Sunshine and Summer Days

School ends and the kids think it is the greatest time of the year.  Dave and I both are not so much fans of the heat, but we do try to dab the sweat and jump into the fun.

Katelee kicked off summer with the first summer camp- FSY with her buddy Rian.  She and Rian stayed for a week at the University of Utah in dorms and had a fab time.  

Katelee said she and Rian were a little unsure how about how the week would go when they realized they were the older peeps of the group (especially when it came to the boys) but never fear, they were able to meet some fellas from other groups and came to appreciate the youngins' in theirs.   

They have already connected with some of the boys they met there and one even picked Katelee up on evening.  She had been asking if we were going to be around that summer evening  and we told her we would be, but she was acting slightly odd.  I had a church function in the backyard and Dave was out shooting hoops with the younger two and cleaning up the yard a bit.  A car pulled up and a teen boy got out and walked up to Dave and shook his hand just as Katelee came out of the house and got in the dude's car.  The two drove off and Dave turned to our neighbor who was also enjoying the summer night and Dave exclaimed, "what just happened? Did Katelee just go on a date?"  Our neighbor, who has been through a couple teens already just busted up and assured Dave that was indeed what had happened.  Katelee came home and as we were teasing her, she explained that they met up with some other FSY friends...but after some digging, we did discover that Jack (the hand shaker) drove the two of them and paid for her dinner and movie.  haha!  Sounds like a sneaky (and fun) first date!  So, FSY would be considered a success in the connections Katelee made.  Ha!

Grant did not get to start out his summer with as much fun as he had a tonsillectomy.  Those throat lumps have been causing issues for years- sore throats a plenty and snoring since a toddler.  The kid's neck and throat have been sliced through a bunch this last six months so why not some more?  

  

But really, we were concerned that Grant's throat had some permanent damage from the breathing tube from the broken neck surgery so this was also to test his voice after the tonsils were removed.  He shouldn't need vocal therapy at this time, but we will keep an eye on it.  Tonsil removal is no joke and Grant did not enjoy it, but he's a trooper and sucked up the painful first days of summer.  

Brenna and her friend Sami went to Hogwarts for a day, 

we kicked off kids bowl free at the local bowling alley

and these three water lovers started using their season passes at the water park.  I opted out of that, but pruney fingers, sunburns and swimsuits don't stress them out.  

It was a Christmas gift and I think they will definitely enjoy this gift all summer.  We also gave my parents a Christmas gift that had been held onto until summer- a magic show with dinner.  It was so fun!  They were uber impressed and while my dad was adamant he would not participate, when the magician asked for him to help out with a response, he answered like the woman was his best buddy.  

It was an excellent celebration as was this guy's birthday!!

He is the hardest worker and we appreciate him so much.  

While we don't have all the crazy busy activities spring demands, we still had a few soccer games for Harrison and a new lacrosse summer team for Katelee.  Mostly we have enjoyed that the majority of the tournaments are held in Park City, so that's a respite from the heat down here below.

Brenna keeps up with dance, of course year round.  She offered her first neighborhood dance camp to earn money and it was a big hit.  

She had the girls come each day to learn a routine for a different style each day (ballet, hip hop, jazz and contemporary) then they performed it at our church building.  It was so cute! Brenna made a big dance move after about 8 years at Rocky Mountain dance.  We felt like it was time to go to a different studio.  It was a pretty strong feeling but really scary for Brenna.  She has had a few classes at her new studio- she was so anxious to start but all is well so far! 

July always starts off with a bang (of course!) but our city decided to not to fireworks on the 4th. The parade was still the night before the fireworks, so we hit that up with our peeps.   

 While we were disappointed to not have our regular holiday tradition, it meant that we got to see the show with our cousins and friends on the 2nd

and then go to the BEES baseball game on July 4th- which turned out to be SO fun! Shannon and Paige still came with us.  Grant didn't come to the city fireworks with the fam but he and Katelee were with us for the baseball game.  And he was thrilled, as you can tell in this picture.  Katelee was thrilled because she got a visit from her friend Jack from FSY at the game (see description of Jack in paragraphs above ;)  

The following week, Katelee, Brenna and I got to go to GIRL's CAMP!  Wahoo! It really was so great having both my girls there.

