The End of Residency, and the Beginning of Vacation!

    Wow! I can't believe it.  Tim is done with residency.  Now we just have one more year of fellowship ahead of us, but let's not get to that too quickly because we've got some vacation in between!

    Tim finished his last day of residency on Monday. He was bummed that he had to present a lecture but after that he was home free!  Before leaving the hospital, he went to the cafeteria to pick up our very last hospital meal with his allotted meal funds which he ironically never has time to use when he's working because he's too busy, and he has always come home for dinner rather than eating multiple meals at the hospital in a day.  Lila requested the usual--hot dogs--and Hyrum requested...sushi.  I'm just glad my kids aren't too picky.  He got a smorgasbord of food, and we enjoyed one last residency food tradition.  He checked out from residency that afternoon, and turned in his badge, etc.  He was the first resident to finish because residency doesn't technically end until June 23rd, but Tim always takes the last block of the year for vacation, and he did the same this year.

    Tim's brother, Adam, came to visit Tuesday through Friday.  He joined the air force and is about to report to basic training so we were delighted to get to spend some time with him.  The kids were pumped and couldn't wait for him to arrive, and they put him to work when he did.  We went swimming every afternoon, went on a hike on a new trail we hadn't yet explored, and did I mention there was a lot of swimming?  Feel in all of the gaps with "Uncle Adam can we wrestle?" Or "play bumper cars (violently smash into each other with pillows)?" Or "can we play Ring Around the Rosie or Chutes and Ladders?" He was a great sport, and the kids were well entertained.  They were sad to see him leave on Friday.

(Tim enjoying the fact that the kids love their uncle, though he did make a few appearances in Ring Around the Rosie)

    Speaking of swimming, Hyrum found his groove in the pool this week.  He took a lot more interest in swimming rather than just playing in the shallow end where he can stand up.  He still struggles with getting behind on his breathing on longer swims, but it's been exciting to see his progress! He also stepped up his diving board game.  Tim told him he could have one of his cherry tomatoes from the garden if he would do a front flip off the diving board, and the rest is history.  He has now checked multiple new tricks off his list:  front flips, cannon ball, toothpick, and we'll give him credit for diving as well even though his "dive" might win a spot on the podium in a belly flop contest.

    We were planning on going to a historical site we live close to on Saturday, but it turns out swimming won out yet again.  My old roommate, Becky, and her family will be moving soon so we took all the kids swimming for a last playdate.  They'll be missed.

    Happy Father's Day everyone!  It was busier than we had planned at our house.  The missionaries asked us to give someone a ride to church so our early start started even earlier.  Tim forgot his laptop for his Sunday School lesson so he had to drive home during the second half of sacrament meeting to get it because the Church asked for Elder Uchtdorf's broadcast to be shown during a Teacher Council Meeting, which was today.  I was scrambling because my sub for a Primary class texted me just before church started, saying her daughter was sick so she couldn't attend, but luckily, everything worked out.  We enjoyed pull-apart pizza and ice cream for Father's Day, and then Tim simultaneously received a new ministering assignment tonight and was requested to go give them a blessing so he headed off while I made final arrangements for.......our BEACH TRIP tomorrow!!!  We are excited, and we are taking advantage of the little time we have off before fellowship starts on July 1st, but at some point we made need a vacation from our vacation.  Next week's blog will come from southern Illinois because we'll leave the day after we get back from the beach to head over to my parents' house.

(A few photos of the kids playing with balloons from Father's Day--cheap entertainment!)

    Photos are slim this week as I'm having issues uploading them from Tim's phone so that's it for this week.  Take care everyone!