A day at the Lake

After we left the Safari park, the plan was to go to the beach hang out and cook out and eat dinner there. It was an absolutely perfect afternoon! Perfect temp, there was a slight breeze we found a spot and were able to cookout right where we were swimming and a parking spot right there as well. We stayed until after 7PM we just didn't want to leave.My handsome hubby playing football with JasonNatalie was making sand angels:)Just crawling around and digging holes was great fun!Yuck, doesn't look fun to me, but Natalie was loving it!Ethan just played like this forever, so content, so unlike him I had to get a shot.We haven't been to this beach since I was pg with Elena, this was new to us so the kids had to check it out. They all got in line, but Natalie got scared and wouldn't go up the ladder.Ethan comes down first. WheeeeElena wanted to go down 100 times!
It was a perfect day. I am so glad we got out and got up to the lake. Since we do the private pool, we don't go to the lake much but you gotta go at least once a summer! So glad we did!

Where do I Begin? T-ball!

Last time I was able to blog was JUNE! Here it is August WOW. We have had a different summer for us. But we have had fun nonetheless. I will start my back tracking with T-ball. Ethan was ready to move up to the next level, but I kept him in T-ball one more year because him and Elena could be on the same team. It worked out since after his tooth incident he only was allowed to bat. Elena really got into it. I was glad to see this. She sometimes will jump into something and then quit. I told her she could choose not to play next year, but she had to play the season out. She was sad when they had their last game. They each got a ribbon with their name and team on it. She was so proud, she wore it to VBS the next day and kept it on the whole day showing it to everyone! It was great. Natalie didn't like having to sit still during the games , but she loved that someone usually had an extra treat for her at the end of the game!

School's Out Slumber Party

For the last day of school this year I thought it would be fun for the kids to have a slumber party to kick off summer vacation, Ethan was already making plans for a sleepover with one of his friends so I thought it would be fun for another mutual friend to come too, especially since his little brother is one of Elena's good friends. We were overloaded with boys so at the last minute we called another one of Elena's friends and luckily she could come and stay too. It was a hot day so we decided to play water games to cool down. We got out the slip and slide, the splash pool and the boys had water gun fights. Had pizza and then came in to cool down a bit. They played Pokemon cards for awhile then we started a movie and of course we made a ton of popcorn to munch on! (That was Natalie's fave part) Miss Natalie loved having all the kids here and she got to sleep on the sleeper sofa with mommy:)
Ethan chillin' with his friends

Elena with hers

The whole gang, well most of the whole gang. Natalie was at the end of the sofa in everyone's way. Which brings us to the end of the night, when they all passed out(which didn't take long) They all swore they weren't tired, but after 5 minutes of soundscapes on the TV it was nighty-nite. What a group.

For having a house full of wound up kids, the night turned out pretty good. Even though they all woke up at 6:25 ready to go again.

Lovely Lake Erie

This summer has really been a fun one for our family. I am loving that Natalie is a bit older and we are able to do a little more. So yesterday after watching the weather and seeing a nice warm day and week were ahead of us, we decided to go to the beach. The real beach, ya know with sand and everything? We live so close to the lake, but I am not crazy about all the sand you bring home with you and the constant worry of an undertow with one of the kids - we are more pool people.

So we loaded up the car and had an awesome day. Nice and sunny, nice breeze. We could've stayed longer, but the kids were getting rumbly stumbly and were getting hurt all over at the playground. But while we were there they had a blast!

The water actually was pretty warm. Although it was a breezy day so there were decent waves. That is what made the day for Elena. She spent the day wave jumping.

Natalie wasn't too crazy about the waves. She stayed very shallow and mostly played in the sand.

These rocks when I was younger, we spent the day on them. Laying in the sun, jumping off into the water. That's when it all wasn't so shallow. Now my kids are here playing on them.

There were a bunch of kids there and Ethan joined right in with a few who were digging a hole, Most of his time was spent maintaining the water level in there little pool. Funny.

So we try to make a trip to the beach once or twice each year, Feels good to have done it. The kids were whooped too. No objections to bedtime last night. YAY!