Swimming

Swimming is finally over for the summer. I'm so proud of the kids.  We had some really long days - two hour afternoon practices and then back to the pool that night a lot of times for the night practices.  A few days the kids hung out with friends in the morning at the zoo or a park and then after practice I would bring home a car load of boys for the rest of the afternoon then take them all back to swim at night. It was fun to look outside and see 6 boys running around my neighborhood on scooters or bikes playing a nerf war in their speedos! Swim kids think nothing of it!  It was so fun we did it several times that week.  Our neighbors have asked when the swim team kids will come again.
This is really our first week all summer for lazy days and its 4pm and Joel has yet to get dressed.  We are enjoying the slow pace this week! 

Colin worked so hard to get on the A team relay. They have an A, B, and C teams and you have to be the fastest free times for the A team.  Our A teams usually makes it to All Stars and Colin would LOVE to make All Stars.  He worked so hard in practice for weeks.  The last meet he requested to be put in free so he could try to beat his time - he needed to drop 0.20 seconds to beat Owen or Max to get his spot on the team.  He just needed to beat one of them.  The two other swimmers were already determined - they were 12 year old boys with much faster times.  Colin, Owen and Max were all trying to get the next two spots on the relay team. Everyone knew Colin was trying to get on that relay team.  The other moms and I were talking how we were all torn because whoever was the 3rd boy wouldn't make the relay team. We all knew one boy would be heartbroken at the end of the race.  They were all swimming it together in the same heat so we would immediately know who was on the relay team.  Well his event came and Colin requested me to go down to the end of the pool to yell at him when he did his flip turn.

(Side note: I would go down and yell at him when he would do his turns to help him to get off the wall faster.  He asked me after a few meets why I kept yelling at him - I do yell for him pretty loud - but I said to get you off that wall faster.  Did it work? He thought about it and said yes and then usually will come find me and ask that I'm at the end of the pool each race)

 He came out strong but as soon as he came out of his turn he was behind Max and Owen.  My heart sank.  There is nothing like seeing your hopes crushed while you are still swimming. Owen was next to him and Colin knew Owen was beating him.  But he finished strong and dropped TWO seconds which is huge! Unfortunately Max and Owen dropped over two seconds and Colin was not going to be on the team they took to Divisionals and then All Stars.  He was crushed but I was very proud how he handled himself.  Sometimes its in the disappointment where you learn the most.  I teared up watching Colin handle himself, another mom teared up, even his coach came to find me and said how he knew exactly how Colin felt.  We are part of a really great team!  Max came up to me with a handful of money and asked if it was ok for him to buy Colin some candy at the concessions.  Sweet Sweet boy.  A brownie and skittles eased the pain a little - but he and I were up well past midnight talking about the race that night and just sitting with him while he cried. 

So he didn't make Divisionals in the relay but he made it in 50 Fly and 50 back.  He actually went to Divisionals in the 13-14 boys 50 back and did really well! So proud of him.  Backstroke is not his stroke. He usually keeps his head up way too high.  He also cheered his hardest for the relay team he wanted to be on. And that made me very proud because I knew how badly he wanted to be swimming in that relay.   He missed All Stars by less than a second in butterfly but I told him he finished 15 place in the entire league - out of 21 teams and when our team is 150 swimmers and one of the medium sized teams he should feel very proud of himself.  We are very proud of him.  He's not wanting to do year round swimming - I think his first love is still basketball but we are looking into a rec league for the winter and also will continue with our teams conditioning practices all winter. 

This boy didn't make Divisionals or All Stars this year.  After they posted the list he came up and told me and said "thats ok - I didn't want to do practice anyways" Ha!  He has however been wearing his All Stars shirt A LOT the past two weeks  (hahaha)which is sometimes hard for Colin because Colin is dying to make All Stars just once and puts so much work into it and his brother made it two years in a row and doesn't work at all.  Joel did however turn it on the last week of practice.  I have never seen him work so hard in practice - he usually slacks off big time but he also dropped a ton of time the last meet.  I told him I had never seen him swim so hard.  I think he's glad he didn't stay retired this summer and had fun swimming with his friends.

