Body Surfing

This is probably the first summer that the boys have really started to feel more comfortable in the ocean.  If the waves are not too overwhelming, they love to body surf and boogey board, and are happy to stay in the water about as long as they can!

Of course, every now and then they have to take a break to explore and find beach treasures...

 

Norfolk Botanical Gardens

Oma and Papa took the boys on a bike ride through the botanical gardens.  I think it was a slightly more relaxed way for the kids to enjoy a bike ride without a lot of traffic and distractions!

Newspaper man

 The newspaper was in the van, although I'm still not sure why.  Rudy has gotten a big kick out of reading the apartment rental ads.  When we got home from the pool today, he was absorbed in the comics:

I told him I was going to run up and get in the shower.  When I came back down, he was sound asleep in the van with his newspaper: 

Computer fix?

We finally gave up hope on our old laptop, figuring that it would be so slow to be worth anything even if we could get it working.  The boys had a great time disassembling it with Papa!

Story time with Papa

These cousins sure are good buddies!

Charlie

Charlie usually sleeps under our bed or in her dog bed in the master bedroom.  I went to bed last night and couldn't find her anywhere, until I checked on the kids...

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Swim meet, round 2

The boys had another swim meet this week; it was Brady's second but Rudy's first.  It was HOT outside - a heat index of 103!  I think Rudy was pretty nervous, and I felt bad for him because he missed his heat for two of the three events he swam, one because he was in the wrong place (still unclear on whether that's because of him or a coach...) and one because his goggles broke.  He was pretty flustered by the whole experience, especially since he was already worn out from the heat and from soccer camp.  He seems to have recovered though and is ready for the next meet.

Their results were none too shabby:

• Rudy relay:  6th place, 3:07.18
• Brady relay: 3rd place, 2:12.10
• Brady 25 free: 11th, 26.19.  He still got 4 points for his team, since he was the top finisher for his team.  The other team must have been quite good; their first place finisher finished in 17.94!
• Rudy 25 free:  13th, 41.75
• Brady 25 back:  11th, 29.37.  Beat his previous time of 31.82 and was the second finisher for his team.
• Rudy 25 back:  9th , 39.22
• Brady 50 free:  9th, 1:05.22.  He was the top competing swimmer for his team.  First place overall was 40.06.  He was exhausted by this point; it was almost 10:00, still hot, and he'd spent all day at basketball camp!

Not a bad overall showing by the Garrett boys.

Love these pictures!

Basketball Camp

Brady went to the UVA basketball camp this week.  He's not a big enough fan to be completely awestruck by the 'celebrity' factor, but I think he did understand how cool it was that the head coach was on the floor every day working with the kids. 

And, if not, then the closing ceremony certainly wowed him at least a little bit!

Rainy day fun

What good is a muddy side yard if you can't play in it, right?

6!

Six years sure flies by quickly!   Rudy celebrated his birthday with multi-colored chocolate chip-and-sprinkle birthday pancakes.  We finished up the day with hamburgers, made by James, and presents:  golf clubs and a new scooter. 

Camping Party

Rudy wanted to have a camping party for his sixth birthday.  After some negotiation on location, we agreed to party at "Camp Whippoorwill," so he could invite all his friends without having to actually drag everyone to a campground.  (The selling point was the s'more cake!)

While we waited for all the kids to arrive, we had a longer-than-expected game of Rudy-invented "tent tag."  If you were tagged, you had to freeze in place like a tent, with your hands on the ground and your butt in the air, until you were unfrozen.  I expected the game to last about 10 minutes, but they played for closer to 40 minutes! 

Ike cheering for the tag players...

When they got hot and started to argue about the finer points of tent tag, we took a break for some watermelon.  

The snack quickly turned into an impromptu watermelon seed spitting contest.  I'm amazed at the distant these guys achieved!

Love Reagan's watermelon seed spitting face ;)

Lila, taking it all in...

Another game that evolved based on a suggestion from Miss Shar was the sleeping bag relay.  We filled the bottoms of the bags with Rudy's animals; the kids had to dive in and retrieve and animal before running over and tagging the next teammate.  The first round they could pick any animal, but we made it more challenging the second round by making them find a specific critter.

A

Next, it was a quick bug hunt.  I'd hidden about 60 plastic bugs in the circle for the kids to collect and keep.  Thankfully, no one came back with any real bugs!

The final game was the Camp Whippoorwill scavenger hunt.  The kids were quite dedicated to finding every item on the list!

Present opening in the tent...

The much-anticipated s'more cake!  Homemade graham cracker top and bottom, chocolate frosted brownie for the Hershey bar, and vanilla-frosted chocolate cake for the marshmallow. 

Ready for cake...

 

What's the best way to follow and super-sweet birthday cake?  With birthday s'mores, of course!

Rudy and Mary Emma...

Rudy and Ben...

My happy camper: