The many adventures of swimming lessons

Sean has been taking swimming lessons at the aquatic center in Renton for the past two weeks. This is his third and final week of lessons. It has been really fun, not just for him, but also for Cami (and therefore for me too) because there is a fountain area where kids who are not currently in lessons can play, and because it is a large open area where she can run around (as long as I keep her from running into the pool areas).

Sean in the water:


Cami loves this dolphin. It's unfortunate that it's a garbage can.



Getting some sun while brother is in the water:



Sean loves playing in the water fountain after class:



To commemorate swimming lessons, we made a water-themed cake as the treat for family home evening this week. Sean decorated it himself:



And ate it himself (well, not ALL of it):



Hooray for swimming lessons (and cake)!

Picnic and playing at the park

A little while ago we went out with some friends to eat lunch and play at a park. It was a really cool park, with a rock climbing wall, a lake, and of course, plenty of toys to play on. Here is Sean having some fun:



Cami kept considerately giving me handfuls of wood chips:



Cami doing some exploring:



Cami riding on a toy with one of our friends:



Unfortunately I didn't get many pictures of Sean--he was running around too much for me to get very good pictures of him. But they both had a very good time!

Fourth of July on the Fourth

On the Fourth itself, we went over to visit friends for dinner and some fireworks. Although we had to leave a little early due to tired kids, we had a blast while we were there.

This is actually Sean's first experience with sparklers, since the city of Renton (where we lived before moving to our home this spring) does not allow ANY fireworks within the city limits.



Cami was very interested in the fireworks too:



So Mommy helped her hold a sparkler:



The large fireworks weren't starting till 9:30 and their bedtime is normally 7:30 for Cami and 8 for Sean, so we didn't have them stay up for it. They really enjoyed watching the small fireworks though, and were so tired that they slept right through all our neighbors setting off fireworks till midnight.

Fourth of July on the Third

Our new ward has an annual pancake breakfast in celebration of the Fourth of July. This year it was on the third, since the fourth was a Sunday. It was really fun, especially for the kids.

This is Sean and his scooter after we finished decorating it for the kid's bike parade. Sorry to include our unattractive garbage cans in the picture, it couldn't be helped:


Cami yawning on the way to the breakfast celebration:



Sean enjoying some pancakes:



Cami on the fire truck:



Sean on the fire truck:



Sean riding his highly decorated scooter in the bike parade:



Sean in the rowboat that was on the property:



And here is Sean climbing a tree with some other kids:

Cami's new hairbrush

Cami picked up a sponge paintbrush today from the toy box. She looked at me and made a "huh"? noise, so I told her it was a paint brush. Apparently she understood the word brush but not the word paint, because she immediately began trying to comb her hair with it.