When you leave a swim meet at midnight because your mommy is on the swim team board and has to clean up.  I will say bedtimes are super easy on nights like that. Everyone just crashes and we all sleep in late.  Back to school is going to be hard on all of us adjusting to early early mornings. 

I've always loved swimming and swim teams but now as a parent I love it even more.  There's nothing more encouraging than seeing friends cheer for each other - even if they are on opposite teams. Also parents are always cheering other kids on and its nice for the kids to have others tell them what a great job they are doing.  For other people to notice when your child drops times and has been working hard.  It helps build their confidence a lot since its not just mom and dad telling them.  Colin tried to beat Shaun all year yet Shaun would be at practice  helping Colin with his strokes. Colin helped this boy Aaron drop 7 seconds in butterfly even when it made Aaron a second away from beating Colin in fly.  Colin just commented that swimming Aaron would just help push him to go faster. 

One mother commented to me at the end of the season that Norah was the most popular kid on the team.  And I don't doubt it! She loved hanging out with her friends and also all the older kids as well.  She dropped about 30 seconds from her freestyle and backstroke this year.  I can't wait to see what she does next year.

Oh hey!  a friend is cheering for her before the race

It was a good season and now we are looking forward to next summer when all the kids will be at the top of their age groups.  Joel is retired again but I'm sure he will come out of retirement to swim again.

Friends

On the way home from Niagara Falls we stopped for a very quick stop to see this sweet family. They just moved to Winchester this winter so when I was mapping the way home I saw we drove right through Winchester! I sent Abby a quick text seeing if they were free since they were literally two minutes off the interstate. It was a fun but quick visit.

The kids used to fight over who got to hold baby Caroline and now they fight over who gets to sit by her and get tickled by her. 

It was a great time to let the kids get out and run off some energy before heading home.  We wish we couldve stayed longer with them.

Eight is Great!

This boy turned 8 a few weeks ago.  Life has been busy so I'm just now sitting down to write this.

He has been so excited for his birthday for months. 

He kept going back and forth with what he wanted.  He originally wanted a big party with a lot of friends but then at the end he said he just wanted to go go Cloud 9 and Pungo Pizza with Nathan and Noah. 

It was the perfect day! These boys have been friends since birth and I couldn't pick better friends for our boys.  We are sad they are moving this summer.  The kids and I are in complete denial that they will leave.  So it was perfect to have a day for the boys to all spend together. 

We picked up the boys and took them to Cloud 9 (an indoor trampoline place) and then went and spent the rest of the afternoon at Pungo Pizza eating pizza and playing in the arcade.  We gave each kid a big bag of quarters and it was fun to watch how they spent it.  Colin and Noah saved theirs for the bigger games, Joel and Norah didn't play a single game - they used them to get those quarter toys and Nathan was a mix of both games and toys. 

It was the perfect day for our Joel and he loved that he got to do it all on his actual birthday. 

The day before his birthday Ma-Ma-Maa and Grandpa came over to watch the kids swim meet and to celebrate Joels birthday.  I was working the swim meet getting kids lined up and they were all at the other end and some how WE ALL MISSED COLIN SWIM breaststroke.  He made sure after that that we ALL knew when he was walking to his lane. 

We had a cookie cake that Joel had picked out and then Joel opened presents. 

Happy Birthday Joel!

Sometimes to be honest I'm not sure what to do with you. You are passionate and strong-willed and so demanding at times.  Yet you are the most sensitive and sweet boy at other times.  Your personality can do a complete 180 in a matter of minutes.  You have always kept us on our toes.

You are so creative that I can't wait to see where that takes you.  I love watching you get out all the craft supplies and spend hours making something.  What you come up with is amazing.  Sometimes your stories and drawings have so much detail that its no wonder you have a hard time sleeping at night.  It must be hard to turn that brain off sometimes.

