Oh, What do you do in the Summertime...

We have been trying to keep ourselves busy enough so that we do not get bored, but not so busy that we are worn out and are not getting the "break" that we need so badly from a strict routine. It has been (mostly) a fun challenge. At the beginning of the summer we may have had too much on our plate. Now we are looking forward to some time away from home for a little change of pace.

The beginning of the summer brought swimming and diving lessons. The kids are getting better at diving. Here is Katie attempting a front flip for the first time. Not bad!

Here is Christian getting ready to make his approach on the board...Katie has just gotten out.

Here is Katie doing a back dive...

And here is Christian just being happy as he is getting out of the pool.

They had a lot of fun. Katie wasn't sure she liked how much her body got smacked as it entered the water. But she thinks it might be worth the price to dive. We will see when we try again next year. Christian loved it, but isn't really getting it quite yet. But he is definitely not afraid of swimming in 11-13 foot deep water. He thought it was funny to swim across the dive tank when his swim class (not diving) was supposed to just be getting comfortable with the idea of being on the edge. (Picture, class on one side, Christian swimming to the other. :) Christian is a ham, so is still lovingly tolerated by his teacher. I stepped in to help and told Christian in front of his teacher that he can get thrown out of class if he didn't listen. He stopped.

We have had a lot of people over to swim in the pool and have invited many more. (Open invitation, if you haven't already received one). And that has kept us very busy and given Katie and Christian a lot of people to play with.

The reading program has been really good as it has helped us stay on track with having minimal reading at the very least. We seem to go in spurts depending on how much time in the pool we have had and probably how much time on the computer has been eaten up by their new webkinz. Luckily we already had time limits for "screen time" otherwise it might have been even rougher than it has been to kick them off. I have had to help them out "earning" kinzcash for their pets too. It has been fun. :). All sorts of ways to bond.

Hope your summer is fun. If you are too hot, come on over.