Hello!
Summer is slipping through our fingers. July is more than halfway done and and the kids go back to school one month from tomorrow. I will admit that at this current time, this makes me more sad than happy! August 17th is way too early to go back to school in my opinion. Wah, wah, wah. But, we will keep making the most of it, which clearly, we have been doing because I am once again two weeks behind in writing. I am going to work backwards, so here are our highlights from this last week.
*Richard has actually been around! When we got back from our trip to Island Park in June, he worked 12 straight days, had two days off, and then worked another stretch of 12 days. It was intense and exhausting for everyone, but especially him. This last week he had Saturday-Wednesday off, worked Thursday, and then only worked 12:00 pm-5:00 pm on Friday. It was AMAZING. We all loved having him home, available, and so present with us. So three cheers for a breather from work! He was able to take Marshall up to his soccer scrimmage in Clearfield on Monday evening, which proved to be an intense game, but Marshall's team came out with the win. On Tuesday he took Gretchen on her summer date. They had a great time going to Hug-Hes for lunch (Gretchen LOVES their bread) and then Target so she could pick out a new backpack for school. (Yes, we are already doing school shopping and I like it and hate it at the same time!) Weeks ago, we bought a foosball table to put in the loft after my massive loft purge the end of May. It has been sitting in a box in the garage for weeks, and on Tuesday evening Richard and Marshall put it together. Marshall was actually incredibly helpful-yay! We have been spending lots of time playing foosball since then. In true Marshall fashion, he has looked up the official rules of the game and holds us all to it. Marshall and I have played multiple times together and even though I have been leading at times, he always wins in the end...until last night! I scored 7 times on him before he scored his first point and then I went onto win 10-1! Victory! I could not believe it...hence I am writing about it...preserved for posterity forever! Marshall has also had a couple of friends over this week and has had fun playing foosball with them. Friday evening, when Richard was done with work, we went on a double date with our friends, Kara and Dan Sonntag. We had a great evening with them and went up to Ogden for some great burgers at Warrens Craft Burger and then we went to Farr's for ice cream. Such a fun night.
*Bridget and her best life. Bridget has had a phenomenal week. On Monday and Tuesday morning she helped at "Horse Camp". The place she does riding lessons at is doing summer camps for young kids and her teacher is using the older kids she teaches as junior counselors. Bridget was able to help for two mornings this week and loved it. The camps are from 9:00-12:00, so it is a good chunk of time. Monday night and Saturday night she worked at the farm with Cambria. And those two girls talked me into a late night at our house Monday after the farm. They are little besties, that is for sure. Wednesday morning Bridget left for Girl's Camp! She was beyond excited. We helped her get all packed on Monday and Tuesday. I asked her Tuesday night if she was nervous at all (I was terrified for my first Girl's Camp, though I did not tell her this!) and she quickly answered that she wasn't nervous at all, just so excited, and that totally showed. We dropped all her gear off Tuesday evening and then I took her to our YW President's house to help assemble tin foil dinners and then they watched a movie. A fun little camp kick-off for them! They were to meet at the church at 9:00 am Wednesday morning, but she was ready to go by 8:00. She had packed her lunch, filled up her water bottle, and had put an old pillowcase on her pillow. :) I told her that I would be walking her to the church to say good-bye and she looked at me like I was crazy! Much to her dismay, her sisters walked with us as well. It's not that she didn't want us there, we just slowed her down a bit! She was so ready. When we got to the church we hugged her good-bye and I told her about a million times to put on sunscreen and then Rachel, Grizz, and I walked home. We picked her up at noon at the church yesterday and this might sound cheesy, but it gave me a small taste of what it might be like to pick up a missionary coming home. To be in a more public setting, with the church parking lot full of parents eagerly waiting for their girls to come home, and then cars pulling into the parking lot every few minutes loaded up with young women, but now knowing which car your child is in! Ah, it got me a bit emotional! We were so happy to see her finally get out of a car, in one piece, looking filthy and happy and carrying a huge bag of popcorn! Ha! Richard, Gretchen, Rachel and I were all there to pick her up and we were so happy to have her back. We spent some time at the church while all the girls worked to unload their gear. It was fun to see them working so well together and just by the looks of it, it sounds like they all had a great week. We have only heard some highlights from Bridget, but I know she will tell us more. Their first day they spent at a reservoir and she kayaked and swam and had so much fun. She was in a tent with two other girls and she had so much fun with them. They spent an afternoon doing archery and she loved that and wants to try it on a horse one day. They made bracelets, hiked to a mine, learned all the silly camp songs, helped with meal prep and clean up (which she and her friends loved doing), and did an iron rod activity. She got thoughtful little gifts from her secret sister and also loved giving and surprising her secret sister. I would count it as a definite win and she was asleep on the couch by 3:00 pm yesterday afternoon.
