#coeurdgarvin

For our first family night of the summer, we all sat in a circle, and one by one, the kids added to our Summer Bucket List. Their eyes lit up, and their sweet little imaginations produced this:

Play tic tac toe
Sleepover with Maria
Beach day once a week
Soccer ball at park
Play a Mila's house
Take Charlie to the dog park
Library day once a week
Swim at Nana's house
Sleepover at Popi's house
Bubble bath
Family walks with Charlie
Go on a walk with Marianne and Charlie
Root beer float night
Sleep in a fort
Camp in the backyard with s'mores
Balboa Park
Family Movie Date
Costco hot dogs and cookers
Play with Mila at the park
Go to Auntie Tarynie's new house

This summer, the kids woke up, did their chores, and we set out to knock one thing off our list. It's hard to say which item was my most favorite to knock off... for the bubble bath, I bought Crayola bath finger paint, and each kid had their own color. Four naked babies, laughing, painting, and covered from head to toe in mountains of colorful bubbles, was just about as cute as you can imagine. At the library, the kids picked more books than they could carry. Henry is currently obsessed with dinosaurs, Elle will forever love horses, and London is mostly drawn to Science books. We left each week with a stack of  books like "Meet the T-Rex", "Prehistoric Dinosaurs", "Velociraptors", "My First Horse", "A Guide to Horses", "What Causes Asthma", and "Great Migrations". The day we took Charlie to the dog park, he had an identity crisis. He thinks he's a combination small lap-dog/one of the twins, so he preferred all the people there to the actual dogs we were hoping he'd play with. I think my kids had more fun than Charlie did. "Charlie, is that a friend? Do you want to go play with him? It's okay, Charlie! Good boy!"

We went on two big road trips this summer. The first was to our niece Tayler's wedding in Portland, Oregon, and the second was to the Garvin Family Reunion in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho.


In Portland, we went berry picking with all the kid's cousins and their cousin's cousins. There were so many kids, they asked if they could take a picture of our group to put on their Facebook page! We picked 54 lbs of blueberries, 27 lbs of blackberries, 11 lbs of boysenberries, and ate our way through these stupid-good melt-in-your-mouth tayberries. We took the kids to Powell's Book store, a fountain in the Pearl District, ate ice cream at Cool Moon, and had a water balloon fight. The wedding itself was picture-perfect, complete with Tayler and Joel's black labs as the ring bearers. Henry danced the night away with one of the bridesmaids, and I captured Kyle twirling our little princess, Juliette

This is Henry's favorite person: his cousin, Roman. "Mom, he's a boy, like me!
 And he is my bruh-ver! And we is friends!"

London wanted to buy this for dad.

Two weeks later, it was time for the Garvin Family Reunion in Coeur d'Alene. We planned to stop in Yellowstone on the drive up, to knock another National Park off of my family list, and then spend the whole week together. Two days before this great, big adventure, Kyle's boss asked him not to go. PEOPLE. This was OUR turn to be in charge of the reunion. That means an entire year of planning on my part- from the location to the venue to the activities to the meal planning-- not to mention the fact that our kids only get to see their cousins once or twice a year, and they had been talking about this reunion since the one last year. But what do you do when your husband seriously loves his job, they really need him there, and you can't exactly drive across the country with 4 small children by yourself?

You cry.

When Kyle's siblings heard the news, they came to our rescue, and although it was INSANE, me and the kids made it all the way to Northern Idaho. How, you ask? First, we had to cancel the Yellowstone trip. Kyle drove up to Spokane with us, and then flew directly home at 4 am, the morning before the reunion started. And on the drive back home, I caravan'd with his sister and her family to the bay area, and drove the rest of the way to San Diego by myself. In total, 51 hours of driving time. ohmygosh it was tiring- but you know what? All the craziness made me feel welcome in a way words can't describe. I'm only disappointed that Kyle had to miss it!

Coeur d'Alene is just so beautiful. We had activities planned for each day: swimming, boating, tubing, hiking, school-clothes shopping, and we ran out of time and energy every day to check all of them off my list!

Our last evening was the talent show, where each person in the family performs. I have to tell you, that evening was magic--and not because Garvins are naturally talented and seriously musical, but because we really, genuinely love each other. As I gazed around the room, it wasn't Kyle's family that I saw...it was mine.