Slice of Life: August 1st, 2017

Sadie has the right attitude about August: we’re going to be maxin’ and relaxin’ during our last full month of summer.

Preschool doesn’t start around here until September, so besides a quick wedding Jamie and I are jetting off to in few weeks, we’re going to be enjoying some slower days around here. It’ll be our last full month as a whole family for a little while, so we plan to take advantage of the time together.

Let’s jump into a slice of life, shall we? 🙂

Do you have your glasses for the Solar Eclipse in a few weeks? Everyone here in northeast Kansas is really over-the-top excited (including me!) because we’re supposed to have a 98.7% eclipse here in Manhattan. We’re planning to drive just 45 minutes north to experience the 100% eclipse though and are hoping it’s a neat experience!

I’ve been hearing a bunch of people warn against fake glasses, so I did some research online the last few days. Space.com strongly recommends purchasing them from one of two brands: American Paper Optics or Rainbow Symphony. Rainbow Symphony had some wonky Amazon Prime purchase options, but purchasing a pack from American Paper Optics on Amazon was easy peasy. I bought this six pack for $21.95 and am glad I ordered them when I did because a bunch of other kinds are already backordered. If you need some glasses, I’d grab these quick. 🙂 We’ll be styling, fo sho!

Moving on to less nerdy things… 🙂 How sweet is this picture of Hadley and Teddy? We can’t imagine life without our buddy. He and Hadley are crazy about each other.

Last Thursday we enjoyed a big night at the county fair and rodeo. 🙂 We’ve been going to this fair since we moved here three years ago and love it so much for its simple family-friendly fun.

I found myself so nostalgic watching Hadley go round and round on this squeaky pink fish ride because it seems like it was just yesterday that she was a year old and riding on the same fish – smiling up a storm! – enjoying her first carnival ride.

We also let her ride the ponies every year. I remember it was torture a couple years ago, but we all know how horse-obsessed this girl is now. 🙂 She reached her hand out and petted the horse the whole time. By the way, according to Hadley, all white horses are named Chase. Chase was the name of the horse she rode on at her horse and princess birthday party last year, and we see “Chase” everywhere we go (considering we live in Kansas, we see a white horse at some point multiple times a week while out driving).

Sadie did her classic mean-mug face while riding, but we know her well enough by now to know that she enjoyed her first pony ride. 🙂 Whatever Hadley does, Sadie wants to do too!

Jamie and I got in on the fun by riding the ferris wheel, but mainly we just smiled our cheeks off as we watched the girls run around having a ball.

We kept the girls up later than usual so that we could catch some of the 8 p.m. Kaw Valley Rodeo.

But by 9, everybody was wiped out from a fun evening and more than ready to head the half mile home. Not our typical Thursday night but we sure did enjoy it. Events like this make my heart ache for how much we’ll miss this amazing little town once we’re out of here next year. Raising our toddlers here has been a joy and taught us that we like the simplicity of small(ish) communities. (I believe around 55k people live here.)

We had a really nice weekend that was equal parts productive and relaxing. We had an FRG event Friday, barbecued with some church friends Saturday, and did a heck of a lot of catching up and cleaning on Sunday. One of the highlights of our weekend was the hour we spent at our favorite pizza place – AJ’s – eating lunch on the patio and relaxing on Saturday – just the four of us.

I may be totally late to the show about this one, but have you ever used a Wet Brush to detangle your hair or your daughter’s hair? I have always used combs on our hair, but my girlfriend and I both picked up a wet brush to try when we were out shopping last week, and I am totally obsessed! We haven’t used Hadley’s detangling spray since! Whaaaaat?! It’s a change from my wide-tooth comb, but I love it and am totally sold. I bought the one pictured below but I would bet that any from this brand are fantastic.

Also, here’s something kind of neat: today I’m featured over on CommuniKait participating in Kait’s brand new series called “Live Like a Local”. Kait is one of my favorite blogging friends and someone I simply adore, so I hope you’ll head over to her site and give my interview a read. 🙂 Thanks for having me, Kait! <3

Let’s chat!

1. Do you love where you live? Why?
2. Are you geeking out about the solar eclipse, or just me? 🙂
3. Who else LOVES THIS BRUSH?