The Adventure That Is Our Life

The Adventure That Is Our Life

Thursday, July 11, 2013

July 4th...

We have mentioned before that Ava LOVES the water right?  :o)  We took our annual July 4th trip to the lake again this year, and it was even more fun this time around.  Not to mention Nathan was our hero of the weekend.  I think Grandma would have kissed him if she could have...  he killed  snake!  

Grandma and I are horribly afraid of snakes, and Nathan came to the rescue.  Ava of course said "poor snakey!"  NO WAY!!!  Funny though, after Nathan first hit the snake with a rock, he picked it up with the long pole we use for that purpose.  But it wasn't completely dead, and so he put it on the dock, dropped another rock on it and then jumped on it for good measure. We of course had to wash the remnants off carpeted dock afterwords.  Ava likened it to "peanut butter and jelly" and warmed me not to step in it.  To her credit, that's actually what it looked like.  Gross!

 Ava & Gigi cooling off


 feeding the ducks

 a snack for our boat ride

 upfront with Chelsea



 Ava showing Shelley & Chelsea her angry birds game

waiting on the fireworks with Amanda


this is what we do, ALL. DAY. LONG! 
... and it's wonderful

 escaping, or maybe hiding, from the sun

 fun with Derek



 looky there... he's relaxing and enjoying himself!
(secretly, this is his favorite place on earth too)

 in one of our favorite places, and yet still finding time to play games on the phone



On Friday night we set off fireworks of our own, and then on Saturday night we took the boat out and watched a beautiful fireworks show on the lake.  Ava loved it, until she had to potty.  But the best thing about that, we after a quick dunk in the lake, she was ready for the second half of the show.









Isn't it beautiful? We love the being at the lake, especially in the evening when it's quiet.


taken from our dock on Friday, slightly blurry.

 from the boat on Saturday









Thursday, June 27, 2013

Water Baby...

Ava is our water baby.  If we'd let her, she'd be in the water 24/7.  She has no problems jumping in, splashing, flipping, or swimming, and she enjoys every second of it.  Even when the water is cold.  Then again, I don't know too many kids who care what the water temp. is!

Ava is also the queen of making friends... she doesn't know a stranger! Young or old, everyone is her friend.  Thinking maybe we should have the stranger talk yet again.  

 This is Slade, Ava met him within 30 seconds of walking into the pool.  They were roughly 9 months apart in age, but had a blast together.

Check out that grin!




 Our Water Baby

 All she wanted to do was go into the deep end with the big kids.  
I don't think Momma was the "big kid" she was hoping for.

 After bath, she wanted her hair tied up like Momma's

 This little one was Ava's second friend, her name was Lydia.  She was much younger than Ava, but that didn't matter to Miss A. 



 CANNONBALL!
She couldn't have been happier when she figured out how to do a cannonball, and the mask allowed her to jump without holding her nose.

 Since Ava's swim lessons this past year were a joke, at least in my mind, we've been doing our best to teach her on our own.  Learning to float hasn't been easy, but she's slowly getting the hang of it.

 Although Ava's favorite friend in the pool is anyone but me, she did have fun when she realized she could pull me around on the noodle.  I found it quite funny, obviously.

Diving for rings

Ava, as well as some of her new friends were quite impressed that I could still do flips in the pool, I'm so old and all.  (Ha!) I spared you the pictures of that and instead here is one of Ava learning to do a flip.  She was able to do both front and back with help and then front flips by herself. 


Ava's last friend of the week was Harley.  They played for hours and were inseparable.  Exactly the same age, and well matched in almost every way.  Thank goodness for little friends at the pool!



It's summer time and for a lot of people that means carnivals.  Ava loves rides; the faster the better.  Thankfully I had a little help, otherwise the poor thing would have been stuck on the kiddie rides or carousel all night.  (Pregnant Momma problems.) 

The Caterpillar

The Swings  
A girl after my own heart... I LOVE the swings, only second to roller coasters, but there weren't any to ride this time. 
 











back to the swings for one last ride... 
she rode the swings about 4 times.  I can't blame her!