'm in love. 

We swim every single day. And putting on bathing suits and suntan lotion are totally activities unto themselves. Plus there's the pre-swim snack and post-swim snack and the pre-swim bathroom break. Getting out of the pool is a whole other activity, with all the drying off and putting on warm sweatpants because the air conditioning is on. It's like six activities in one, which, really, you just can't beat that. I mean, that's a half a day right there. 

The question that always remains though is what the heck to do the rest of the day? 

I usually turn to my Camp Mommy Pinterest board to answer that question and today, we painted rocks. Pinterest offers many many ways to paint rocks, come involving googly eyes and sharpies and glue. This was not for me. We just painted rocks. 

Here's how. 
Collect rocks from the rock-filled front porch thing that's not really a porch. Yet. We're working on it. 
Walk to the backyard and sit in the shade. 
Paint the rocks while Mommy sits in an Adirondack chair, also, thankfully, in the shade. 

The one tip I can give you would be to collect many many rocks. That way the painting can go on and on and on. 

We each painted 18 rocks because the egg cartons we were using to collect our rocks had 18 sections. (We eat a lot of eggs). Also, the egg cartons are a great place to let your rocks dry. 

We also each painted a very large flat rock; we have a lot of those sitting around the edge of our pond. Yeah, we have a pond. It was there when we moved in, it's full of fish and frogs and we have not filtered or fed said fish or frogs in the past 11 months and they seem to be doing just fine, so why mess with a good thing, you know? 

Rock painting. So fun. We're definitely going to do this again. 

:) 
Jen 

It's just so so hot here in Florida - we barely use the backyard because it's sunny all day. That wasn't a complaint, we get to use the backyard all winter, it was more of a statement. 

This morning, after Josh pulled his car out of the driveway and left for work, it realized that the section of driveway where he always parks is always shady. A nice spot for his car, an even better spot for the rest of us to hang out. A nice big, low hanging tree sits on that part of the driveway. And now I love that part of the driveway. 

We set up on shop under the tree. We brought out drinks, cups, paper and paint, the picnic table and the easel and we were good. The kids painted for a good hour, I handed out new papers and drinks and we were all in the shade. We hung the pictures on the tree with masking tape to let them dry, although in this heat, I'm pretty sure they were dry before I got them on to the tree. 

The only sad part was when they got bored of painting. I kept saying things like, you know you wanna paint another one, don't you? Don't you wanna make a picture to mail to someone? Anyone? Hey, let's sit sit here and watch the paintings dry! But they were having none of it. 

So we went in the sprinkler instead. Not too bad of a day. 

:)
Jen

I'm so conflicted. On the one hand, I really miss blogging. On the other hand, I still feel like I shouldn't be sharing so much. Password protecting the blog was one option, but weebly now charges for that, so that's out. 

I guess my options are starting a new password protected blog elsewhere or moving the whole Crumb Blog to another server (I don't even know what I'm saying) or, I'm not sure what other options I have. I would also very much like to print my blog as a book and weebly does not yet have that function so it's looking more and more like moving away from weebly is the best option. For now, blogging a little more quietly will be the way I choose to go. No more blog Facebook page, no more blog entries going out to a hundred subscribers. Just people I actually I know on that subscriber list, no strangers allowed.  

But I don't have too much time to dwell on this these days because school is out and the kids are in (the house). Camp Mommy officially started on Monday but here's what's been going on since school ended. 

We went downtown and parked for 50 cents an hour. I know! That wasn't the whole activity but it was enough for me! We actually went to the Main Library, the nicest library I have seen in my entire life. Except for the somewhat sketchy crowd that hangs out there, but it's downtown, I can't really expect better. 

We arrived just in time for the Fizz, Boom, Bang! Science show, the pre-kickoff to the Summer Reading Program at the library. The show was, according to my kids, really very boring and the hoops one must jump through to win a reading prize at the end of the summer seem excessive but we did have lunch at the library, outside, in the atrium, which was quite beautiful and you know, it was lunch and my kids love (love) lunch. 

They also pretended to read books in the children's section so I would take their picture. 

Father's Day was somewhat uneventful but we like it that way. We swam, but not in our own pool but that's mostly because our house didnt come with one. 

We did take a trip to Lowes so we could get all this: 

My friends, what you see here are your Pinterest dollars at work:
Is it a car wash? A sprinkler? Who cares! The kids have been playing for hours.  

Josh and the kids did an amazing job. I wasn't even home; I was at the dollar store getting pool noodles and sponges because what's a car wash without sponges and you know, styrafoam noodles? 

Very wet fun was had by all. 

Yesterday we tried a kiddie yoga class for the first time. 

We arrived and the eye-rolling started from the two older ones. They didn't want to choose a mat, they didn't want to rub the peace stones or do anything bendy. Until they did. And all of a sudden, they loved it. They laughed, they smiled, they were a tree. And then, at the end, they lay so still, it was a wonder to behold. I've never seen my children, especially my number 2 child, be still. 

We got back to the car and I asked who felt relaxed, who felt calm. They showed me small smiles, almost sheepish. They were so chilled out and because of that chillness, a whole conversation about trying something new and giving things a chance ensued. Maybe I need to give things a chance too, like blogging again. Maybe because we have come a decision about the issues I mentioned a month ago, and I feel a hundred times calmer and have placed it all in Hashem's hands, maybe I can try blogging again. Just more quietly. 

I'll let you know. 

:)
Jen