We were all princesses and wore crowns the entire camp.  There was lots of camp drama- someone covered in spots, cow pies, fights between one of our leaders and the camp host, chasing girls down in the middle of the night, scaring campers in their tents, some contraband items, a camp host displaying a gun, anxiety, etc...

BUT, there was also TONS of laughing, bonding, dancing, zip-lining, singing, stories, testimonies and friendship.  I am super grateful I get to spend time with the awesome girls in our church group and especially my two little princesses.  They are absolute queens.

May the Force Be with Us

We always need some extra force when April/May roll around.  Wrapping up a school year and fitting in all the activities is crazy!  Brenna had dance comps and recitals and solo performances and it is exhausting, but she loves it.  We are looking into trying a different studio next year so all these final performances with Rocky Mountain have been a bit emotional.  

We do love seeing the people perform and enjoy all their sports.  Harrison continues to be our sports enthusiast and spends all his extra time drawing/designing uniforms and logos.  He has been playing basketball at recess and comes home to tell us how each game goes.  He came home upset the other day and when reporting the recess game, he relayed that he he was swatting the ball away from people trying to shoot.  He was very adamant about how that is perfectly legal and everyone else was able to block the shot and swat, but no one would let Harrison because he's just too good.  He collapsed into tears while telling the story and exclaimed "curse my basketball skills!"

Katelee had tears of JOY when she got to join the lacrosse season for the last few weeks after sitting out with her broken wrist.  

She had such a fun time and can't wait to play next year...hopefully the entire season! She was filled with even more excitement when she passed her driving permit test!!  Are we ready to train another driver??

  Not my fav part of parenting, but alas, she is thrilled.  These kids are growing up and are hardly recognizable to me.  I still picture them as little babes but here they are driving and dancing and dating and being shot down because they are just so skilled.  hahaha  

I did want to be unrecognizable at a recent youth activity.  We took our youth group to the mall and they had to play Where's Waldo with some of the adults in the neighborhood.  My friend has wigs and costumes galore, so she made me a blonde

I walked right by so many of the teens and they had no idea it was me.  It was on May 4th so one of the adults felt like her disguise needed to be Star Wars themed...which was perfect but pretty easy to spot!  

I loved coming home even more because Dave and Harrison had to do double takes.  They didn't even know what had happened that night and didn't realize I was incognito.  They didn't approached me cautiously, even in our home, unsure if I was indeed Kara McArthur.  It was so funny.  

Our annual Petrick Family Memorial Day extravaganza was a rain out.  It rarely happens that we can't go to the park and do all our outside activities, but we made do and played Jack Box games with Rachel and Toren's device and played with their new babe Forrest.  The kids had a great time loving on their new cousin, as is apparent by Harrison's face in this pic...although I think they were making Forrest have ridiculous faces on Snap filters, but still it was with love.  

End of May-end of school for some of these guys.  It was a big end of school for Miss Brenna.  She graduated elementary and is ready to hit the pits of despair in middle school.  Just kidding, some people love those junior high years, here's to hoping Brenna is one of them! 

We snapped a couple pics of her with her friends at their clap out...which wasn't really the last day of school, so that was slightly weird.  They didn't actually end until June, but it was still momentous.  

Every school year we take a deep breath and fall on to the couch (or floor) thinking 'we did it!'  Then, we realize there is so much ahead and a summer full of days to keep them all busy.  I know we aren't alone in this journey, but I will definitely admit I need more than the force with me!  I need God's help and often a good Diet Dr Pepper!

