Braving the Pool

I took the girls to the pool this afternoon for the first time this summer.  It's pretty hot here, so I figured it would be a good way to get some outside time after naps (or non-nap in the case of Miss).  My husband had a meeting, so I braved the pool on my own.  Through having the girls in the water at my sister-in-law's in the past few weeks, we have learned that Lass is fearless when it comes to the water, so I was a bit nervous.  I figured we'd be okay though since the pool has zero-entry and I put a floatie on her.  At first it was super easy, and I wondered what I had even been nervous about.  Sis sat in her car

seat in the shade and Miss and Lass splashed around harmlessly in less that one foot of water, pretty much right by my feet.  Then a friend, who is about two months older than Miss showed up.  It was great for the girls to be able to play with her, but her arrival disrupted our little peaceful, safe, easy playing.  She and Miss immediately headed for deeper water ("deeper" in this case meaning one to two feet) and of course Lass went right along with them.  They were playing "horsey" on some of those pool noodles.  That, in addition to the slightly deeper water, was enough to throw Lass off her balance a bit, and twice I went running though the water and hauled her up after she lost her footing and went face first into the water.  With the noodle under her she couldn't quite get her feet back under herself.  After the second time, I had to call it quits for Lass for today.  I think I'm going to get a more substantial life jacket and maybe we'll try it again in a few days.  That girl freaks me out.  She's my little dare devil.  

I really would love to have some photos of our pool time to post, since it was mostly lots of fun and the girls were, naturally, oh so cute splashing around.  But between hawk-watching Miss and Lass, trying to keep the sun off Sis (she was perfectly shaded in her car seat, but then got fussy, so I put her in the Ergo), and making life-saving dives for my middle child, the camera never made it out of my bag.  So instead, I'll share with you a few of the photos from last week at the farm.

Of course my husband did tons of fishing and the girls were very excited to see some of the larger fish he caught.  No filleting this time, though.

Foos-ball-room for the princesses to dance in.

We had a very big and somewhat scary storm the last night we were at the Farm.  It blew up right around snack time, so we took our stuff to the basement for a picnic.  The girls seemed unfazed in spite of all the thunder and lightning, the 40-50 MPH winds, sideways-falling rain and hail. 

Of course we celebrated Father's Day morning at the Farm before heading home.  During the week prior to our trip, I had the girls make Father's Day paintings.  They painted canvases for their Daddy.

Then Miss did paintings on paper for my Grandpa, my Dad, and my Father-in-law (Lass lost interest after her canvas was done).  At the end as she was finishing up the painting for my Father-in-law, her Papa, she decided it would be funny to stick her face in the still-wet paint.

She seems to be our little budding artist.  She really loves to paint anything.  She got really into painting some gourds with my Mother-in-law when we were at the farm.  She seems to understand the power of art to make people smile too.  When she created her painting for my Grandpa she said, "I think this will make Great-grandpa happy."  Yes, I think so too.