On to new skills and belt colors! Though, paying attention and focusing in class just might be the toughest challenge yet:)

Nope! Just birthday party mania at a friend’s house. Holmes also wore a Christmas sweater and holiday socks to the soirée too. Covering the spread.

No furniture is safe in our household.

Seven-year check-up! News worth hearing:)

Happy Birthday, Meryl! Backyard parties have resumed and we brought in a magician who filled us all with awe!

Seven!

Taylor Swift has taken over Meryl’s playlist and Holmes found the perfect book to give to Meryl, which is about Taylor Swift:) (Also, wrapping presents is for Christmas.)

Turns out that above all the gifts Meryl had on her wish list, her latest entry just days before her birthday (so much for planning ahead) was a set of reusable water balloons. They’re actually very cool. Magnets hold the silicone spheres together and they do indeed blast apart upon contact. Target practice in the backyard! Even Xanna got in on the action.

Cake milkshakes!

On Meryl’s birthday, we joined up with her second grade(!) classmates for indoor mini-golf, which was a last minute Plan B to meeting at the beach, as wildfire smoke descended upon Seattle that very day (no longer unique, but a true end of summer season of weather). Lucky for Meryl, her party was the day before with good air quality. Lucky for Holmes, he inserted himself as the life of this party:)

And we got the whole pool to ourselves!

To the Locks!