Rainbow

This afternoon we were gifted with a beautiful rainbow.

And it was a complete rainbow.

I can't help but marvel at the beauty of God's creation.

Grace is swimming

Grace has learned to swim all by herself!

She can even jump off the diving board.

She always looks so funny as she jumps.

And makes as big of a splash as she can.

Then she paddles her way to the ladder ready to do it all over again.

I'm really amazed at how well she's swimming this year.

Last year she could barely float.

And now she's jumping and flopping and swimming just like a fish.

I mean a real live mermaid of course.

Wet and Wild

Today I took the kids to Wet and Wild Wednesday.

We arrived right before it started so we had the kiddie pools all to ourselves.

I was surprised to see all 3 kids playing in the baby pools.

but it didn't take Grace long to head over to the big kid slides.

Faith kept playing in the kiddie pool until the other 200 or so kids arrived.  Then she hung out with me and Benjamin under a tent watching all the fun while eating watermelon and peanut butter sandwiches.

But Grace was fearless and went up and down those waterslides until it was finally time to go home.

Exploreum

Today the children and I played at the Exploreum.

Faith and Grace hopped on the ship after walking the plank.

Benjamin, however, wasn't quite sure where to begin.

So Faith splashed him with "water" while yelling, "Ahoy!  Ahoy!"

Then Benjamin realized that the water was actually balls!

After that we went to play with the pendulums.

Faith pulled hard.

And Grace tugged, too.

Then together they finally made it work.

After that, we headed to the Hands On Hall.

We made parachutes and flew them to the sky.

And then we found marbles and tubing.

So we built some mazes along the wall and let Benjamin drop the marbles in.

What a fantastic way to beat the heat.

Faith likes to shake it and make it, too

This morning Faith dressed herself.

As a "boo-full pinsess" (a beautiful princess) nonetheless.

Then she asked if she could, "say-K it to may-K it, too.  Pri-ee peas?"  

(Shake it to make it, too.  Pretty please?)

For some reason Faith really emphasizes the K sound instead of T.  So "Right" become "WhyK"  and "okay" becomes "oh-tay")  

And of course, I let her make it all by herself.

Shake it to make it icecream

We saw Nanna and Gran yesterday and they had a surprise for Grace.

A shake-it-to-make-it-ice cream maker!

So we put some ice and table salt with a splash of water in the bottom container.  And then we added some heavy cream and a pinch of sugar with a dollop of vanilla to the top container.

And then it was time to shake it to make it!  Grace rattled and shook her ice cream for three full minutes.

The result?

A perfectly sized single serving of delicious homemade ice cream.  What a fun treat!

Pediatrician visit - Benjamin's 1 year checkup

Today we went to the pediatrician for Benjamin's 1 year check up.

He now weighs 27 pounds 10 ounces and is 33 inches tall.  

Benjamin is officially off the charts in both his height and weight categories.  To compare, Faith is almost 2 years older than Benjamin but he already outweighs her by a few ounces and is only 5 inches shorter.  I have a feeling that Benjamin will be bigger than both Faith and Grace in just another couple of years.  He's a growing boy - that's for certain.

He also received is pneumococcal conjugate, Hepatitis A, Chickenpox, and MMR vaccines today.