Summer Bucket List: Swim!

Okay, so this one may be a bit of a stretch...we planned on going to the other big pool for open swim, but the girls both took lessons at a different one this summer, so we spent a couple hours after their lessons on a few different occasions, so we checked it off!

And, what a great Poppy the girls have because he got in and even went down the slide!!!

Shortly after this picture was taken, Sydney did a jump and took her sweet time swimming to the side...the lifeguard jumped in and helped her over {even though she didn't really need the help} and boy did that upset her!  Needless to say, we left right after ;)

Sydney Turns Four!!!

For Sydney's fourth birthday, we wanted to do something simple and fun.  And, with the temperature still in the triple digits, there's not many choices besides swimming.  Good thing that sweet girl is a fish in the water and loves to swim!

We decided on a little hawaiian luau theme, with fun decorations and then Chick-Fil-A for dinner.  We planned a nice afternoon of swimming, food, treats and a piñata, but sadly a thunderstorm came in right as we were getting out of the pool and we had to postpone our piñata for another afternoon.

We watched her birthday video (which I still need to upload) and had cake before giving the girls their little party favor bags.  I thought they were cute...little Hawaiian bags that could be used whenever they come over to our house (because they are always forgetting/leaving things) filled with cute beach things like flip flops and candy. 

Sheri and Riley got her this giant Ariel balloon and made her this gorgeous Ariel dress.  She loves them both!

Sydney had a blast celebrating her big day with her friends, and I just can't believe that our baby is FOUR years old!  We love her so much.  She makes us laugh every single day!  What a gift she is to us!

Swim Lessons and Donuts!

We have been taking swim lessons {on and off} through the city pretty much since we moved her.  I think it will be about 4 years this coming January for lessons for Olivia.  We don't do them year round -- pretty much just in the summertime -- and sometimes it's 4x/week and sometimes it is just on Saturdays.   She has moved up from the Daddy & Me classes {see that post here}, breezed through tadpole, shrimp, duck, seahorse, otter, turtle and is now in frog!  She's such a great swimmer and just loves being in the water.

Sydney is in duck and is just waiting a few weeks so she can meet the age requirement to swim on into the seahorse class!  She's just as much a fish as Olivia is in the water.

Our evening classes are over for now and we are just to Saturday mornings, which makes it perfect for sleeping in a little bit and then rewarding their hard work with a little Bosa Donuts treat!  ;)

And, in case you wanted some swim pictures....

We Basically Swim All the Time

If we aren't at school or inside eating, chances are pretty good that we are swimming somewhere.  It's too hot to do much of anything else.

Liv LOVED her last teacher for swim, so I signed her up for lessons again each evening at 5 because he was supposed to be teaching them too.  {What was I thinking?!}  For some reason there is a different teacher, but Olivia is still rockin' the class.  My dad took her the first two days of practice and kept texting me about how she was beating all of the other kids in her group during their kickboard races!

Yesterday {yesterday!  Do you see how caught up I am!}, David and I took the neighborhood crew to the pool for public swim while Liv had her lesson.  She got to enjoy the slides before and after practice too.  While this heat is no fun, I am thankful for all the pools our kids are able to swim in AND for the fact that our girls are such good swimmers!

➹  This little fish right here can swim the entire length of our pool, take a short break, and swim right back to the other end! ➹

➹ Swimming is way more fun than homework! ➹

The End of Summer Break, Part 2

I guess I sort of jumped the gun with my last end of summer break post, because there were a few things that hadn't been included or hadn't been done yet!  So, here we go with part 2.

➸➸  I signed both girls up for swim lessons AT NINE AM the last week of summer break (M-Th).  My plan was to get us up and out of the house in the mornings in preparation for school starting.  It was tough, but I think it may have helped us out.  Olivia DID sleep until 10:30 on Friday morning, so if nothing else, it wore us out! 

On one of those days, I invited the neighbor girls to spend the night and go to the pool with us the next morning so they could do the open swim after the girls' lessons.  I think they had a blast at the pool, and they did such a good job of watching out for Sydney.  My plan was to leave at 1 {because, hello, 9-1 in 100+ heat is more than enough}, but I let the girls do a couple more jumps off the high dive.  I should have stuck to my 1:00 time frame because on Sydney's second to last jump, she started swimming in circles in the pool and I had to jump in to get her.  She was never in any danger, but she was taking forever to get to the side of the pool and the lifeguard was giving me the side eye. 

➸➸  We saw online that there were requests for school supplies and backpacks for some local children in need, so one afternoon Nana and I took the girls supply shopping.  They picked out all the colors of folders and papers and backpacks for another child and were so excited to go drop them off at the collection location.

➸➸  Olivia takes her lunch and a snack every day, so we tried to stock up on some new and different foods she might want at school.  

➸➸  While David was out of town, I took the girls on a Bahama Bucks shave ice date.  Olivia had picked up a new Lego Friends kit and did the whole thing while eating her treat.  This is her new favorite activity and my new favorite nemesis {tiny pieces EVERYWHERE}!

➸➸  We were missing Liv's friend, Ava, so we decided to go out for a special lunch date at the fancy Olive Garden.  The girls were so cute and felt so grown up!

➸➸  And, well, here's a couple more swim pictures!

Lessons in Swimming

The girls have been taking swim lessons for the last couple of months at one of the local pools.  I have seen SO much improvement in Sydney in swimming at home (not gonna brag, but that's mostly our doing, I think), but I have also seen improvement with her in listening to the instructors at swim lessons.  We tried lessons with her at the beginning of the summer and she wouldn't even stay on the steps of the pool for more than a minute before she would be off running to play in the splash pad.  Now, she sits in the group and is one of the best in her class.

Also, you may have noticed that posting has been a little slow in the last few weeks.  I am working on Sydney's photo albums and clearing up the 40,000 pictures that are stored on my computer!