 

Symphony of the Seas

A couple of years ago, we had decided to go on a cruise with our kids for a family vacation.  The year we purchased the cruise was 2020...then there was this global pandemic "incident" that shut down life for quite some time and a cruise was the last place you wanted to be.  It wasn't even possible for much of the time since covid exploded.  With the health of the earth looking up and the industry opening again, we thought we'd chance it and book our cruise for Spring Break this year.  We gave the trip to the kids as a gift at Christmas so we were anxiously awaiting April to come!

We had to get swabbed and receive a negative Covid test before we could board the boat.  We were so nervous because a neighbor had a little niece get a false positive before their cruise while checking in and their entire party was unable to set food on the ship.  We were determined to sail- so we found our lab, did some precautionary nostril cleansing and all tested negative!  We had to stop by the lab that did our paperwork because we thought we were missing some information and didn't want that to hold us up, so we were rushing it at the airport.  When we were unloading from our shuttle at the car park, we asked Harrison where his bag was and realized...we never even packed it in the car.  It was still at our house.  Oh snap.  We were already running a bit behind, there was no way we could go back.  Our rockstar neighbor, Susan, broke in our house and zipped that luggage to Dave with minutes to spare.  And we were off!  It was a hectic time followed by mixed up airline seats, hour plus wait at the car rental, but finally we were ready to set sail. Wahoo!  Anchors away!

The staff wore masks but we were only asked to wear them when checking in.  We booked this cruise just planning on chillin with our little family, but our neighbor friends, the Hepplers had booked the same cruise!  They have kids one year older than each of our oldest three, so they spent a lot of time with their buddies.  We met up with them as soon as we got on the boat and explored together.  

This ship was incredible.  I took every opportunity to do any latin dance class and got Harrison up there with me a bit.  I was cha-cha- cha-ing every night away.  

The kids loved the Flow Rider and Katelee even surfed with her broken wrist...unauthorized by me. 

 She just couldn't pass it up.  Grant decided his neck wasn't ready for that after a fall that caused some pain, so I was happy he opted for other activities-which there were plenty!!

There was a teen club and Grant as well as Katelee especially loved that.  They met a lot of friends from all over the world and spent time getting to know them with Cameron and Hailey Heppler.  Brenna was on the young end of that so she and Harrison spent more time with us, which we loved.  The pool deck had a splash pad, water slides, pools and all the fun for water loving folks.  I loved to see the kids (Brenna in the first pic) go down the slide and wave and then continue reading my book.  Haha! We camped out at a spot right under the 'toilet bowl' slide and it gave me the necessary shade I require.  

There was a mix of weather with some rain and some sunny days.  They took advantage of the sun whenever they could. 

While I personally didn't get on these water slides, I heard they were great.  I preferred the slide you had a mat to sit on that took you down the side of the ship- the Ultimate Abyss.  

Brenna kept pronouncing it Ab-iss, so now I have to make sure I get that first syllable emphasized her way.  

I was so fast some of the the rides, the lights and music didn't even turn on.  I guess I'm pretty much a professional Ultimate Ab-iss rider.  I give the Ultimate Abyss 2 enthusiastic thumbs up. 

The evenings were spent every night together in the main dining room.  We had the best waiter, Steven, from India.  He remembered everyone's names, our preferences and kept us full and happy.  Grant went for escargot the very first night, I mean we don't usually have restaurants around here that offer the buttery slimy goodness.  He said they were fine, I thought they were great.  No one else was quite as daring.  

We got dressed up for our formal night  dinner and then everyone quickly changed to more comfortable apparel.  But we looked snazzy for a hot second.  

After our dinner meal we would go see a show (sometimes all together, sometimes we'd run into the teenagers as they popped around), or participate in a game show like Family Feud...

I can't remember who won this challenge, but I don't think we were ever super stars.  The kids were great at karaoke.  

I was walking through the promenade one night and thought a voice sounded familiar and sure enough it was Brenna and a couple gals belting T-Swift.  There was constant entertainment and thank heavens there was a Royal Caribbean app so I could make sure my people were still on the boat when I hadn't seen them for awhile.  

