Under the Sea!

It is quiet at our house tonight. Kevin is on a mission trip. Hannah is at camp thru Friday. Alli is at a friend's house, and my little man Aaron is asleep. This is the week during the summer when I have mixed feelings about my husband and daughter being away from me. I am excited for these trips they are making, but I am so reminded that I am not in control and I have to trust the Lord to take care of my crew. The past few days I have sat around like a teenager hovering over my phone waiting to talk with my husband for just a few minutes. I am so glad to get to talk with him today and know that everything is going well for him. They saw 58 patients today and hoping for 60 plus tomorrow.

Hannah left for Centrikid Monday. She is having a great time. She absolutely loves this camp. It has been quiet this week without her. She is growing up so much. We are now shopping for the same size shoes. She still has 8 inches to catch up with me in height.

Alli is in cheer leading camp this week. She has spent lots of time with her best friend, A. They have been doing a lot of bike riding this week. The child enjoys life fully with a smile, except when her mom tells her it's time to leave the pool.

Aaron just loves to stay at home and chill. He does enjoy the pool, but he also loves the old cartoons his dad and mom grew up watching. Of course, there's the Wii and the DS--Mario, Luigi, Princess Peach, etc. Aaron's personality continues to amaze me. He has a little OCD about him, but in a good way. One of his favorite things to do right now is take out all the kitchen washcloths from the drawer, throw them on the couch, and then refold them into squares and stack them neatly back in the drawer. He also told me that he was not going into kindergarten next year, that he was still in the 4 year old class. He says he is ready to go back to school and he loves the work. I can't wait to see what he says come August.

This weekend my mom came to visit for a few days. While she was here, we made a trip to the aquarium, which is also hosting the Titanic exhibit this summer. The kids really enjoyed seeing all the sea creatures, watching Deepo's 3D movie, and seeing the Titanic exhibit. Aaron did not care for the exhibit much. Before you go into the exhibit they give you a boarding pass that has a person's name on it who was actually on the Titanic. Towards the end they list all the names of the passengers and whether they survived or not. So you get to look up your person's name and find out if they survived. We all survived but Aaron. His person had two sons with him. He had been going thru a divorce and custody battle. The sons survived. The man thought that when they got to America things would work out and he and his wife would be reunited. I could have spent a long time in the exhibit reading all the info, but some little boy I know kept pulling me forward. He was ready for lunch!

P.S.- This post was started on Tuesday evening, but didn't get finished till Wednesday!

Back to Reality!

Unfortunately all vacations must come to an end, so Sunday we bid farewell to St. George Island and made our way home. I think I could have stayed for an entire month. I think St. George has been our favorite beach vacation so far. We hope to return again at some point in the future. It truly is a vacation from the hectic world we live in. We did cook, wash dishes, and wash clothes, but the rest of the time was sitting on the beach, playing in the pool, fishing, reading, watching t.v., playing the ds nintendo, and taking a few naps.

I won't forget our fishing trip that Kevin chartered with a guy at Indian Pass. It was planned for Friday morning. I agreed to go as long as they had a bathroom close by the dock. If you have had several babies, you will understand where I am coming from. Well, Kevin checked it out and asked if there was a restroom. The lady told him, "yes, there's one at the dock." The lady also told him we would be fishing on the bay and we would fish for fish we could eat. We finally get there and I asked Kevin to find out where the bathroom was, so I could take care of that issue before we got on the boat. He came back to the car and said, "Karen, there's your bathroom over there." Oh yes, it was a port-a-potty. I could just imagine how long it had been sitting there. I survived and decided I had been in one in Atlanta when I participated in the Peachtree Road Race that had smelled worse. So we all loaded onto the boat, ready to catch some big fish! Well that little boat carried us out into the gulf, not the bay. After about 30-40 minutes, Aaron starts whining about his tummy hurting. To be honest, I think all of us were a little on the nauseated side. You couldn't stand up on the boat without getting knocked around by the waves that were tossing the boat around. After two and a half hours of fishing, Kevin had caught one shark. The guy must have felt bad because he started fishing for sail cats (catfish) and by the time our time was up, the kids had caught 10 sail cats. The guy would cast the line, hook the fish, and then let the kids do the rest. We enjoyed our little trip, but I think we were all exhausted. I slept for about 3 hours when we got back to the house.

We got a late start to our day on Saturday, but we packed a lot in after lunch--beach, swimming in the pool, riding bikes, cooking catfish, pictures on the beach at sunset, and washing laundry. Saturday was a big day for me because I finally tackled something that I have wanted to work on for a long time. All three of my kids know how to swim. Their mother, however, has been dog paddling for years with a fear of putting her head in the water. This has bothered me forever, but I never have been able to overcome this fear. Since we had a private pool at the house where we stayed, I decided this might be the week for me to work on this issue. It took me all week to work up the nerve to put my head in the water. Well, Saturday, with my three little encouragers in the pool with me, I put my head down and swam. I think they were as excited as me. I enjoyed this sweet time with them. What a blessing my kids are to me!

Well, I truly hated leaving Sunday morning. I love the beach. I love to sit and listen to the waves roll in. It's so peaceful! When I am sitting there, I can't help thinking about how big our God is and how great He is! On a funny note, if I was planning life for Kevin and I when the kids are all grown up, it would be for Kevin to get a job on a cruise liner(such as Disney), and then retire and live on St. George Island. Hey, nothing wrong with dreaming! You can tell where my favorite two vacations have been.

So Monday morning, we were back to reality. The girls are enjoying a week of basketball camp and today we got to spend a few hours at the pool with friends. I am savoring these summer days!