School's Out for Summer...

Before I begin this post, I need to first tell you about the crazy technical issues I've been having around here! Last week (Sunday I think), I went to upload pictures as usual, but found my memory card was kind of stuck in my camera.  I pushed and pushed and managed to get it out, but then I couldn't get it back in when I was done uploading.  It wouldn't catch in the camera, so I hoped a new memory card would do the trick.  I No bueno, and at this point I was super bummed.  I LOVE my camera, like I could do without a lot of things, but my camera is not one of them.  Seeing a few hundred dollar expense in his near future, Josh played around with my camera the next night and managed to remove a tiny plastic piece from where the memory card goes and voila my memory card was back in.  I was super excited, but when I went to take pictures the next day (at Colton's end of the school year party), it said my memory card was locked, and I couldn't take any pictures!  Seriously, I almost cried, but after I got home I googled it and it turns out there's a tiny switch on the side of the memory card that can be slid up and down to lock and unlock it (who knew, right?...or maybe you already did!).  I investigated my old memory card...found no such switch...looked at the new one I still had in my possession...saw where the switch should be...and realized the tiny plastic piece Josh had removed from jammed camera the night before was most likely the broken off lock switch.  I put the new memory card back in, and we were back in business.  Phew!
But then my blog (well, actually blogs because I do another one just for family about the boys) was being funky.  I could get in to see my posts and things, but I couldn't edit them, write new posts, or upload photos. I played around a lot, and then googled and figured out I should try to delete all plug ins on my computer (didn't even know I had any).  It did the trick, and now I'm back in business.
All this is to explain 1. why my blog may have been super funky last week (posts appearing twice, no photos, etc).  2.  why some posts, including this one, have pretty pathetic pictures as I've had to rely on my iPhone.  But I digress...
Back to the original point of the post: Colton is out of school for the summer!  But before he got out of school, I helped plan his class's end of the year party.  Now here's the thing: I love parties (obviously) and would go to the nines every time, but when planning an hour long thing for a bunch of 2/3 year olds, pretty decorations and themey food are probably just a waste of time!  But not fun activities...messy, chaotic fun is absolutely required, so that's where I focused my energy.  We decided to do a bubble party (or more accurately I convinced the other two parents helping me plan) and set up tons of bubble fun for the kids.  Again, I didn't get good pictures, but we had:

•  a couple water tables filled with bubble solution (just dish soap and water) and lots of fun bubble making tools (cookie cutters, funnels, wands, PVC pipe sections, etc)
•  a baby pool filled up with bubble solution and hula hoops for making big bubbles (really the kids just ended up splashing around in there though!)
• individual bubble packs and a bubble refill station (a big water jug filled with bubble solution)
• lots of bubble wands, bubble blowers, etc. all over the place!
• sprinklers going for the kids to run through

And like I said, we kept the food really simple: pizza, watermelon, pretzels, and popsicles for dessert.  Obviously, Levi had to get in on that action too!

the boys and Colton's most favorite school buddy, Macie

It was a fun (for the kids), exhausting (for me) morning and two days later Colton returned to his school for the last day.  He said good bye to his teachers

And we celebrated by going to Chik-Fil-A (Colton's current favorite restaurant) for lunch and play time with Josh who left work to meet us.

And with the school year officially in the books, the boys came home to start taking advantage of all that summer is.

And I am just left in total amazement of how much he's grown up this year...and how far we've all come as a family.  I know I bored you with all the details last week, so I won't do that to you again, but how about we just look at his picture from the first day (and one with Levi for good measure):

And one from the last day: