Before I had kids, I would have 100% told you winter was my favorite time of the year. I loved it being cold, I loved wearing coats, I loved snuggling up with a hot drink.

Now, I am 100% in love with summer. Mostly because the kids can be outside from dawn until dark, they don’t need jackets, we are rarely sick and it’s just awesome. I love that Jon only has one job in the summer and everything just feels relaxed and great.

This year, we’ve been killing ourselves trying to get this backyard done. When we first were looking at our house while it was on the market, we were thinking we’d do a good clean and then remodel the backyard first. Well, insert the rodent infestation and priorities quickly reversed. 😉 So, we ended up spending our yard budget on the kitchen and had to put the yard off for a few years.

We finally have the cash for the yard, which we are so excited about, but my muscles aren’t loving it. 😉

Father’s Day 2018. We are so thankful for this guy!!

Nathan had the idea to spell “Dad” with bacon and I thought it was genius. Ha! So cute.

We went to Wecks for lunch and then spent the afternoon and dinner time at Gammy and Pops’ house. They have the best driveway for bike riding!

Jon and I were working in the yard (because what else do we do) and the kids took a board and connected two giant dirt piles to make a “mountain bridge”. It was SO cute to listen to them play on it – it sounded like they were trying to cross Niagara Falls. Love it.

We finally had the sandbox area dug up and framed out and it was time to move the playset! Nathan has been the BIGGEST help. That kid lives for yard projects. We called in a few friends and they moved the whole thing in like 30 seconds. It was amazing.

It’s coming together!! We put the final bricks on our fire pit area. The sand is on it’s way!

Nathan took a break from running wheelbarrows full of sand and I caught this sweet brother moment. They are SO excited for the new yard!

We took a break from the yard to celebrate our sweet Junie’s birthday. Parker loves Junie with all his heart. Such sweet friends!

We hit up Costco on the way home. Not sure there’s a more accurate picture describing how tired we all are after all this yard work. Ha!

Summer time is the time when I work outside all day and then come inside just in time to bake a few dozen cookies. We try to spread them around the neighborhood so we don’t eat them all. 😉