The Thomas Family: A Week in Review (July 24-30)

A Week in Review (July 24-30)

Watched: Jack and his friend Landon have a great time playing together. Landon will be gone until school starts again so we made sure to squeeze in a day between our return and their departure. So many of our friends will be gone during the month of August. We will really miss them all.

Read: I finished up The Children on our plane ride home. I found this book through a mommy bloggers recommendation list. I can see why someone in that profession would enjoy the book. I personally thought it was a bit predictable. It wasn't awful writing or anything, but it definitely doesn't make me want to rush out and pick up another Ann Leary book. Next, I started The Girl in the Red Coat, which I found through the same list. I will be interesting to see what I think of it. It's been okay so far. I like hearing the same story from both the mother and the daughter's perspectives.

Listened: To Jack pop bubbles. When we were taking off on our plane ride last week, I had made a bubble. Jack asked me how it worked and so I explained the mechanics of it. He tried it once or twice, but was too distracted by being on the plane. On Sunday, I bought a pack of Hubba Bubba for him. On our way home from the show, he gets excited and tells me to turn around quick because he made a bubble. I am driving in Vegas traffic so I really can't do that. I handed him my phone where he proceed to take a ton of pictures of his different bubbles. Since he has figured it out, he just can't stop. I love his excitement at picking up this new skill!

Made: Jack start to train for his run with the Olympic torch. He hasn't really done any distance running this summer and we want to make sure that he can handle the pace and distance. They have told him to try for 2 miles in 20 minutes. While he isn't exactly there, I don't think he will have any problems when he is in with a group to help pace him. I drive beside him in the car to help keep his mileage and time. I am pretty sure that most people think I am making him run for punishment. I keep waiting for something to pop up in our neighborhood Facebook group about it. Haha

Felt: Devastated. Our friend whom we got the sad news about last week passed away. My dear friend Laurie, whom we saw on our trip back to KC, had a stroke and ended up passing away several days later. I will honor her memory each year by having a day of random acts of kindness to replace just a few of the ones she would have performed that year. She will greatly be missed by our entire family.

Planned: On having Jack be awake for our plane trip home but he was zonked out and didn't spend much time awake. He fell asleep on the car ride to the airport. He fell back asleep while we waited to board and then fell back asleep before we took off. He didn't wake up until about 25 minutes before we landed. We are going to have to work to help return his sleep pattern to one that will be more beneficial for school hours. I always hate doing that because then I feel like I am shortening an already too short summer.

Loved: Jack seeing just light up at Penn & Teller show. It is so amazing! I was surprised because over half the show was new tricks that I hadn't seen before. We had great seats too. Before the stage Jack went up in the box. He even examined it thoroughly. He was blown away when the trick with the box was revealed. He also got to help lift over the disappearing cell phone box to the stage. During the final trick, he got to go on stage and be the human wall and watch an "elephant" (really a cow dressed like an elephant) disappear and a chicken. As he was walking off the stage Penn stopped him and made him promise that he would always let people know he saw an elephant vanish from the stage. After the show was just as amazing. Penn and Teller wait and speak to every person. Teller was much better with Jack than Penn. Jack saved their force card and Teller signed it with saying "This is your card". He also noticed that Jack had gotten dressed up for the show. So he took off his tie that he had hacked off during the show and gave it to Jack and autographed it just for him. Penn was clearly more tired and wasn't as interactive. He did congratulate Nick on his weight loss when he let him know that he listened to his podcast and was inspired by Penn's weight loss. I made a side by side and the changes, especially in Penn, are pretty drastic.

Here are the pics for the week:

All dressed up and ready for the show