happy father's day!

This morning, Mike slept in while the boys and I went to a Father's Day breakfast at my parents' house. On the drive over, while Max and Henry watched a movie in the back, Liam and I talked about all the things he loves about his dad. Here is his top five list, in the order that he gave it (although he wanted to be clear that he was doing a top five because he couldn't narrow it down to just one thing he loves the best).

1. He plays catch with me all the time.
2. He teaches me about gardening.
3. He pitches to me so I can do batting practice.
4. He tells me all the time that I am tall and strong and smart.
5. He gets up every morning to drive us to school even though he is tired from working late.

Being a parent is hard work, and Mike (like every other parent!) worries sometimes that he is not doing it as well as he can be. But I think it's pretty telling that the things his son has to say about him are about how his dad spends a lot of time with him doing things they love together and makes him feel good about who he is. In my book, that means he's doing it exactly right. Happy Father's Day, Mike!

nature boys

During the summer, Mike has a lot of mandatory overtime (boo!) on Saturdays, which means I am left to my own devices to figure out something fun to do with the boys. This weekend, I planned to take them to Taltree Arboretum in Valparaiso. Unfortunately, Max's plans (hitting and kicking) weren't compatible with mine, so he went to work at my parents' house for the afternoon while Liam, Henry, Klaudia, and I headed out. We checked out the Railway Garden first, of course, because no little boy can resist its charms. And everything was great, everyone happy as we walked around and checked out the scenery...

 ...Until Henry touched a train and derailed it.  Liam went into the office to alert the staff, but before they came out another train came barreling down the track, there was a collision, and one of the cars fell off the trestle and into the water below. As you can imagine, that was the end of the train portion of our visit.

Next we checked out the Children's Adventure Garden, which is new since we were here last year (and is still partially under construction). We investigated the chicken coop (in which one of the chickens was raising some orphaned ducklings -- awesome!), a building with a turf roof, paths made out of logs, a hidden music garden, and lots of other fun stuff.

After that, we took a walk around the giant pond where the bullfrogs live. This month's exhibit is called People of the Woods. The staff at the arboretum took fallen logs and carved/sculpted them into the forms of some famous environmentalists. Neat!

All in all, it had all the ingredients for a successful afternoon: not too crowded, plenty of interesting things to see and do, and lots of room for the boys to run around and exhaust themselves (which made bedtime a real treat).

sunday drive

Today we headed up to Michigan to see Barb and Kevin and have a little adventure. We met them at their cottage, then had a lovely brunch at Blue Plate Cafe, where the boys were shockingly well behaved. It was nice to see them--somehow we all got busy and hadn't gotten together since before Easter. After brunch, Barb and Kevin headed back home to Naperville, and Mike and I took the boys to Warren Dunes State Park. It was way too chilly to hang out on the beach, let alone dip a toe in Lake Michigan, so instead we set out to climb the 260-foot dune. As you can see, the boys really dug it. They are still talking about it hours later, and already wondering when we can go back for another round!

opening day!

Today was Liam's first baseball game of the season. This year he moved up from T-ball to C League, which pretty much means more of everything: more practice, more innings in the game, more games in the season. He is really loving it so far (even if I am not loving that later games and practices mean I have to keep the little boys up way past their bedtime!) and seems to be doing well. In this game, his team lost, but Liam got his first hit and first RBI of the season. As you can see above, Liam plays "pitcher," which is really just a fielding position since they use a pitching machine.

One thing that's kind of stinky: This game was the only one all season to be played on a weekend day. The rest of the season will be played on weeknights, which sucks for Mike, who is at work in the evenings and won't get to see many games at all. He has arranged to take at least one night off to see a game when his parents come to town to cheer Liam on, but that's pretty much it.

Anyway, back to the game: Max and Henry were pretty good spectators, mostly because I brought a truck and a bucket and shovel for Henry so he could dig in the dirt, and Max discovered that C League has a hidden benefit: a concession stand. Amazing how long a bag of popcorn can keep a kid entertained. It helped that Bethany and Klaudia came too, giving Liam a cheering section six strong. His next game is Wednesday, and I'm pretty sure we won't have any extra spectators, so it will be interesting to see if Max and Henry behaving was just a fluke or a sign of a fun and more relaxed (for me, anyway!) season to come.