*Swimming and tumbling for Rachel and Gretchen. These two girls had a week of swim lessons this last week. They both have teachers they had last year and are loving it. Rachel is terrified of treading water in the deep end, but she slowly added on time each day. She spent a lot of time working on dives and now she has a successful dive more than she does a belly flop! Gretchen, per the usual, is squishy and darling in her goggles and remains decently brave but also uncoordinated. She is hilarious to watch. When she runs and dances she looks pretty coordinated, but with swim lessons last year and this year, I am reminded that she was severely behind with gross motor skills as a baby and it seems to manifest in the pool. It is honestly completely endearing to me, and her teacher is so patient with her and I know one day she will get it down. When she is just focusing on her kicks or her arms for the front crawl, and stationary, she totally gets it, but as soon as the teacher moves her around or asks her to combine the arms and legs, it all goes crazy and it cracks me up. I just love her. Anyway, that has been fun to watch this last week. Also this week Rachel and Gretchen started a summer tumbling class at Project Move. It is just once a week for three weeks, so it is quick, but they loved being in class together and I am so grateful they get to do it. Rachel will keep doing tumbling in the fall and Gretchen is on the wait-list (fingers crossed), but they will not be in the same class anyway. So, fun week for them doing so much together!
*Cross country. Marshall isn't ready to admit it, but I think he is really starting to love cross country. This was the first week he was able to be at every single practice, and they practice Monday-Saturday at 6:30 am, so that is some dedication! He ran over 26 miles this week, and was happy to inform us about that stat yesterday. :) We are proud of him!
*Rachel's summer date. Even though Rachel and I pretty much had seven straight days of a date in San Diego, she and I went out for our annual summer date on Friday afternoon. In San Diego, I introduced her to the Old Spaghetti Factory and she loved it, so she wanted to go to the one here in Trolley Square. We had a fun lunch together and then went to Target to pick out her backpack for the upcoming school year. She was so fun to be with. She asked me so many questions and had the silliest comments for things. It was a delightful afternoon with her!
Okay, San Diego! I think I am going to break this week into three parts. First part...DANCE!
*Rachel had a dance rehearsal Sunday evening, competition for two dances and awards Monday morning/afternoon, master classes Tuesday afternoon, a rehearsal Wednesday evening, and competition and awards for her last routine Thursday evening. So dance, of some sort, every day for five days straight and she loved it. All three of her routines scored in the diamond category, which is the highest category point-wise to be in. Walk the Line and One Shoe Blues were scored in a category of over 30 dances and they only announced the top 10 scores and those two dances took 7th and 8th! I was so proud of those little dancers for scoring so high and placing so well! At the awards on Thursday night they said that to that point the judges had seen over 1400 dances! Sheesh! And there was still one full day left. My goodness. We stayed at the hotel where the competition was, so there were literally dancers everywhere, from all over the western United States. It was neat to see such a wide variety of dance and costumes and ethnicities and accents, even though we were just in California. Overall, it was a really great experience and I am so glad Rachel had this opportunity. I hope she gets to repeat it in two years!
