mcculloch's kansas city adventure

for the past few summers my mom has hosted a sleepover for my cousin's daughter mcculloch. they usually go swimming like twelve times, watch movies and go on a little adventure. she is easy to please and is always gushing about how great her sleepovers are. this year my mom decided she wanted to go big with the adventure and bring mcculloch to legoland in kansas city. so they took their sleepover on the road and we spent a few days having fun together.

along with the visit to legoland, we made art at kalidescope, swam at a water park, had hamburgers delivered by a model train, ate some questionable jelly beans, and were wowed by donald's light saber pizza cutter. it was definitely action packed, but the best part was hearing the hilarious things that mcculloch says.  so in no particular order, here are my top ten mcculloch-isms:

1. are you jealous of my comedy?

2. [as dag is licking her] this is the old school way to wash your hands

3. i feel like a real gamer now

4. that was harder than spreading cheese on a rotten cracker

5. you guys have the coolest objects [referencing the tv remote you can talk into, but needless to say she was very impressed with all of donald's toys]

6. this is like a water wonderland!

7. we're such an amazing couple [re: shelly & mcculloch]

8. oh no, papa sir knows nothing about fashion

9. having kids is a fun and hard job

10. the funnest part of today was just being a family

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how we summer

it's no secret that i love summer. i love sunshine and swimming and shave ice. i also love the feel of summer...the freedom from school and responsibilities. obviously most adults don't get to enjoy the same level of freedom as the kids, but i still do my best to make summer feel like summer, even as a grown up. we typically take a bit of a break from house projects and try to spend our time enjoying summery things.

after a few too many summers that felt like they were over before i really got to enjoy them, i started making 'the summer list'. it's a fun way to make sure we don't miss out on our favorite activities and really, who doesn't love checking things off a list! the only downside is that most of the items require some level of planning or scheduling, so it wasn't really helping with that carefree summer feeling. so this year i added a mantra...enjoy every day.

it isn't much different than the simple discipline of noticing. i wanted to fully enjoy the moments that felt most like summer, and maybe add a little something extra to make them more fun. so instead of eating that shave ice or qt cone in the car, we found a patch of grass to lounge in. i took the back roads home at night with the windows down and the radio up [i also randomly started playing real mccoy songs, which immediately transported me to the summers of the late 90's and those early morning pom practices]. there were day movies and night movies. walks to the thrift store. honey smacks for breakfast. mugs up root beer floats, just because. sandwiches with lettuce. sitting outside after dark. reading by the pool. and an adventure to find the raytown dragon...and i thoroughly enjoyed it all.

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