Summer in Vermillion

Oh, what do you do in the summertime?

Other than avoiding doing the dishes and listening to Owen keep himself awake by counting (Vun! Two! Fee! Foh! Fi! See! Veven! Ey! Ni! Den! Beben! Eh! Ni! Den!), we've stayed pretty busy so far this summer.

Camille is enjoying her Little Explorers class. I'm also enjoying her being at Little Explorers. It doesn't seem to run very smoothly, but I can't expect much from a program that costs $80 for three hours a day, four days a week, and runs for nine weeks.

Camille is also enjoying swimming lessons. They were also a bargain--$15 for 8 lessons. She is the youngest and smallest in all of her classes because she just barely turned four.

We have also been going to the free lunch program at the elementary school. They give free school lunch to anyone under 18, M-F through the end of July. I also found out today that they leave trays of day old bread and buns at the door for anyone to take. It's always white bread, but hey, it's free.

The library had a huge summer reading program kickoff  that involved popsicles, and a bouncy house, and a cardboard box maze, and a little ball pit. They also do free weekly movies at the little movie theater over the summer, but we probably won't go to that because it's during Owen's nap time.

A lady in the branch put together an "adventure club" where moms take turns leading a field trip to some nearby locale. We skipped out on the splash pad last week because Owen was just getting over his barfiness and it was thundering. I am planning on taking the kids to tour the recycling center this week. Super exciting stuff. I still need to think up what adventure I should be in charge of.

I'm starting to see the same people at a lot of these things, so it's also a good way to get to know some other families. All the members always go to these things, so it's been nice to get to know them outside of church and nice for the kids to make friends with them outside of church.

It has also made me really happy that for most of these things (library, pool, free lunch) we can walk or bike. Lots of other people walk or bike, too. The bike rack at the library was overflowing with kids' bikes this week, and I've seen lots of people using bike seats and trailers to transport kids, which I never saw in Provo.

I'm loving the summer here, except for the excess of mosquitoes and the fact that it is going to be super hot for the next two weeks. I thought I was getting away from that by moving to South Dakota.

I spotted these free desks on the side of the road when I was out running yesterday. Last night I wished I had gotten them, so I made Brian go see if they were still there. They were! I know our kids aren't going to be desk age for a little while, but I can't pass up free good-quality desks.