Late summer fun

We take as much sunmmer as we can get!  It's not that I don't like Fall actually, it's just that thought of how LONG it will be until the nice weather will come around again.  If I could just get rid of Feb-April I'd be fine:)

Labor Day weekend started with picking the kids up from school and heading in to Grandpa's for one last round of swimming!  The kids did so good this year.  Max has it down perfectly as far as keeping himself afloat and swimming where he needs to go.  For the first time he jumped off the diving board and swam all the way to the side (and one time all the way down to the shallow end of the pool!) all by himself.  I had good intentions of getting swim lessons in but never had the time so I'm very relieved we achieved this milestone as well.  Aliyah is pretty much there too.  She does very well and can almost get to where she needs to on her own.

They're rebuilding a bridge down the road, the kids like to check the progress when we visit.

I had a few free tickets to the Whitaker Center and last Saturday was a cool rainy day.  The kids always ask to go there when we drive by so they were thrilled.  We got there soon after it opened and there was hardly anyone there.  We had a very fun morning!

 A hurricane!

My soccer dude!  He decided this Fall he wanted to play real soccer (they had done the soccer shots classes a few times) so we signed him up.  At the last minute his coach fell through so I'm also coaching.  It's a good group of 7 boys, only one who has ever played real "game" soccer before.  They are doing great!

For my mom's birthday I gave her an IOU for us all to go to a Reading Phillies game sometime.  After all our trips (Uncle Jim, Aunt Brenda and Brian also met us there) it was getting towards the end but we got a game it.  It was a beautiful and fun evening, ending with fireworks at the game!

Our church's annual Labor Day picnic!

It was really hot, with little to eat and the hot sun, it was a little too much for this peanut to take...

A fun Saturday activity.... I can't say it feels like Fall today but it was a nice day for apple picking!

SCHOOL!!!

I can't believe the day is here but it is!  They're BOTH off to big kid school.  I don't know where the time has gone, but at the same time, I can hardly remember not having them and babies seem like SO long ago.  I'm so proud of the awesome kids they're turning out to be.  We're also really blessed to have such a wonderful school for them to go to.  Upon request and favors Aliyah has the same wonderful kindergarten teacher Max did and is just loving school.  We were also blessed with a wonderful 1st grade teacher for Max who he is really enjoying.  We still have Max's "normal" nervousness, mostly with the bus, and reluctance to just want to do the whole school thing in general (as opposed to just hanging around playing all day), but we're working through it all and they're enjoying school.

The first day went very well.  Despite nervousness leading up to the big day, they were bouncing off the walls in the morning and had no reservations getting on that big bus (with the assurance they could sit together).  So it was nice I didn't have to cry until the bus drove away:)

Shenandoah Crossing