*San Diego in general. Even though Rache. had a lot of dance going on, we still got to do some other really cool things. I had not been to San Diego since 2004, so it had been a long time, and we both basically fell in love with the city. We didn't rent a car, so with the exception of getting to and from the airport and Sea World, we walked everywhere. I was reminded that San Diego weather cannot be beat. My goodness, we were in heaven with temperatures in the low to mid 70s and almost a constant cool breeze coming off the water. Everywhere we walked was clean, well kept, and we felt safe and if it weren't for the cost of living, we could both totally move there. :) Our hotel was right next to Seaport Village, a darling little area right on the water with great restaurants and shops. We spent Monday afternoon there shopping, walking around and eating, it was delightful. Tuesday night was the 4th of July and we met up with Sara's family there to watch the fireworks. We were able to see three separate firework shows and it was so fun and also hard to know where to look because there were always fireworks exploding in the sky, it was quite the night! We went back to Seaport on Wednesday afternoon with most of her team to get an ice cream treat after the awards extravaganza. I got a delicious dole whip and Rachel got a churro sundae, which she is still talking about. It was such a fun little area. On the afternoon of the 4th we had a team lunch at the Cheesecake Factory, which was both fun and delicious. After that, Rachel and I met up with Sara's family again and toured the USS Midway. Lunch took quite a while and the girls had master classes to get back for, so we were only on the ship for one hour, and we easily could have spent three hours, so we had to rush it, but it was remarkable. So incredible and a really fun place to be on Indepence Day! I told Richard and Marshall the USS Midway is a must see! Wednesday morning Rachel slept until 10:30 am, so we scrapped any sort of adventure for the day and walked to a great restaurant for a very late brunch. Richard Walker's Pancake House was our best find on this trip and it was amazing. Thursday we tried a different restaurant for breakfast, also very good, and then we went to go see Six with two of Rachel's teammates and their moms. Six happened to be in San Diego for two weeks on tour and I could not believe it when I looked at tickets for a Thursday matinee on a Monday and there were so many open seats! We scored two seats right by one of Rachel's dance friends. I knew the storyline of Six, but we had not listened to a single song. Rachel and I loved it, and suffice it to say, Rachel and Gretchen are now listening to the soundtrack on repeat at home. :) Friday was our last day there and the only day we didn't have a dance schedule to work around so Rachel and I decided to visit Sea World! We had so much fun! We were there from 12:00 pm to 7:00 pm and had a great time. We saw the dolphin, orca and sea lion shows and had a blast. I insisted we get there 30 minutes early for each show because I wanted good seats! We sat in the soak zone for each one. We got a tiny bit wet with the dolphins, not wet at all with the sea lions, and completely soaked with the orcas. My word, those are HUGE animals and their splash packs quite a punch. We smelled so great afterward! Ha! But we both loved it. We also saw sting rays, sharks, flamingoes, and stood in a way too long line for a ride equivalent to Rattlesnake Rapids at Lagoon. Rachel was beat by the time we were done with that ride, and the sun was starting to set, so we called it a day and took a Lyft back to the hotel. Rachel was exhausted and fell asleep before 8:30 that night and slept until 8:30 the next morning! She had had quite a week! Despite doing all of that, we did have a lot of downtime at the hotel. Rachel is a girl who likes and needs downtime, so even though I desperately missed our family, for that single reason I am glad it could just be the two of us on that trip. She called the shots and had plenty of time to rest and recharge. She found a show on Netflix and made it through almost every episode that week! Ha! I also liked it too, so it was a win-win! She and I played a lot of games and just genuinely enjoyed being together. I caught up on much needed sleep, read an entire book, and got caught up on some projects, so I also loved the downtime! It was a fun and memorable week for the two of us!
*At home. Despite Richard working every day I was gone, the kids survived and still had an excellent week. My parents picked them up Sunday afternoon and they spent the rest of the day playing games and eating dinner before they brought them back home. Marshall played with Johnny on Monday and Melanie came and picked up Bridget and Gretchen at 11:00 that morning. She fed them lunch, took them swimming at their neighbor's pool, did Bridget's hair in a cool wrapped braid, covered the farm with Bridget and Cambria, fed everyone dinner and brought them home at 10:00 pm! Winner of a day for sure for my girls. My parents picked them up the next morning for Centereville's first 4th of July parade in three years! I have actually heard mixed reviews on the parade, but I think they still had fun. Later that afternoon they went back to my parents' house for a BBQ and cousin time. That was a highlight for sure. They played fun games and got to meet brand new cousin, Miles, and just had the best time. My Mom was so kind to come pick them up the next morning again and drive them to Heber where they met Grandpa Bob at Dairy Keen before driving the rest of the way to Vernal. The kids had a great time in Veranl. Obviously, Bridget was in heaven. Marshall spent quite a bit of time on horses himself! They played fun games, went to the rodeo, which Marshall found most impressive, watched movies and just enjoyed time with grandparents. And Ziggy survived his first encounter with Sassy the cat...who proved to be just that...sassy! We were all reunited at the airport about 4:30 pm last Saturday and we were so happy to be back together!
So there you have it folks. Summer is alive and well in the Leake household. We have this week home together and then Marshall will be at some camp or another for the next three weeks with days at home only here and there. That will be odd! Here's hoping it gives him a little bump up in his maturity level. :)
We love each of you!
Love,
Richard, Jenny, Marshall, Bridget, Rachel, and Gretchen :)
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