Ben's 8th Birthday!

When did this happen?  8?  It can't really be true, but it is.....

Ben celebrated at school with donuts, at our house with family and at Incredible Pizza with friends.  Mom even tricked Ben and "wasn't sure if she could make it to the school birthday".  Mom knew all along that she had signed up to be Mystery Reader on that same day and surprised Ben after lunch with some of his favorite books to read to the class and got to help pass out the donuts.  Ben seemed to enjoy all of his celebrations and is pleased as punch that he is 8!

The Summer Highlights

We started the summer (even though school wasn't out yet) off with a trip to Branson. Not sure why one of the prisoners was so cheery and the other wasn't.

The next weekend school was officially out and Mom and Ben headed to Sunset Bible Camp for the one day 2nd grade camp.  There was crafting, sports, swimming (pool and lake), paddle boating, devotion time, missions and lots of fun games.  And of course the all important camp lunch and canteen snacks.  It was one of Ben's favorite events of the summer and by the time we got in the van to head home, he was planning how many nights he could stay next year with 3rd grade camp.  Gulp!

Summer also included some old favorites like Tulsa Tough.  Go Jeremy!

Camps of all kinds filled part of our summer schedule.  Ben did a basketball camp at TU and both kids enjoyed swim lessons.  Camp Invention, VBS and Music Camp were also repeat favorites from last summer.

Elizabeth got to go to a preschool graduation party at her favorite Bible Class teacher's house.  Ben starred in a puppet show at Kidz Klub.  We enjoyed a Drillers game with friends and also enjoyed various occasions with family.

The biggest holiday of the summer was the 4th of July.  This was the first year that the kids actually enjoyed fireworks so we celebrated for several days straight!!

We were also very blessed to be able to take a beach vacation this summer.  There are many more pics and stories, so we'll save that for another post.  It was a great summer and we are already anticipating more fun next year.  Our biggest difference between this summer and the year before was having our own pool.  There aren't any pics, but we sure had lots of fun times including hosting our small group, having friends to swim and enjoying lots of quick weeknight swims as well.  Ben is swimming like a fish and E is very confident in her floaties.  She will probably be on her own next summer.  So fun!!

The Beach!

Ben went on a beach trip just before his first birthday.  It has been 7 years since our family has been to the beach.  We decided to drive and experience a road trip as well.  It was an adventure!  The kids did mostly really well on the car rides.  We took two days to drive there and two days home as well.  We went to Seagrove, Florida in the Destin area.  It was about 14 hours one way.  Both kids took to the sand and ocean really quickly.  Ben was determined to surf and go as deep as we would let him in the ocean.  Elizabeth also liked the water, but mostly stayed a little more shallow and especially loved hunting for shells.

We drove to Destin a couple of times.  We went to a boardwalk area for a parade and shopping and another day we went on a dolphin boat cruise.

 

One of the things that the kids were determined to do was to catch a fish.  They tried with buckets for a while and then we bought nets.  They were still very difficult to catch.  Those little dudes were fast!  Mom was the only one to catch one.  We kept it in a bucket and the kids added sand and seaweed to make it feel at home.  We let it go after a while so it could get back to its family.

After all of the beach and ocean play we worked up big appetites each day!  We enjoyed eating at our condo some and dining out at new places.  We even found a homemade popsicle place that we went to two days in a row it was so good!  We would have gone more, but we didn't try it until the last couple of days of our trip.

It was a great trip and the kids are now official beach bums.  They look forward to going back some day to enjoy the surf again.