Summer 2013

This summer has flown by! The girls are at such a great age to get out and enjoy the world, and in general, we love keeping busy. Here’s a brief update with lots of pictures of some of what we’ve been up to these past few months.

In June, Lisa had a birthday. She turned 4 and is now officially a ‘BIG’ girl.

Her big gift was a puppet theater. (Which has been a lot of fun this summer!)

My Mom came to visit.

Lisa attended her first ever week of VBS with Nate. She wasn’t sure about it at first, but ended up loving it. (And Sam can’t wait to go when she’s old enough!)

We made trips to Krispy Kreme. Sometimes in church dresses.

And it was delicious.

I started a membership at the Y. This has been the summer of being purposeful in making healthy choices. Like exercising. It also enabled the girls to get swim lessons there.

Lisa has come so far in her swimming this summer. She started out with a lot of uncertainty and wouldn’t even get in the pool at first.

But by the end, she was swimming confidently with a few ‘floaters’ and can float on her back really well. She also learned how to get out of the side of the pool and jump in (often with a hand). She still has a lot to learn, but she’s come a long way! (And taking an extra class with her friend didn’t hurt a bit!)

Sam also had lessons, but could only do a Parent/Child class since she’s under 3. She also loved it, but mostly can’t wait until she can join her sister with the ‘big’ girls.

This has also been the summer of running! It all started in May with the annual Chick-fil-a 5K in Newport News. It was the girls first ‘fun’ run, and they loved running with all the cows and, of course, hanging with their friends.

Matt and Tiffany ran the 10K, because they can just wake up and do that kind of thing. I’m really proud of them!

On July 4th, we ran in a “Sparkle Me Wild” 5K in Hampton with a bunch of our friends. That was SO much fun! The girls and I loved getting ‘sparkly’ together!

Here’s the (clean) Before:

And the (sparkly!) After:

And a little of what happened in between:

The last race we signed up for was a local Coast Guard 5K in Yorktown this August. It was my goal to actually run the whole thing, and I did (mostly). It was incredibly emotional and hard, and I’m just glad I finished!

The kids ran in the fun run before the 5K started, and then chilled together with a babysitter, since all parents were running. Tiffany and Laura ran, and won first place for their age bracket! Go girls!

The Staffords visited over the July 4th holiday:

We also had pool parties:

And outgrew baby pools:

Matt had a birthday this August:

We took several trips to the beach:

And we had sleepovers with our best friends:

In general, this summer has left us pretty exhausted!

This child (Sam) can sleep in any position!

Now we’re gearing up for a full and busy Fall. We’ll be doing Pre-school at home again this year, and plan to continue swim lessons, MOPS, Bible Study Fellowship, and a Mom’s Morning Out every other week. We can’t wait for things to start this September!