It's Summertime!

Summer has arrived. It's the season for sunshine, sunscreen, sweat, and swimming. We're off to a great start with out summer activities and have plans for lots more fun summer activities in the coming weeks!

Last weekend we went to the first annual Franklin Family Fishing tournament at the Franklin family farm in St. Mary. Carson caught the biggest fish in his age category, a bass weighing in at 1lb13oz, just 2 oz less than Carson weighed when he was born! He reeled it in with some help from Uncle Jim and lots of cheering from me. Carson had a great time playing with all of his cousins. Greg had several bites, but didn't manage to hook any fish. I planted my butt in a lawn chair and kept watch for spiders, snakes, ticks, frogs, bugs, and all of the other icky things that I cannot stand and truly fear. The sacrifices I have to make for family. I am so not an outdoorsy girl.

On Monday I left for a three day trip to St. Louis as part of my volunteer work as a validator for the Missouri Child Care Accreditation group. I took three coworkers with me and we had a great time. The work days were very long, but we were able to sneak in a trip to Chesterfield mall and dinners at the Cheesecake Factory and PF Changs. It was a nice break.

On my to pick up a rental car for the trip on Monday, I was the ninth caller on a local radio station and won 4 tickets to see Mamma Mia at the Fabulous Fox Theater in St. Louis on Saturday. I took my mom, sister, and mother-in-law. It was terrific! We had lunch at Mama Caprese's on The Hill, then went to the matinee performance. I think I may have to download some ABBA to my ipod! Juli and I will be adding "Dancing Queen" to our karaoke repertoire.

Today we headed back to St Louis (my third trip in 6 days!) to the St Louis Zoo. We piled in my van with my mom, Grandma Pat, and Juli. We met Juli's friend, Josh, at the zoo and caught up our friend, Brittni, who is doing a summer internship in the Great Ape Habitat this summer as part of her pre vet studies. It was hot, but we had a good time visiting the animals, having a picnic lunch, and riding the zoo train, where Carson got to say, "All Aboard!" on the loudspeaker.

This week is slow at work. On Friday we'll be attending a rehearsal dinner for a wedding we're helping with on Saturday. Sunday's plan is still open for now.

In other news, Juli and I have decided that we are each going to lose 50 pounds and take a girls-only cruise in January as a reward for our hard work. We are both attending Weight Watchers and will be starting water aerobics tomorrow night. She's already ahead of me by 10 pounds, so I have to get my butt in gear. I'll be packing my lunch much more often.

I have a decent list of summer activities we're planning to do so far. If you want details on any of them, just let me know. Here they are:

trip to Farmington water park
trip to Land Between the Lakes in KY
attend a Southern Illinois Miners baseball game in Marion, IL
have lunch at Giant City Park and browse the funky little shops in Makanda, IL
attend the DuQuoin State Fair in late August
visit and stay with my friend, Katie, and go to the Incredible Pizza Company and other fun St Louis stuff with her
trip to the City Museum in St Louis
trip to Grant's Farm in St Louis
2 weeks of swim lessons for Carson
1 week of space camp at the university for Carson
hanging out at the camp ground with my aunt and uncle
trip to Elephant Rocks park in Iron County
attend a St Louis Cardinal game
Municipal band concerts in the city park on Thursday nights
attend a show at The Muny in Forrest Park
other activities as we have time!

I have a lot of things to schedule! I'll be working on that this week. Have a great week!