Moody Gardens

Just before school started, our family took advantage of Daddy's Fridays off and spent a day together at Moody Gardens in Galveston. We had bought an annual membership there at the beginning of the summer and wanted to visit one more time while the Palm Beach water park was still open. We had a great visit! It certainly helped that, unlike our last visit in June, all of our kids were healthy this time! We tried to hit up all of the attractions that we hadn't yet seen. So, first we visited the Rainforest Pyramid. 

We loved the wide variety of colorful, exotic animals that we saw!

Adley was thrilled to see all the animals. She would point emphatically at them and often try to imitate their sounds.

We visited at a good time because we got to see two feeding times! The second lady came out and blew a whistle to signal to the birds that it was mealtime. Our kids loved seeing the birds from an extra close-up view.

Because the whole rainforest was enclosed in a large pyramid, there were few enclosures and only short walls. It was fun to have birds fly directly over our heads at times. We could really feel like we were a part of the rainforest!

The beginning and end of the rainforest had these rope-like vines hanging from the doorways. Jaden and Cody probably passed through the ropes at least 20 times. They both said this was their favorite part of the rainforest visit. Ha!

After our rainforest tour, we ate our sack lunch and then took a ride on the Colonel Paddlewheel Boat.

The boat is a replica of a true 1800s-era paddlewheel boat. Thankfully, they included the modern-day convenience of air conditioning!

The "cruise" was about 45-minutes long. We spent our time walking through the gift shop, viewing the sights of Galveston Bay....

exploring every inch of the boat (including getting a close-up look at the paddlewheel),

and eating some fun treats! We had been hoping to eat our lunch on the boat, but guests are not allowed to bring any of their own food or drink on the cruise, unfortunately. Our kids loved the chance to eat ice cream and shakes instead!

We spent the rest of our visit at the Palm Beach water park. It was easy to spend several hours here, and by this point of the day, we were all ready to cool off.

Jaden and Cody especially liked the lazy river and the wave pool (pictured below).

I didn't get pictures of Jaden and Cody going down the larger waterslides (which they loved!), but I did get a few shots of them enjoying the smaller slides in the section for younger kids.

These slides are designed so that parents can go with their little ones, so both Mommy and Daddy got to slide with Adley. She wanted to go over and over again!

After leaving Moody Gardens, we made one more stop in Galveston before heading home-- visiting the Rainforest Cafe for dinner. Not the best food in the world, but definitely a memorable experience for the kids. :)

What a great end-of-summer hurrah! :)

Summer Accomplishments

While our summer was largely full of relaxing play time, fun events, and various travels, the teacher in me also made sure that Jaden and Cody kept up some important learning too! Thankfully, the boys are like curious little sponges right now, so doing these extra activities didn't take too much coercing from Mommy! Here are a few of the boys' summertime accomplishments.

Tying Shoes

We tried learning this feat a couple times during the boys' kindergarten year but it was met some frustration, so we didn't push it. Thankfully, the skill clicked with both boys fairly quickly this summer! After proving that they could independently tie Mommy and Daddy's shoes, the boys got to go shoe shopping and pick out new shoes with laces. Jaden and Cody were SO proud of their new shoes and couldn't wait to wear them to school.

Reading

Nearly every day this summer, Cody and Jaden read an easy reader book aloud to either Daddy or Mommy to help strengthen their independent reading. They grew a lot as readers over the summer! Also, each day the boys listened as Mommy or Daddy read chapter books out loud to them. They listened to audiobooks anytime we were in the car too. Jaden and Cody absolutely LOVE listening to stories! They would always beg for "just ONE more chapter," and that is an offer that Mommy can rarely refuse. :) We kept a running list of all the books that we read for their school's summer reading challenge. We were so excited by the end of the summer when we realized that together we had read 100 chapter books!!

Writing

This next accomplishment was something that the boys jumped into all on their own. Both Jaden and Cody decided that they wanted to write and illustrate their own chapter book series. They worked so hard on these books and came up with some pretty fun, clever stories (in Mommy's totally unbiased opinion). Jaden wrote several stories about a boy named Peter. His stories were quite lengthy and his pictures were often very detailed too.

Cody definitely was an eager writer this summer! He wrote a TON of books! His longest series was a set of books about a character named Ninja Boy, who always ran into some bad guy/creature that he had to battle. I loved how each one of his books followed a similar plot pattern. Cody's drawings were always pretty clever too. I got a kick out of another one of Cody's series about the adventures of two phones named Google and "Ulexa." What a creative young man! :)

Playing Piano

 Early in the summer, I started giving piano lessons to Jaden and Cody and was surprised with their enthusiasm to learn. It probably helps that they've seen and heard quite a number of kids take lessons from Mommy over the years, and now it's finally their turn! Here are some samplings of their songs-- first from Jaden and then Cody.

August Misc

Once we returned home after our vacation, the boys' summer break was nearly over! We did squeeze in a few fun events before heading back to school, however. Here are a few of our miscellaneous activities from August:

Beauty and the Beast Play

We felt so honored when a family from church gave us a set of 4 free tickets to a theater production of Beauty and the Beast. Rather than find a babysitter for Adley, Jason had the great idea to let me take Jaden and Cody along with our niece Abby. We all had a fabulous time! The boys had never been to a play before, so we were excited for this first experience for them. We figured the Beauty and the Beast storyline would hold their interest well, and we were right! All three kids were captivated by the acting, singing, and amazing costumes. Each time they leaned over to tell me something, I thought for sure they'd ask when the play would be over (since it was over 2 hours long!), but they always had something to ask or tell me about the play itself. We were all very impressed with the show! 

After the show, every member of the cast came out to the lobby so the audience could meet them and take pictures with them. Cody loved the way Gaston moved his eyebrows so theatrically, and Abby was especially enamored with Belle's pretty dress. It was fun to see all the actors up close and talk with them personally!

Children's Museum

Our family still has an annual membership to this museum, so we love visiting whenever we can. I took all three kids on our last week of summer. Jaden and Cody spent most of their time creating and building, both with the Duplos and with these large blue blocks.

I love watching Adley explore the museum now that she understands so much more. She hopped around to nearly every exhibit but probably enjoyed the toddler-zone slide the most.

All three kids enjoyed playing at the fire station.

Our Little Comedians

I'm not sure what got them started on this kick, but Cody and Jaden both went on a joke-writing craze this month. Both boys filled up numerous pages full of jokes and asked if I could video them as they read samples of their jokes. Cody cracked me up as he read since he added his own laughter soundtrack after each joke. :) We loved hearing how both boys tried to make little plays on words in their punchlines. Not all their jokes made perfect sense to Mommy and Daddy, but the boys sure got a kick out of themselves!

Cody's Tooth

Shortly into the new school year, Cody lost his FIRST tooth! Just like Jaden, Cody had his permanent tooth already growing in behind this tooth (another shark tooth situation!), so we were ready to get this guy out. Cody was very brave as he let Mommy tug on his tooth one evening before bed. Since the tooth was so wiggly, it didn't take much effort at all. Cody was excited to use his Minions tooth pillow for the first time.