Just keep swimming...

One of the down sides to staying where we were on the island is that the ocean was much more rough than the past few years. We were really quite a bit further out into the ocean! The only times that were really safe to take the kids out to the beach were a few hours after the high tide had started to turn. As a result, we didn't spend as much time on the beach as other years. Fortunately, the house we were in had a swimming pool, and I think the kids actually preferred it to the ocean!

I can remember when I was growing up, once I'd conquered my fear of water, spending hours at our neighbor's house making up jumps into their pool. Ryan and Samantha had so much fun doing the same thing this year! Katy continued to work on swimming without her vest and is really doing well with it. Olivia is still doing great with her vest, and even put her face in the water a few times--so she's already doing better than I did at age 5!

Life's a Beach

We're back! Our trip to Hatteras Island was wonderful. After all, how can things be anything but when you're at the beach? The kids had so much fun seeing their friends Samantha and Cameron, and the week flew by too quickly. Our house wasn't oceanfront this time--we were about 4 houses back from the beach and were equidistant from the sound on the other side of the island--it was a really narrow part of the island! We were almost at the southern tip of the island, about 60 miles down from the bridge that connected us to the mainland.

The house we stayed in was beautifully decorated. The pictures on the website really don't do it justice because you don't see the tiles on the floor or the artwork that covered the walls. The homeowners come to the house about once a month throughout the year, so it was filled with all types of little touches that made it more homey (tons of pretty dishes to choose from, cozy throw blankets in the living room, a state-of-the-art surround sound system on the main TV, a separate ice maker for filling coolers, a hot tub and a heated pool, a cabinet filled with books and puzzles and games, etc.).

Here are some pics from one of our days on the beach.

Goin' to the beach...

Be back next week!

Someone's Been Playing with My Camera...

...and I know who it was! Do you?

Who knew

that cleaning up the garage could be such hard work? So that's why Kevin put the little TV out there...

No one's richer...

Some may own castles on the banks of the Rhine,
and hire orchestras each morning at nine.
But richer than I they will never be…
I had a dad who spent time with me.

Play Ball?

The girls begged to play tee-ball this year at the Y. Our friends, the Sedgleys, signed their daughters up too and they're all on the same team. It has been quite fascinating to observe the different way that Olivia, Katy, Rory & Delaney approach tee-ball as compared to Ryan...

At the beginning of a game, they are quite engaged. Olivia did a nice job of hitting and running the bases...















Katy was quite good at getting into the "ready" position as each batter came up to bat...















Katy did well sitting with her teammates and cheering them on as they took their turns at the tee...















But it has been quite hot around here lately. We've been in the upper 90s and even in the 100s for days, and by the middle of the game boredom has set in. Or perhaps it's exhaustion. They're pitiful! Look at them--they can't even stand up in the field!















And instead of sitting patiently and waiting for her turn to bat, Olivia starts being silly with the batting helmet (yes, that IS Olivia under there!)...















Kevin finally had to go have a little talk with them to encourage them to stay engaged with the game that they so wanted to play.

In the end, I'm not sure if it was Kevin's talk, or the bribery that worked best...

Les Artistes

"Mommy, can we please paint today?" The looks on their faces when they were done was worth the little bit of clean up.

Cue Alice Cooper...

because School's Out for Summer! Seventy-five long, hazy, lazy days stretch before us without any real obligations other than to go to the pool, go to the beach, go out on the lake, visit our friends and family, and work on our tans. Sigh. No need to rise at 6 a.m. to get Ryan on the bus. Just need to continue making it to the Y on a regular basis! Of course the housework is neverending, but at least there are no other "to do lists" hanging over our head.

To celebrate the end of school and start of summer, our neighborhood (me) planned and organized an ambush at the bus stop this afternoon. The parents and younger brothers and sisters all gathered with water balloons and super soakers to await the arrival of the bus... (and considering that temperatures climbed over 100 again today, we were all congratulating ourselves on a fun plan!)

And when the bus arrived and our kids emerged, we opened fire! They were stunned, and dying with laughter as we thoroughly doused them with water while shouting "Happy Summer Vacation!" and "Happy Last Day of School!" Once the super soakers were emptied, we turned the new toys over to the kids so that they could orchestrate their own water battles throughout the summer.

Oooops....

Guess it wasn't "dishwasher safe" for the bottom rack...

















The kids got a laugh, and one of my neighbors said it looked like art. Maybe I'll keep it?

Little Swimmers!

Okay, don't have any pictures because I was too busy in the pool this past weekend to be worrying about a camera...

On Thursday the girls and I went over to the home of one of their friends from preschool. Emily has a pool and it was HOT, so we were pretty excited to get the invitation. Katy was her normal swimming self--paddling all over the place in her vest, attempting cannon balls off the diving board, etc. Olivia was her typical skittish self and stuck to the stairs (which I totally understand!). But by the end of the day, Olivia had finally worked up the nerve to start going off the steps, and discovered that she didn't sink with that life jacket on! She spent the last 10 minutes paddling all over the pool--and was SO PROUD of herself.

Today I took all three kids to one of the YMCA branches that has an outdoor pool. Ryan has been swimming pretty well for the past 2 years, and he just keeps improving. Olivia was a little timid at first, but started heading into the slightly deeper water after a few test runs. Katy asked me to try taking off her vest...

I said "sure!" And we gave it a try. Katy sank the first two times, but was paddling for all she was worth. But then the next time she kept her head up a little better. And the next time she just flopped in and did a great prone float! Before I knew it she was swimming all around me, and then she figured out how to do forward somersaults in the water, and then she started to do backward somersaults under water! She is a total little fish.

Way to swim, girls! I'm so proud of you both!

Paybacks can be nice

So I spent half of April and most of May watching our neighbor's 7-month-old and 3-year-old daughters. They had lost their au pair, and I had a case of diarhea of the mouth when I said "I'd be happy to help out" until the new au pair came. Oh, and then I said that I wouldn't accept any payment--they are good friends, and have money issues, and I also wanted to have the freedom to not be available on certain days without feeling any guilt about it.

Anyway, long story short. These neighbors have a boat, and we now get to use the boat on our own pretty much any time we want. And we get invited out on the boat a lot. And we've been taken out to dinner, and they've watched the kids for us to go out by our selves, and we've gotten to go to NASCAR races, etc., etc., etc. It's been a pretty good trade now that I look back on it--especially since I'm done with the babysitting, but they're still feeling indebted to us!

We took the boat out while the Zirkles were here last week and went fishing near the island where we usually go for cookouts. Turns out that it's quite the fishing hole! As soon as those lines hit the water, the kids were reeling in fish. It kept up for over an hour, and we all had a blast. And I got to blame my camera for not being able to help out with the baiting...