summer fun (or where I've been)

It's been quite a while since I posted anything!

When I started this blog, it was partly because I no longer posted at my kids eat off the floor. I thought a fresh start with a new format and new ideas would help.

I'm hoping that once school starts in two weeks I will get back on track!

Let me tell you about some of the fun things we've done this summer!

Park passports: We've visited four parks and two splash pads that aren't our usual go-to neighborhood park. The girls dutifully fill in their park passports after each visit!

Science: We've burst a watermelon using rubber bands, attempted a Rube Goldberg machine (it failed), melted a giant ice cube to get to rubber sea creatures, blown up a balloon with baking soda, made a doodlebot, built and destroyed a dam in our neighborhood park creek...

Field trips: One of my favorite things about summer is that it gives us the opportunity to go to all the many fun places in our area that we can't get to during the school year. This year we've gone to: the fairy forest, the SLC library, Hill Air Force Base museum, Pioneer Quarry Trail, Great Salt Lake Shoreline preserve in Layton, the farmer's market, movie in the park, hiking several times, the pioneer museum in Provo...

Vacations:  We've been totally spoiled this summer, with 10 days in Tennessee, four days in Washington DC, a weekend in Idaho Falls, and a weekend at our family cabin. 

We have two more weeks of summer and we're going to try to cram as much fun into it as we can!

Outdoor living (teenage survival plan part 1)

I might have a few years before I have to worry about teenagers hanging out at our house, but since we don't have a basement to shoo them down into, I'm already making a plan.

Part 1 is a totally awesome, inviting backyard. Here in Utah we can use the backyard pretty much 9 months of the year. We've created a really fun outdoor living space on our back deck and are working on our firepit area, too.

We have liked loved adored our more comfortable, functional deck this summer. I fell in love with the idea of a pergola earlier in the spring, but then I realized that what I really wanted was lights strung up on the deck. 

2 10-ft copper pipes, cut to 8-ft lengths (the guy at Home Depot just opened up a pipe cutting tool and cut them for me free of charge)

2 small hooks

2 copper pipe caps

4 copper brackets that fit your pipe and 8 screws

Couldn't be easier! Drill a small hole about 6 inches from the top of your pipe and screw in the hook. Slide the cap onto the end of your pipe. Drill holes through the brackets and screw into place (yes, there are now holes in my vinyl deck railing. I don't care. I will not be taking these lights down!) String lights and enjoy!

I bought some plastic globe lights from Target.com (Glass ones break so easily and we get wicked east winds on our street). The string of lights + all the copper hardware only cost $30 total.

The lights are strung over just half of the deck, over our seating area. We've had all this furniture for years, but I moved some pillows from our inside couch to our swing bench. I put the pillow forms into plastic garbage bags and then zipped them back up in the pillow covers. The swing bench folds flat into a futon and Jason and I have been known to pile pillows and blankets on it and bring the computer out to watch movies under the stars. I found the outdoor mat for just $5 and I love how it helps define this space!

On the other side of the deck is our table and chairs. We've never had an outdoor dining set, but I found this one on a Facebook yard sale group. It was such a great deal! The umbrella is huge and covers half the deck. It's the perfect place to sit and enjoy a nice cold glass of fresh lemonade together.

These doors used to be white, but I noticed the wood along the bottom under the jamb was in danger of rotting, so I decided to paint the doors. First I tried black, but it was terrible, then I tried a gray that was even worse, and I finally settled on this gray (Intellectual by Behr). Funny story, I spent so much energy painting and repainting that I never got around to sanding or painting the wood that is actually rotting. Great!!!!

And I love my boxwood wreath and A!

So, until my girls start inviting their friends over on the weekends, Jason and I have been enjoying the deck pretty much every evening. How are you enjoying summer?

FREE printable park passport!

hello from beautiful Franklin, Tennessee!

I was crazy enough to fly from Utah to Tennessee ALONE with my four children this week. It went pretty well (minus the literal sprint from one terminal to another to make our connecting flight, which had finished boarding before we even landed. We did make it, though). Now we are enjoying swimming in the neighborhood pool every day and catching fireflies every evening with Grandma Lisa and Grandpa K.

It's a pretty magical place!

If you follow me on Instagram, you might remember me sharing this picture of our park passports a few weeks ago. 

We broke them out last week for our first official park day of the summer and even brought them to Tennessee so the girls can review any parks we go to here.  Last night we hit up a fun local park called Pinkerton Park (more commonly known to the locals as Tinkerbell Park).

The playground is an old fashioned wooden one, similar to Castle Park, one of our favorite parks back in Utah.

This park is decorated with rainbow turrets, Peter Pan, and Tinkerbell.

There's also lots of fun musical playground equipment!

Around the perimeter of the park is a walking trail with exercise equipment. This beautiful bridge crosses the river, the perfect place to stop and throw rocks in the water below.

If you want to download your own park passport, head on over to The Salt Project for my guest post and FREE download!

