I had a very fun, busy and relaxing weekend…

On Friday night my kids all slept over at Grandma’s with Gabriel and Shepherd.  I dropped them off around noon Friday and didn’t get them until Saturday morning.  I was so relieved to have all that time to myself.  I had also just cleaned the house so I was able to enjoy a clean house for almost 24 hours (almost unheard of).  I decide that a nap was a very good use of a quiet house.  After the nap, Tom and I had a date night and then he went to bed early because he had an International distance triathlon the next morning at Lake Norman.  Tom’s continuing goal is to be on the top three finishers in his age group.  He had yet to achieve this goal until this race. This time, Tom came in third place in his age group.  He works very hard at doing his best in these races.  When I raced a few last summer I just wanted to finish and have fun, he wants to win.  Third place was a great achievement.  Here he is crossing the finish line and up on the podium….

 

While Tom was at his race (which I didn’t go to because I was sleeping in with no kids), I went over to my mom’s to play with the kids and see Grandmama Pat.  Grandmama loves to come over to see the kids.  Today she wanted to see them swim at the pool and help in my mom’s gigantic garden.  My mom’s bean plants are so tall that Faith had to get up on an eight foot ladder to reach the top of the plants.  This picture is actually only half of her garden.  The other half has tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, squash and zucchini.

After gardening we took the kids to the pool.  It turns out that the best time to go to the pool is on a rainy day.  It had be sprinkling off and on all day, but without any thunder.  Instead of their being 100 people at the pool there was only ten, and we were half of them.  My dad played in the pool with the kids and continued to teach Gabriel how to swim.  My dad loves to play and to teach.  The kids were crawling all over him towards the end.  Wilson kept climbing on him and stealing his hat.  Wilson doesn’t know when to quit so he kept doing it over and over again.  It is usually either annoying or funny.  This time it was both.  I happened to catch an action shot since he couldn’t stop doing it long enough to take a decent picture.

Even after all that, our day was not done.  We went over to Jeff and Joanna Wise’s house for dinner.  The Youngs were invited also.  Faith, Robin and Colton are in the same Sunday School class together and so are Dallon, Jesse, Wilson and Miller.  The kids have become good friends over the past year.  It was time for all of us to get together outside of church.  The BBQ, sangria and conversation were all very delightful.  I would love to do it again sometime.  The Wises have a beautiful house and are very gracious hosts.  I love that all my friends have a relaxed house that  is very kid friendly.  It makes for such an enjoyable night.

This is Sidney, Bobby,  Jeff and Joanna….

The kids are now old enough to eat outside while we eat in peace inside. I am not sure if much eating was done, but they were having fun….