Cell Phone Dump

My new favorite summer beverage - Redd's Strawberry Ale

Chick-fil-A ice cream cone - Mason's favorite!

Love seeing this come in the mail after my annual GYN visit - ALL GOOD :)

I love how Snapchat makes me look 30 instead of my real age!

My grey-haired, smooshy faced girl!

Haven't worn these shoes in awhile...looks like I will never be wearing them again!

Future Rockstar!

Daddy is out of town so it is date-night for me & this little Mister!

Saw this on the shelf at Wal-Mart & let out a little squeal! Fall is around the corner!!!

Free 2 weeks of Sirius XM & I get to listen to my favorite station. Taking it back old school!

Jarin & Mason - what I see every morning when I pull away from daycare. 

Playdate with G

Once a month Mason's best friend Greyson spends a Saturday with us while his Mama goes to work. I absolutely love these days & look so forward to them because for 6 hours my child is entertained by someone other than himself, Shane or I. 

Those of you who have only 1 child know what I am talking about. Unlike a child with siblings, the parents are the ones that end up being their childs' playmate. They are the ones who they play games with, puts puzzles together with, plays with Play-Doh & colors with. As much as I love spending time with my little man it sure is nice when he is distracted by a friend for 6 hours time :) I can get a whole heck of a lot done in 6 hours time without distractions.

And I love watching the two of them interact together. They love like brothers & sometimes they fight like brothers & sometimes it makes me sad that Mason is an only child. They have SO much fun together, love spending time together & to see their different personalities come out are fun to watch. 

Greyson is a shy, timid, hesitant, quiet little guy. A follower. My kid is the outgoing, wild, ready & willing, loud little guy. A leader. So to see the two of them interact & play together is fun to see. They are a good balance together & I can't wait to watch them grow up & experience life together as they get older.

Today was a gorgeous day outside so we took advantage of the nice weather & did some playing outside. The boys went cruising to the park in Mason's truck, they blew bubbles on the front patio, played with Play-Doh, had their favorite Mac-n-Cheese for lunch & then went swimming.

We absolutely love Greyson & our play-dates with him & look forward so many more in the future!

KU Heart Clinic

Today I am headed to the University of Kansas campus (home of our beloved Jayhawks) to help volunteer at the St. Lukes Heart Clinic for all the incoming freshmen & transfer student athletes. Every athlete that plays for KU gets an overall heart & health assessment by our Cardiologists - many of whom I work side by side with everyday.

At this clinic we take blood pressures, do EKG's, Echocardiograms, take their weight/BMI measurements & then a wellness interview of their overall health is done by the Cardiologist using the results of all the screenings we did for the day. 

These two awesome co-workers of mine assisted me today with blood pressures & EKG's. We had SO much fun meeting the athletes, talking with them about what sport they played, what they wanted to major in, where they were from & all hanging out together. They were a group of pretty awesome kids & those southern ones were quite respectful as they kept calling me Ma'am. Talk about feeling old - especially since I was old enough to be these kids mother. Yikes!

After the day was done, we ended up seeing almost 100 students in 6 hours time & you know what was the best part? We got paid for having fun, hanging out together at our favorite college campus & meeting students from all over the US! Can't wait to get to participate at another heart clinic in the future! Maybe I will be lucky enough to get to do the football & basketball team in the fall?!?

Birthday

Looking back, I have had some good birthday celebrations in the past.

There was that time where I met Lil' John & he gave me a birthday shout out & toast....

Or that time when I was 3 months pregnant & turning 40 & all my closest girlfriends made it such a special day...

 But none of those beat out the amazing birthday I had today!


You see, these girls right here.....

These girls are my Mama Tribe & they are amazing. Every Mama needs a Mama Tribe & I couldn't ask for a better group of girls to be in mine. 

These girls right there in that picture each took the day off of work to spend the my birthday with little ol' me. LOVE.

We all met at First Watch for brunch where I was showered with love, gifts & breakfast by these lovely ladies. One of my favorite gifts was wrapped in a barf bag - LOL! Hilarious.

We had a yummy brunch & then made our way to the movie theater to see the movie Bad Moms. We got to our seats & of course ordered cocktails. I opted for the "Mama-politan" & the girls surprised me with a yummy, gooey, fudgy brownie treat! It was oh so good!

The movie was hilarious & I loved how I could pick out the personalities of the girls in my tribe & apply them to the Mom's in the movie. We have the loud, crazy one, the conservative one, & the practical, routined, always on a schedule one. I won't tell you which one I am :)

After the movie two of the Mama's ended up having to go but Dana, Sara & I had a couple of hours before we had to get the kids so we ended up at the mexican restaurant across the street for apps & 'ritas.

We were the only ones in the place so we bellied up to the bar where we all enjoyed our drinks, chips & salsa. There were lots of great stories & laughs shared with these two & I feel so blessed to have such an amazing group of Mama's by my side.

We all parted ways around 4:30pm & I made my way to the daycare to pick up my little man & headed home for round 2 of birthday festivities.

