More Lake...

The lake is becoming a common theme this summer! It is so nice to have calm water and a beach close by (as opposed to the ocean which I am not a huge fan of!) Charlotte tried out her new swim vest, which she wasn't thrilled with. I told her it would help her learn to swim, which she translated into "this will make me swim". She was not pleased to find out that it doesn't provide much floatation and she much prefers her swimmies.

Caroline went right into the water and swam out to Chris and Charlotte.

 They had such a great time!

Later that week the girls and I went back and met Jenni and Marcus to play. 

I got the girls little inner tubes which they loved.

 Charlotte was in the lake pretty much the whole time. She found some friends to swim around with and I hardly saw her!

 Since Chris was at work, I packed the wagon to help carry the stuff down to the lake. Of course this meant that Caroline was obsessed with sitting in it. Jenni stepped up and gave them rides up and down the beach. Marcus and Caroline loved it, but I had to listen to Charlotte complain that she didn't get a ride, (she make the wagon a little heavy for us pregnant mom's to pull!) All in all it was a fun day!

Lake George

A few weekends ago Mom's long time friends Richard and Valerie invited us up to their lake house to go swimming. Their granddaughter is Charlotte's age, and their grandson is Caroline's! (Although he napped like a good little child all afternoon!) Charlotte was eager to get in the water and get swimming!

 She has really come a long way in the water since last year!

 The girls took a break to get sandy and dirty!

 Then there was more swimming. Caroline loved the little star float.

 Of course, like her big sister, she wanted on the floaties, so Mimi took her swimming. Everyone had a great time!

Lisa's Visit- Phone Pictures

Lisa was very brave and decided to fly into New York City and spend a couple nights there before taking the train up to see us. So, the girls and I got to go to the train station to pick them up. The train station wasn't what I remembered, and there wasn't really a place to wait besides outside, so the girls sat on the ledge and watched for their train!

Charlotte was super excited to see them when they arrived!

Its a good thing we have a van, because we just hardly fit!!!

We stayed at Mom's for the first two nights before heading home. I think we gave Mom a slight heart attack.

Picnicking...

Ice Cream...

One of the reason's we stayed at Mom's was to go to the Drive In's with the big kids!

We came home and the kids were excited to have the run of the house and endless toys, although they always seemed to want the same toy...

I think Markus felt about the same as Chris when he is surrounded by girls!

We stopped to feed the Trout.

4th of July at the beach.

On our way to fireworks!!! It was a heavy wagon load!

Lisa's Visit- 4th of July Part Two

After we woke up from naps we got showered and ready for Fireworks.

We went outside to take a few pictures before everyone got dirty!

Lisa so wonderfully braided Charlotte's hair AND made dinner!!!

Chris brought out some poppers and the kids had a great time.

Then came the sparklers. They were all a little timid at first.

Markus with fire is a very scary thing!

The girls were very excited to head out for fireworks!

But first we roasted marshmallows, or it was more like sticking them in the fire and then eating them!

They were sure to make a big sticky mess!

We then headed off to the park to watch the fireworks. Luckily we left in enough time because on the way there I got a message that they were changing the time by a half hour because of the weather! We ran to the fields and got there with about 5 minutes to spare! The kids loved watching them, even Caroline. The best part was when she army crawled back to us from where the girls were sitting when the finale started (with a big grin on her face!) She is so her father's daughter! We walked back to the car and got there just as it started pouring!!