Swimming!

Our summer travels and softball are over so we have been able to reclaim our weeknights and weekends again.  This means swimming...lots and lots of swimming!  The kids have been taking swim lessons twice a week for most of the summer now.  We were able to find a really good teacher through our neighborhood website.  She does half-hour personal lessons for about the same price we paid for group lessons at the YMCA.  It works out great because while one child is taking their lesson, the other can swim and play and then they switch.  The results have been great!  Elsie no longer dreads swim lessons and her confidence is back!  Owen is a fish regardless, but has shown a ton of growth this summer.

Last softball game of the season a couple of weeks ago.  Elsie is excited to play Fall softball with the same team.  It starts in late August.

Looking confident!

Definitely confident!

One thing that both kids just learned how to do is to dive for toys.  Elsie has been reluctant to put her face under in the past but she's over that now.  A few weeks ago I taught her how to get her legs up in order to push her body under.  Owen has been working on that too, but he still asks me to push him way under water so he can go down and get the toys.  It feels kind of funny to do that, like you are dunking him or something, but he begs me to help him. :)  I couldn't be more proud of the effort both of our kids have put in to get better at swimming this year.  They are loving it!

The other night we had the pool all to ourselves which was nice.

Last week we had Owen's preschool graduation party at a local bowling alley.  The kids all had fun bowling and the grownups had fun talking and reflecting on their kids and how awesome of a teacher they have.  For our kids it was their first time bowling, though they've practiced lots on the Wii.  :)

The big guy with his diploma!

We are sure going to miss Mrs. Laurie.  She's been an amazing teacher and we are to thankful to have found her.

Millie has been a good girl lately, so we've let her go upstairs more.  This is what happens...
At least she didn't jump in!

This weekend, Sarah and Elsie drove to Washington, MO to meet with the family and settle her Grandma's estate.  Owen and I stayed home to tend to Millie and have a "guy" weekend.  We started it off by watching Star Wars cartoons and eating pizza on Friday night.  Saturday we had breakfast at the Miami Co. Airport, went to see The Secret Life of Pets, and then hit up the swimming pool.  Fun stuff...

Elsie and Sarah stopped by to check out the Mizzou campus on their way to Washington.

Owen got to camp out in his own room on Friday night.

Both kids are looking forward to school starting.  Elsie has one week of Y-Camp left and then is going to spend the last week of summer in Boonville with Grandma and Grandpa Cas.  Owen has two weeks of preschool left.  It's going to go by fast!

Ryan, Sarah, Elsie, and Owen