And Then There Were 2!!!: The 8th Week of Summer 2015

The 8th week of summer started with us hanging out at home, still recovering from our emotional and quick journey to Virginia...we had flown up late Tuesday night and returned early Thursday morning, so I could go to work Thursday afternoon.

Sunday afternoon we went to a local church to participate in the The Compassion Experience, an interactive exhibit that allows participants to step into the daily life of a child living in poverty. As I struggle to help Tate understand how blessed we are, not only monetarily, but spiritually, physically, emotionally, I wanted us to participate. We really enjoyed the exhibit. We chose to experience the life of Julian, a young girl from Uganda...it was a 20 minute walk through her life as a young girl. Tate was as interested as I was, asking questions and taking in the Julian's environment on display. When we finished the tour we chose a young child to sponsor as well. I'm excited to write to him and to hopefully foster a lifetime of giving in Tate.

This is Julian now teaching in Uganda, her home

What is even more amazing is that one of my sorority sisters from college saw my post of Facebook about our visit to the Compassion Experience. I posted those same 4 pictures on my wall. It turns out that Debbie, my sorority sister, knew Julian!!! Julian flourished with the The Compassion Experience and went to college at Baylor University for her advanced degree. Debbie said she had the pleasure of driving Julian to and from campus while Julian attended Baylor! She said that Julian was always saying how good God was :). I would have to agree!! For Tate and I to have chosen to learn her story and then to know someone who knows Julian is amazing! And to know that really and truly this organization helps really made me happy to help support them!

Monday, Tate started his last week of Kidventure Camp which he loves. At drop-off he runs off with nary a backwards glance. I always feel like an outsider as he runs off :). I have to ask for him to come back for a kiss and/or hug. I'm so glad he's so comfortable and that he enjoys himself so much.

Tuesday my friend N picked Tate up from camp for me and took the kids to the pool. Well she said it was the pool. She sent me a couple of pics of the kids having fun at the pool while I was still working. This is nothing like the pool I was anticipating!

Isn't that amazing? This is the local pool in one of our neighborhoods. The kids had a blast. I made my way there after work to pick up Tate and we motored on home.

The only issue with all of this was that Tate was exhausted. I knew it would make for a late night having to drive to the pool, so not arriving there until 530, having to get him changed, so we didn't leave until 545. Then we were stuck in horrific traffic as I anticipated. So it made for a very long day for my boy. We didn't get home until 625, and we still needed dinner. He was a hot mess of whining and frustration. But we made it through. I however know that that's not something we can do on a regular basis. We are always being asked to come play after work, come to the pool with Tate when you get home. That makes for a very long day for a 6 year old who has to be up by 6am to go to various camps. So we just don't get to do those summer evening activities, and I feel bad about that, but really, what do I do? So we make up for it, I hope, with unstructured summer afternoons and hanging out on weekends!

I came to the end of camp rally on Friday. I love how he loves finding my face in the audience and beaming with pride and excitement. They asked for volunteers to come to the front to tell everyone what their favorite part of camp was...one boy and one girl from each of the two age groups. Tate got chosen for his age group! My little boy loves to be in the spotlight!

Tate and his counselor, Ms. V!

The performances were fun!

Friday night was Game Night and Movie Night which has really become Pizza and Movie Night. I need to work on getting a game or two back into our repetoire. After much fuss and complaining on his part we watched 'Monsters Inc'...I instituted a 'you choose this week's movie, I'll choose next week's' about a month ago after we watched 'Cars' for 3 weeks in a row. I get lots of complaints and tears about how he doesn't want to watch my choices, but each time I just turn the movies on, and he ends up trying hard to not look interested or watching and lo and behold watches the movies in their entirety and telling me how much he liked them! Sigh. But it works. So he didn't want to watch 'Monsters Inc.' I said fine, but that's what I'm putting on. This time I had to tell him he had to watch for 10 minutes and that I was going to set the timer. So he grudgingly came over to watch and I set the timer for 10 15 minutes, and he was hooked! When the timer went off I told him he didn't have to watch anymore, and he looked at me like I was a loon :)

Saturday ended up being one of our best days of summer. We went over to my friend Bryan's to go swimming in his pool for a bit. Ended up spending the entire morning hanging out in the heat while the kids swam...our friend Alison came with her two and Bryan's sister came with her 3 from out of town along with Bryan's parents. Of note, Bryan does not have any kids :) It was so nice to just hang out and drink mimosas while the kids had an absolute blast. Bryan got in with the kids after a bit to cool off, then Alison's husband showed up and jumped in with them as well. But the kids were great in the pool alone most of the time!

And Tate! Well Tate is a rock star! He's been struggling trying to figure out how to dive under water to get rings off the bottom..not diving into the pool, but diving under the water. He always ends up floating immediately back to the top. As little as two weeks ago, he couldn't do it. We've practiced together at our neighborhood pool with me giving him a push on the head or back, and he's been working on it in swim lessons since we started 5 years ago. I told his instructor that that's what he wants most to get better at. Well lo and behold he's figured it out!!! I am so very proud of him!!! And he's so very proud of himself!!!

Saturday late afternoon we had a birthday party at an indoor swim school! Tate passed the swim test (of course :) ), so he didn't have to wear a life vest. He had an absolute blast!