Ever since your surgery you have gone back to rubbing our pretty ears.  ALL THE TIME.  It has been a long time since our pretty ears were rubbed so much.  I think you still have a lot of anxiety from the surgery so we are working through that.  You were terrified to go back to see the doctor a week ago because they would cut you open but thankfully they didn't (they did freeze off some warts so there's another thing for you to worry about)

You are a very hard worker in school but seem to think that at home anything that requires you to lift a finger should not be done.  Lately that's when you start to tell me your incision hurts.  I didn't believe you until last week at the doctors they said that you do indeed still have internal stitches that have not dissolved yet.  So at that you were telling the truth.  It was just always a coincidence it would always hurt when it was time to clean.

Colin got a new to us bookshelf from Grandpa and Ma-Ma-Maa so we moved his into your room.  I told you to remove all the books off your old smaller bookshelf so we could put the bigger one in its place. You grumbled and complained and took forever but finally did it.  Then when it was time to put everything back on the shelves you started ranting and raving "but YOU told me to take everything off. and YOU made my room messy (I did rearrange some things in there) so YOU should clean my room for me not ME!"  I mean you did have a point.  If I hadn't moved your desk around then all the toys shoved under it wouldn't need to be cleaned up. But it is your room so you had to clean it up and it took all day but you eventually did it.   You always find a loophole for everything.

There is no one who makes Colin laugh harder than you.  You can make Colin laugh big belly laughs and your whole face lights up when he can't stop laughing at something you've said.  There is also no one who encourages you like Colin.  I hope you always stay close.  You and Norah have a love/hate thing going on right now - you love to play together but have very different ways of playing at times and get annoyed very quickly at each other.  Yet when I tell you to go to your own separate rooms you refuse and want to be together.  

I hope you know how much we love you.  Life wouldn't be the same without you.  We are so thankful God sent you to us.  You are such a gift to us.  Happy Birthday Joely Bean! We love you!

Niagara Falls

 We have been wanting to come visit Kaitlin and Aaron for years and it finally all worked out to go this past weekend. The fact that they live 30 minutes from Niagara Falls was extra bonus.  It was amazing and the kids have said was well worth all the driving.  We went to their wedding in Pennsylvania when Colin was 6 and when we were driving into New York Colin started asking where we were going.  He said this isn't where the wedding was.  His memory is remarkable. 

 Apparently the 4th of July weekend is also Canada's independence as well and because of that we picked the biggest weekend out of the year to visit the falls. We just picked that weekend because it was the easiest for Brent to take off from work. So not the best timing but it was still amazing.

 
 Its amazing people have gone over the falls in barrels and lived!

   
  
  We waited in line for over two hours to go see the cave of the winds.  Usually they said the wait is much much less but the kids all agreed it was well worth the wait.  You go down an elevator and then walk through this cave and out to a walkway and decks.  It puts you out under the falls.  So much fun!

 This sweet little family is such a blessing to us! They feel like family to us.  It is always so encouraging to spend time with them. We've been spoiled because we saw them at spring break and now this summer.   We wish we could've stayed longer. 

 They take down the wooden decks and walkways each winter and then rebuild it all over again in the spring.  I found that fact really interesting. 

He liked the fact that he was looking at Canada!

  Pictures don't do it justice. 

  
 Everyone got sandals before you went out to the walkway.  Joel loves his and has worn them ever sense.

 I just love this girl!  She is such a gift from God and I'm very thankful for her friendship.   I'm so glad we've kept in touch all these years and its really fun that our kids are growing up together.  I had to laugh thinking about how she would babysit for MOPS when Colin was 6 months old so I would pick her up on campus and drive to MOPS.  Colin would scream his head off in the car and this weekend she heard Norah's screaming in the car! haha almost like we've come full circle! ha!

 

Niagara Falls was breathtaking and such a fun experience but I think our favorite times this weekend was just hanging out playing at their house together.