We got home, ate supper & Mason was SO excited to have some birthday ice cream cake & sing Happy Birthday to his Mama! Ugh I love this boy so much!

It ended up being an awesome birthday spent with those that I love & as I turn another year older I am even more thankful for all the blessings in my life.

The next day at work I was surprised by my co-workers with a birthday lunch...

And my most favorite cheesecake by my friend Stetson - White Chocolate Raspberry! Ugh he truly loves me :)

And if the day couldn't get any better, I get a surprise visit by two of my most favorite girls....Ms. Jen & her daughter Ava Jean. 

They brought me the most cutest birthday present - a personalized rug for our camper. I absolutely love it & love them!

So as you can see, turning 44 years old wasn't so bad. I was surrounded by the bestest friends & family that a girl could ask for. Here's to another amazing, healthy, happy year!

Splash

There is a new park & splash pad that was built in Overland Park called Roe Park this past spring so Mase & I ventured out on this hot day to check it out.

Mason had a blast playing on all the equipment, walking on the trails & running through the sprinklers! 

This is one park that we will definitely be coming back to again & again! 

And everyone knows a visit to a park isn't complete without making a trip for ice cream! We ended up stopping at Dairy Queen on the way home & had us a chocolate dipped cone & cherry freeze. 

YUMMY!

Gwen & friends

Tonight I had me a "Mama's Night Out" with my favorite Mama friends & it was FUN times! We all had tickets to see Eve & Gwen Stefani but before the concert we decided to have a little pre-concert food & cocktails.

We ended up at Tanner's in the Power & Light district & filled our tummies full of bar food & cocktails! Mmmm - Moscow Mules! The Mommies favorite drink :)

We were all excited to get in, grab our seats & watch the show. We had been looking forward to seeing Gwen since we bought tickets almost 6 months ago!

Eve was one of my favorite female rappers growing up in the 90's & I was super excited to see her perform.

We made our way inside the arena, grabbed a cocktail & settled into our seats anxiously awaiting the beginning of the concert! Eve opened up the show & she was awesome as I knew she would be! She sang all my favorites...Let Me Blow Ya Mind, Who's That Girl, Satisfaction, Tambourine. Ugh SO good!

There was a bit of intermission before Gwen came on & everyone was so excited to see here appear! Gwen's concert ended up being absolutely amazing! She sang for almost 3 hours with no break & her show was non-stop energy! My friends from work were on the floor in front of the stage so they shared some great pics up close of Gwen during the show!

Us Mama's had a great time & it was definitely one of the better concerts I have been too in quite some time!! 

Melvern Lake

This weekend we are headed back to one of our favorite campsites - Melvern Lake. Our dear friends Camille & Ray are packing up their family & heading down also to spend the weekend camping with us.

One of the many reasons we love Melvern Lake so much is because it is only an hour south of where we live so to pick up & go camping for the weekend is easy peasy. We got down there early Friday morning, set up camp & then took Mason on his first fishing excursion.

We got all set up on the bank of the lake & Mason was SO excited to try out his new Spiderman fishing pole.

Shane got out his fancy fishing pole & the two of them stood patiently waiting for a nibble on their line.

It took Mason only 10 minutes before he caught his first fish (a little bluegill) & he was SO excited!!!

We spent the next half hour fishing in the same spot with no luck so we decided to move across the pond & try out a different location. Another 15 minutes had passed & Mason caught his 2nd fish! He was really enjoying this fishing thang!Just incase you all aren't keeping score....Mason - 2  Daddy - 0.

We spent a little more time fishing & then saw Ray & Camille pull into the campsite so we packed up our gear & went to meet them. We helped them unload their stuff, help set up their pop-up camper & then Camille & I got supper ready for everyone.

After supper we let the kids watch a movie in our RV while the big kids sat around the campfire enjoying catching up & have a few beers.

The next morning we all slept in & had a bit of a late start. Once everyone was up we met over at Ray & Camille's camper where Camille was making us all waffles for breakfast. Afterwards we all took a walk around the area & let the kids play at the park & throw rocks into the lake.

We went on a walk on the nature trails, rode bikes, went fishing & had so much fun hanging out together. I ended up cooking for the crew that evening making burgers & brats & later we had another campfire where we brought out the stuff to make smores. The kids had a great time running around while the big kids had fun sitting around the campfire sharing stories & talking about life. Good times :)

Early the next morning a huge storm came through the area & dumped a TON of rain. While we were dry as a bone in our RV, I was worried about Camille, Ray & the kids in their pop-up camper. We texted each other back & forth & turns out the kids slept through the entire storm & they too were cozy & dry as a bone. By late morning it had stopped raining, the sun came out & things started to dry out. We all had lunch together & then headed over to the beach area so the kids could do some swimming. Reason #2 I love this campsite - the nice, clean, huge beach area!

 

Since it was early afternoon on Sunday, a lot of the campers had already left so the beach area was totally empty. We pretty much had the whole place to ourselves. We spent a couple of hours watching the kids swim & splash around & then it was time to head back to the campers & pack up.

We had such a great weekend with Camille, Ray & family & look forward to many more camping trips with them in the future!