Wrapping up Summer

Well, school started three days ago, so I guess it's time to sum up our Summer.  It was good, fun and busy. Going in to Summer, I didn't feel like we had a lot going on - but boy it didn't feel that way.  We stayed really busy and it went by really fast!

After our camping week, Emma started her summer of ESY (Extended School Year). Her program was 4 days a week from 9-12, so that still left time to have fun together.

Heidi and Rachel were able to attend VBS at our church.  The theme was a '70's theme - "We Are Family" and they had so much fun.

One of the activities was a box maze. Here they are exploring it.

 

Heidi also attended VBS at her preschool church. She had a great time with that too! We are all still enjoying the music CD from the week.

Emma and Heidi were both able to attend Grammy Camp this Summer. My mom takes each of the grandkids individually for a few days and plans activities and field trips and general fun. This was Heidi's first time and she had a wonderful time! Part of both of their Grammy Camp experiences was gem mining.  At the end of Emma's camp time, we all went up and did it together.

That led us straight in to Independence Day. After the gem mining, the girls stayed with Grammy & Papa for the night so Jason and I could get up and run the Peachtree Roadrace on the 4th. It was particularly warm and we knew it would be, so we took it slowly. I think we both enjoyed it despite the fact we weren't as trained for it as we would have liked.
After the race, yummy brunch with a friend, and a shower, we drove back up to Dahlonega for their Independence Day parade.  Grammy was in the parade! We were trying to teach Rachel to keep the flags off the ground.

Heidi was enjoying taking pictures of everything - even the cars driving by before the parade started.

Enjoying the parade.

Flag waving.

Family Pic.

After the parade we packed up a picnic dinner to eat while we waited for the fireworks to begin. Waiting for the fireworks.

Almost fireworks time!

It was a really fun and tiring day!  We spent the night with Grammy & Papa and then got up early to drive home so Jason could get in to work.
Then we left the next morning to drive to Nashville for the US Boomerang Nationals. I didn't get many pictures, but it was INCREDIBLY hot while we were there.  The kids had fun trying to stay cool and making new friends.

In addition to the chairs and umbrellas, there was a baby pool that was a huge hit too! It was a great tournament and a fun time with all our boomerang friends.
The girls are interacting with our cats more and more. The cats are still rather timid around Rachel & Heidi (they move too fast and are too loud), but they do occasionally oblige the girls' desires to "catch" them and pet them.

The Olympic Games have wrapped up the Summer. I always enjoy watching the Olympics and I think I turned Heidi and Rachel in to Olympics junkies too.  Every day Heidi asked me to turn the TV on so she could watch whatever sport they were showing. Heidi's favorite was gymnastics and Rachel's favorites were beach volleyball and gymnastics.
Watching the Olympics.

Well, that's kind of our Summer in a nutshell. I'm not sure what all else we did - a few play dates with friends, swimming at the Y a little, visits to Champion Kids and Catch Air, and just general fun I guess.
School has now started (next post) and Fall activities are getting in to full swing!  Never a dull moment. But what fun would that be.

Camping!

As you may or may not know, we bought a pop up camper back in December.  We've camped in it a few times in our driveway, but had yet to get it out of the driveway. Partly because we had some work to do on the van before it would be a decent tow vehicle.  Well, the camper has now been out of the driveway!

Jason took the week off and we had our family vacation of camping. Our first stop was McKinney Campground on Lake Allatoona. Jason had met some people on a "pop-up blog" and some of them were getting together at this campground. It was really nice meeting some new friends, getting advice from people who have been doing this for awhile, and just knowing others at the campground. They even organized a potluck dinner on Saturday night - which was VERY delicious.There's already plans in the making for this group to get together again in September - we're planning to try to go.

I forgot to take a picture of our actual set up. But here's Rachel looking out of their bunk end.

And lunch at our campsite.

What the girls seemed to like the most about camping was that where we camped, there was always a "beach!" They really enjoyed being in the water and playing in the sand.

We spent two nights at McKinney. We then went home for one night - repacked and headed out again on Tuesday to Duckett Mill Campground on Lake Lanier. This campground was very quite - probably because it was mid-week. Each time we set up, Heidi and Rachel were in the mix wanting to help.

 Here's our set up.

And our view of Lake Lanier.

 Camping meals

Everyone helped with our campfires. Heidi & Rachel helped Jason gather the wood.

  And Emma helped by breaking the larger sticks in to smaller ones that would fit in the fire pit.

 Roasting marshmallows

We did not actually swim in Lake Lanier, but the girls did enjoy walking along the edge finding rocks and shells.  Yes - shells.  Who knew there were shells in Lake Lanier???

Rachel & Heidi found a rather large caterpillar on this log and wanted their picture taken with it. So, there is a caterpillar in between them. :-)

While we didn't swim in the lake, we did go to a nearby county aquatic center that was really fun. It has water slides, a little lazy river, and a playground in a pool that's only about 1 foot deep.  We all had a great time!

Camping fun!

 Sunset!

 Just because...

After 2 nights at Duckett Mill, we went home for the afternoon.  Jason had an appointment at a camper place to help us with our weight distribution hitch  While he was there, we got organized to head out one more time for the week. This time we went to Victoria Campground back on Lake Allatoona. This campground was nice and flat and perfect for riding bikes.

It is a really nice campground with a playground and a beach. Additionally, there is a day use area right next door with another bigger, nicer beach. Of course we checked them both out!

We were planning to camp three nights, but the forecast for Saturday night and Sunday was nothing but rain. We figured we might as well pack up late Saturday and head home dry rather than do it all in the rain on Sunday. It was such a fun time.  The girls seem to really enjoy camping!

Having the camping bug, and wanting to take advantage of the Summer as much as we can, this last weekend we went back to Victoria Campground on Allatoona. More of the same kinds of fun - except it was much warmer this time, so the lake was very inviting to all of us.

 

 

Here's our campsite.

Our view of the lake.

We took all of our bikes this time, so we took a few evening family bike rides around the campground.

Rachel has upgraded from her tricycle to a bicycle with training wheels. But she DOES NOT like to go fast.

Getting the campfire started to roast some marshmallows.

Now THAT'S a Smore!

I bought the gigantic marshmallows for roasting this time (don't think I'll do that again - a little too much of a good thing). I think it took Rachel about 8 or 10 bites to eat the whole thing. :-)

Yummy mess!

Daddy loving on his littlest girl.

The girls sleeping in their "bunk."

I believe it is safe to call camping with our pop up a success!  Everyone has enjoyed it and we've started having adventures and making memories!  Hopefully we'll be able to camp a couple more times before school starts back. At some point, we need to go camping somewhere without a beach so the girls learn there is more to camping than the beach! :-)  It's been fun!