Swimming Preview

We got to watch the kids at the end of each set of lessons for the parent viewing day.  It was amazing to see how they progressed over the summer.  Ben is getting stronger and likes to dive down under and swim around.  He isn’t as big of a fan of the individual strokes and techniques, but he is getting to where he can play in the pool without constant contact with an adult.  He is watched like a hawk of course, but he used to hang off of you and not be able to get around on his own very much.  Elizabeth started in a smaller group of kids where the teachers really moved the kids around and almost always had hold of them.  By the end of the summer she could easily make it half the width of the pool by herself and really enjoys putting her face in to blow bubbles.  Yea for this improvement – hopefully they can hang on to their skills through the winter enough to start back in lessons next June about where they left off.

Calebration

We celebrated our newest family member last month with a “Caleb”ration at our house.  Elizabeth swooned over him and thought he was so cute!  But she was also worried that two babies would be at her house and would touch her things.  The other baby is Caleb’s big brother, but he is still a baby to her since he is younger.  She did well though and ended up sharing toys while we all drooled over our newest little guy.

We had a light brunch to celebrate and had juice to drink as well as some soda options.  Both kids were determined to have Sprite.  Since it was a special occasion, it wasn’t a big deal to have some.  Even though in the past both kids have frowned at the “spicy bubbles”.  This time, Ben enjoyed a few sips and was done for the day.  E, however, loved it!  Every day after that for at least a week she asked for “the new juice from the baby party” that she liked so much.  Watch out, world!  E is a fan of soda!

Tulsa Tough

We hit Tulsa Tough again this year on the Friday night in the Blue Dome District.  We grabbed dinner at Dilly Deli before which was a pleasant experienced where we all enjoyed our meals.  We brought our cow bell and the kids took turns cheering on the riders.  We have a friend that races in a later race and the kids made it until he raced about 8pm.  The race was about an hour and our friend finished well – certainly it was due to our cheering!  Ben got to enjoy sitting with a friend for a while and Elizabeth enjoyed receiving some goody bag items that were being handed out.  Our family loves this event and we look forward to it each year.  Shortly after this fun event, the Tour de France starts and the boys are glued to the TV for 3 weeks straight watching for the various jersey colors.  Ben has become more detail oriented as he watches sports and is really enjoying the finer aspects of each sport.  He followed certain cyclists and new some of their “stats” and tracked who had the various jerseys each day and who got injured.  He was spouting off names that Mom had never heard of and she quickly figured out that she wasn’t able to keep up.  Luckily, Dad can dish out the stats and facts too, so the boys just go at it and entertain each other with all of the cycling trivia.