Grant refused to attend a second ice skating show after we forced him to go with us to the first one, but we did get him and Katelee to the comedian and a singer.  The musical was slightly painful, so I didn't blame them when they begged to sneak out and meet up with other cool cats.  But what's not cool about this?

The best show was the water show, I think that was unanimously agreed to by each McArthur.  So, yay, we had one consensus there.  

Katelee, Brenna and Harrison all did the little zip line that took you across the middle of the boat.  Harrison looked like he was  hanging on for dear life,

 the girls thought it was hardly exciting.   There really were just so many activities and events offered and ones we participated in, I can hardly cover it.

Climbing, games, arcades, scattergories, hunts, shows, movies, kids club, merry go round, mini golf  and lots and lots and lots of slices of pizza, ice cream cones and tacos.  

  We were sailing over Easter, so I got up and went to the church service.  No one else in the fam wanted to attend Mass with me, but I wanted to think about Jesus on his day and appreciated others on the ship that did as well.  I bumbled through the words, but my heart was in it.   It was a great service and I maybe got holy water shot into my eye, but  I'm sure I need a new vision...I was just getting some help from the priest.  

Besides the days at sea and time on the boat, 

we got to experience some cool excursions.  We rode horses in St Martin.  These were some skinny little horses, so Dave didn't ride one.  He spent the time taking our photos and apparently talking a native into driving him to the grocery store.  Our friends came to the tour after us and thought Dave was being absconded.  Luckily he was brought back to us and had some local goods for us to sample. 

Everyone got along well with their ponies 

even if Brenna looked like it hurt in every single picture.  We took a loop around the hills and then ended up walking through the water.  

Once they hit the ocean, the horses just let everything out of their bowels, so there was floating feces all over.  The guide told us its just nature and not to worry, but I was still trying to avoid the poops as much as possible.  

Grant donned his tank tops the entire week and you can see his skin progressively getting more red and damaged as the days went on.  By the time we got home, he was completely scabbed and blistered.  But he still did not cover up- gotta let those guns out no matter the burn I guess.  These four give 5 stars to horses in the Carribbean.

Our second tour was a snorkel in St Thomas.  That was a lot of fun!  It took some serious coaxing to get Harrison in the water but he did it and some of us even saw turtles.  Yay for that!

The catamaran ride was quite a thrill watching the Londoners Katelee and Grant made friends with get pretty crazy.  It must have been too much for Harrison because we looked over and saw him in this position:

The dude was totally zen.  Dave snapped a pic and a gentleman from Ireland asked me who taught Harrison to meditate like that. The Irish man said he teaches meditation and yoga as a profession and was impressed with how "grounded" Harrison was.  Really though, can't get much more calming than boating through tropical ocean waves.  

The final port was on Royal Caribbean's little water park island called Coco Cay.  Grant took the 2 younger kids to the water park 

and Grant and Katelee hit it up with their friends.  I spent the morning solo and getting a massage at the spa on the boat.  I'm not sure if that masseuse knew I wanted a massage and not a beating, because I ended up pretty bruised.   But hey, at least I got some alone time.  It poured for a bit once they got on the island, but they still got plenty of time to play and came back happy.  

That was our last stop before disembarking the next morning.  We said goodbye to all the awesome staff that made our vacation exceptional. 

Harrison came home with some impressive magic tricks with their help, Grant had a gnarly burn that scabbed and blistered, Brenna and Katelee both had corn rolls in their hair and I had came back with quite a few more pounds.  

Before we flew home, we went on a swamp tour of the everglades.  

There were gators all over the place.  It was creepy and fascinating.  

Katelee had the best gator vision and spotted a tiny baby in the trees near the shore. 

 Her phone was even borrowed for a gator show so she will always have memories of a giant reptile almost eating her beloved device.  

Reflecting back on the trip, I would say it was unforgettable! So much to do, so much to eat, so much to take in.  The goal was to make memories so that mission was accomplished.