Having Fun in the Summertime!

Summer is finally here and we have been enjoying it every chance we get!  The kids love to be outside and we try and get them out as much as possible.  We get our pools out a few times a week but have been going to the spray park and public pools as well.  Brody can now touch the bottom in a three foot pool and seems pretty comfortable doing so even with the water being up to his chin.  Next summer I am sure he will be swimming on his own.  He is not crazy about going under but is working on his swim strokes while wearing his puddle jumper.  Each time we swim I make him do a few laps back and forth for good practice.  Briana loves the water as well, but she would rather play in a water table or baby pool than swim in a deep pool.

Brody is going to school Monday, Wednesday and Friday for the summer.  I decided to keep two days open for us to do what we want.  This way he still has the consistency of going but also has some time off to enjoy the summer.  He had an awesome day at school yesterday and seems to be adjusting to the routine and being in a classroom.  He has made some new friends and is really attached to two of the girls in the class.  Most of his class is girls so he doesn't have too many boys to choose from.  He is always so excited when I pick him up to show me what he did and tell me about his day.  He is very much a little boy right now and enjoys playing outside with dirt, rocks, leaves and sticks.  His imagination continues to amaze us as he is so creative in his play.  He can turn anything into a store, supplies or a jungle.  He is very into writing and art and even though I am not seeing letters just yet he is making tons of lines to represent words so I know it won't be long before he is writing letters.  He continues to read on his own and can read most of a early reader on his own with little help.  On Sunday I took him to his second movie, Monster's University, which we both really enjoyed.  There were 25 minutes of previews and he is not a fan of sitting to begin with so we had to stretch a little in the middle but other than that he did great!

Briana is a daredevil and I think we are convinced she may be a boy trapped in a girls body! :)  She has two scrapped up knees at the moment, a scratch on her forehead and under her eye along with many small bruises all from having no fear and wanting to play just as rough as any boy would.  She continues to talk more and more and puts tons of words together that surprise us all the time. Her new one is "I don't like it."  Hard to believe that in just 6 weeks she will be two!  Such a bittersweet time!  She is so fun at this age and cracks us up all the time.

I took the kids on a first experience for all 3 of us last week, we went strawberry picking!  I had never been and thought it would be something really neat to do with the kids.  It was great and we had such a fun time not to mention the strawberries were SO good!  They said it was the best yield they had in years because of all the rain.  We got to rid a tractor and the kids jumped right in to picking and did so great!  Can't wait to go again next year!

We don't watch much T.V. at our house but Brody has really started to like a show called Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood.  It is written by the writers of Mister Rodger's Neighborhood and I will admit is a very cute show with good lessons and values.  I found out Daniel was coming to the local library a few months ago so I took the kids last Tuesday.  We had to wait in line for 45 minutes but they had a lot of crafts and games set up for the kids and all the kids got a free book.  We only saw Daniel for a few seconds (I guess he was too warm in the costume) and weren't able to get any photos with him but it was something different and the kids seemed to have a good time which is all that matters!