Summer

The girls finished another great school year and are quite happy to have summer break. I was looking forward to the break as well, but now that we are almost 4 weeks into summer, there are days when I am ready for school to start back again. It could have something to do with all the whining that starts when I say we need to go to the grocery store or something else that none of them want to do!

The week before school ended we were happy to celebrate with our niece, Emmie, on her high school graduation. We are so proud of her in what she has done and overcome in the last 4 years and only wish her the best in her years at Rhodes.

The day after school ended, we headed an hour north to Helen, GA, where we rented a house with Bill's mom and sister Elizabeth's family. It was a great 4 days where we hiked to 2 beautiful waterfalls and went tubing on the Chattahoochee. We tried to fish, but we weren't very successful, which could be attributed to a 3 year old not making things easy or just to the lake not having much available. Elliott brought some GA fireworks (not the real deal), which were great for us, especially since the girls still don't love all the noise that comes with most of them. The tubing was most of the excitement since Elizabeth ended up flipping and went under for almost a minute. Katherine ended up getting out of her tube to help, which ended up flipping Lauren. Lauren was not phased and just wanted to swim, but Katherine was holding her and the tube and just didn't know what to do. Bill, Kaitlyn, Alexa and I were tied together and just before we met up with them, Alexa ended up flipping, but I grabbed her just as she hit the water. Alexa was a little frightened, so she stayed with me and then Katherine was able to throw Lauren in Alexa's tube. We were all finally able to meet up and get everyone in their proper tubes and untie everyone so it was just 2 tubes together, so I got to deal with Alexa crying most of the rest of the way since she was so afraid to flip again. It was a crazy ordeal, and I really didn't do it justice, but we all ended up safe, which is the most important thing. The funny thing is that when we were trying to decide what to do the next day, our fearful and cautious Kaitlyn is the one that wanted to go tubing again. Lauren and Alexa did not want to go, but for different reasons since one wanted to do other things while the other was afraid. But in the end, we all went again since Lauren decided to go and Alexa just wants to do what her big sisters are doing all the time. This time it was smooth sailing after the first 10 minutes of Alexa being afraid of flipping every time we would see some rapids. All in all, a great time with the family and a great start to summer.

On the way home from Helen, we stopped in Dahlonega to pan for gold. We toured an old gold mine, which the girls weren't too interested in, but it was amazing to feel the difference in temperature when you head down 200 feet into the earth. The girls did enjoy panning for gold and then finding some gems in a bucket of sand.

Kaitlyn is in her 3rd straight week of camp (1st tennis, then vacation bible school and now flute camp). Not like I remember from my youth of spending my summers at Wanakah, but she is enjoying herself. The tennis camp was 9 - 3pm, so long days in the 90 degree heat and humidity, but Kaitlyn enjoyed herself until she had to compete against the other kids, but she couldn't get a serve in, so it was very frustrating for her. This flute camp is really band camp for beginners, so it is to see if she wants to play the flute (which was mine and my sisters growing up).

Lauren has been doing swim team and seems to be enjoying it, but there are times when she just wants to play and stay under the water. Lauren has already had 3 swim meets with 2

to go, and she has also drastically improved her time for both 25 yard free and backstroke from the 1st meet. We pretty much have to drag Lauren out of the pool every time we are there, and we have a hard time finding her with her going from the diving pool to the slide pool to the lap pool to the kiddie pool. Lauren has also been thinking about what she wants to do when she grows up, and she is deciding between a dolphin trainer, a star and a veterinarian. She is hoping to move to NYC and to somehow combine them all. I just hope that she can do what she dreams because she would be an amazing star!

As for Alexa, she is just loving the pool. Alexa loves to have her sisters around, but hates it when they are always locking her out of their rooms. Alexa just seems to get into everything and messes all their games up, so I have a hard time making them include her in everything. Alexa and Lauren also seem to have a love/hate relationship, so I am always trying to break up some kind of disagreement between them.

So that has been our summer so far. Pool, pool, and more pool.