Summertime fun with family

Whether we were home, or traveling, this summer was a great one for reconnecting with lots of family. We enjoyed catching up with "Uncle Charlie" while Emily and kids were in town. We had a fun visit with him and of course, the kids all got their fill of hanging on his back! He's so fun!

Austin and Jordan got a little boy date with John one day while Jordan and fam were in town. They went out for some fishing fun at a little pond near our house. From what I hear, they had a good time... looks like they enjoyed themselves.

They even caught some fish!

This is one of the few that they caught and released. They were proud.

We didn't get up to Kelsi's big sweet 16 bash, but we made our own litle version here with a cake and a few little gifts. Can't beleive how fast she has grown up into such a beautiful young lady! We were glad we got to celebrate with her.

It even worked out that we all got a rare visit from Grandpa Jack. He traveled through while Emily and kids were visiting at our house, so we all caught up for a couple of hours and enjoyed a short but sweet visit.

It was fun to have Emily, Kelsi, Jordan and Mareena here for a couple visits this summer too. It's great that everyone gets along so well and enjoys each other's company. The girls play house and dolls for hours and the boys play video games of all sorts for even longer... Kelsi goes out and makes all kinds of new friends and Cameron tags along with anyone who will welcome him. :-)

Thanks for all the fun visits everybody!

Out with a Bang!

We had our last swim meet of the season this past weekend. It was a quad meet, which meant that we were one of 4 teams competing against one another, compared to our usual 2. There were lots of swimmers in each age group, since there were so many teams. Both kids did well and we were so proud of Brooke for completing her first season. She loved it and really had a fabulous time. Her strokes improved a lot and she gained a lot of confidence in the water. Her favorite is backstroke and she won her heat 3 meets in a row with her backstoke. She has loved every bit of being onswim team and I know she'll continue to improve and love it more each season.

It was Austin's 4th season on the summer swim team and he enjoys it more each year. He really blossomed this season and at this last meet he was at the top of his game. We were so very happy for his success. So, in a nut shell, there were about 50 7 &8 year old boys at this meet and Austin got first place in 3 of his 5 events!! He got a 2^nd and a 3^rd in his other two, which are fabulous as well. He had an awesome meet and we were so proud of him. He loves to swim and it's so fun to see him develop his skill while having a great time. He really ended the season with a bang! Now he's just trying to talk us into signing him up for the year round team. J

He swam 5 races and below are the results:

Event 2 Boys 8 Year Olds 100 Yard IM (individual medley =one length of the pool doing each stroke-backstroke, butterfly, breaststroke and freestyle)

Name Team Finals Time

Estrada, Austin- Lakeway Lakers- 2:00.41

Event 14 Boys 7-8 100 Yard Freestyle Relay

Team Finals Time

1 Lakeway Lakers- 1:23.19

1. Piercy, TJ 8 2) Sandlin, Gray 7 3) Estrada, Austin 8 4) Linn, Reilly 8
   

26 Boys 8 Year Olds 25 Yard Freestyle

Name Team Finals Time

1 Estrada, Austin Lakeway Lakers - 19.59 10

Event 50 Boys 8 Year Olds 25 Yard Breaststroke

Name Age Team Finals Time

1 Govind, Keshav 8 Waac Rec Swim Team 27.05

2 Lasseter, Luke 8 Waac Rec Swim Team 27.73

3 Estrada, Austin 8 Lakeway Lakers-ST 28.69

Event 72 Boys 7-8 100 Yard Medley Relay (4 boys each swim one of the strokes in a relay – Austin was breaststroke)

Team Relay Seed Time Finals Time Points

1 Lakeway Lakers- 1:39.50

1) Piercy, TJ 8 2) Sandlin, Gray 7 3) Linn, Reilly 8 4) Hansen, Jake 7

2 Lakeway Lakers- 2:01.65

1. Conway-Malott, Kyle 8 2) Estrada, Austin 8 3) Bernick, Ethan 8 4) Burr, Weston 8
   

Organic Corn

You'd think I'd have lots of free time in the summer to do lots of blogging, but that
just hasn't been the case. I have certainly been enjoying my kids though. The first week of summer was full of great times like lake play, cousin visits, swimming, boating, playdates gardening and all around family fun.

The kids were especially excited today when they harvested their first ear of corn from their garden. :-) They have been carefully tending their garden for months. They water it, pick weeds, watch for squirrel thieves, and enjoy the reward for their efforts.

The corn hasn't been ready until today and they were soooooo stoked to be able to pick, shuck and eat the first ear. It was very cute to see how excited they all were after tending it for so long. Somehow, the corn was ever so much more delicious coming from their own garden.

Those farmer genes are in the blood and I'm very glad. :-)