Friday field trip: giant book mural in SLC

I've designated Friday as our field trip day this summer. We kicked our summer field trips off with a quick little trip to downtown Salt Lake to see the giant book mural.

This is one of the coolest hidden gems in SLC. The kids ran right over to start exploring the different books. Most of the books are adult books (Gone with the Wind, The Scarlet Letter, The Grapes of Wrath, On the Road), but there are a few children's books represented as well (Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, Winnie the Pooh, The Wizard of Oz).

The mural is on one of the walls in a little courtyard tucked between a few office buildings and a parking garage. There's plenty of shade and it's off the beaten path so not too many people see it.

Isn't this a sweet picture?! 

Unfortunately, as soon as we started lining the kids up to take pictures, a security guard came out to tell us NO PICTURES ALLOWED! Sad, huh? I guess the mural is on the wall of one building, but the courtyard is owned by a different building. Luckily we had already taken a few!

To find the giant book mural: go to 222 S Main St, Salt Lake City. There is an alley directly south of this building--go through the alley and the mural is in the courtyard at the end of the alley.

Welcome summer!

Hello summer!

I am having so much fun planning summer activities for my kids, transforming our backyard into the perfect summer hangout, and making salad for dinner basically every night.

Oh, and drinking lemonade. Lots and lots of lemonade.

If you're like me and you love good fresh lemonade (not the powdered stuff!!) then this post is for you!

I have the easiest, most satisfying fresh lemonade recipe to share. I've seen similar recipes floating around Pinterest, but here's my take on it.

1. Quarter six lemons and add to a blender with 1 1/2 cups sugar and 10 cups cold water. Yes, you're adding the lemons quarters whole--no peeling or juicing required! You'll probably have to do this in two batches--my Ninja jar was just slightly too small. Blend for about 30 seconds.

2.  Press the mixture with a wooden spoon through a very fine mesh sieve to strain out all the bits of pulp and peel.

3. Enjoy--preferably on your back deck or patio and from a mason jar! I drank mine while planning my two week menu with my favorite magazine, Cooking Light. 

This is the perfect lemonade to make big batches of and keep in the fridge for all those summer times that you just have to have a glass of lemonade--it's also great for lemonade stands!

I'm glad I made this the SUMMER OF THE BACKYARD because it is coming together really nicely. I can't wait to show you our back deck (or as I like to call it, our outdoor living room), our soon-to-be expanded treehouse, and our new fire pit!

SOS

I have deemed this the summer of the backyard and I'm finally tackling all the little projects in the backyard that never get done because no one sees it. 

Yay!

Most of them are fun!

Here's one that is not!

I desperately needed to paint the back doors leading from the kitchen to the deck because the wood was starting to rot in places. They were white, but I saw a picture on Pinterest of a house with tan siding and black exterior french doors. I loved the look, so I decided to do that!

But after two coats of glossy black paint, I decided I was wrong wrong wrong. It was like looking into a pit of despair. Or like the Nothing from Never Ending Story.

So then I decided gray would be better. But THIS IS WORSE THAN THE BLACK!! I chose a very blue gray (gray is hard). This is definitely not working. I have one more darker, more grayer gray to try (close to charcoal). If that doesn't work, I need your help--

Should I go back to white? Or should I try to find a good red for the doors? If it makes a difference, everything on the deck is very warm tones.

summer of reading: bingo cards

It's no secret that we are a family of readers. I definitely don't have to do much coaxing to get my kids to read/be read to.  

BUT I love making our summers extra special, and one thing that we do every summer is participate in several summer reading programs.

One of our favorites is the Barnes and Noble program. Stop in at any store and pick up a reading journal (or print one here). After you read any 8 books, you can turn it in and choose a FREE book from their summer reading selection.

Pottery Barn has a similar program, although you have to complete one of their reading lists to receive a free book.

But my favorite summer reading programs are the ones we do ourselves!

This is the fourth summer that we will be hosting a kids' book club for the kids in our neighborhood/area. It's so fun to get kids together, having fun exploring and reading! I will be posting more details about this year's Bookworms events soon. We're doing it a little differently this year, and I'm excited to share my ideas!

Every day we make time in our schedule for reading, both individually and as a family. While Tempe will flop down with a book anywhere, any time, Helena requires a little bit more persuasion. Once she is reading, she loves it, but it's not something she will think to do on her own.

This bingo chart is great for that, because it gets her out of her comfort zone!

They must read for 20 minutes to pass off a square (they don't have to do what that square says for the whole 20 minutes, though) and at the end of the summer, if they have blacked out their whole card, they get a small prize at our back-to-school family dinner. I make sure that everyone gets their card blacked out, because I want reading to be something that we do as a family and something that they feel is an accomplishment. 

Feel free to print my bingo card (or create your own!) to get your kids reading this summer!

More summer reading activities and ideas coming soon!

Please share if you have any fun things you do to encourage reading, creativity, and learning through play during the summers!