This year we have a seventh grader, fourth grader, second grader, & a preschooler. Now that the kids are all older, first day of school pics are getting pretty easy, in fact, the morning was eerily smooth! Slow down, time.

We went to Nana’s after our night at Great Wolf Lodge. We had a great time visiting and playing at the house. One afternoon we went downtown and had a picnic and saw some sights.

Here’s the rest of what we were up to in August:

After the rest of the kids learned Avery and I got to go to Great Wolf Lodge with the Lotts earlier in the summer they were begging us to take them too. It seemed cruel not to, but we decided to have some fun and make it a surprise.

As it happens, Great Wolf Lodge is half way to Nana’s house. So when the kids packed their bags for a long weekend at her house I packed an extra one with bathing suits and other swimming necessities. Half-way to Nana’s we exited the freeway and pulled in at Great Wolf, much to their delight and confusion. We explained we would still see Nana, we were just stopping here for a day on the way.

The kids had a blast. Avery enjoyed being the seasoned veteran, showing his siblings everything he’d told them about. We learned Silas is quite the little thrill seeker. He was completely unfazed by even the largest slide, the howling tornado, which Kieron was pretty leery of, but had to go on once his little bro came back bragging about how not scary it was! And Layla was just adventurous enough, doing one of the medium slides and all of the pools. We did a bit of swimming practice, which she couldn’t get enough of!

All in all, a successful trip. Happy kids and Jonathan and I had our fill for at least a year or two!

We spent a few days at cooling off at Lake Sammamish over the summer. Will have to come here more next year!