Cousin Camp - Monday

The morning started off rough ... K9 & C8 were a little exclusive and didn't want to include Q7. Q7 bit C8. Although when questioned, Q7 said her mouth was open and C7 put her shoulder in Q7s mouth JUST as Q7 as Q7 was shutting it. Hm. That sounds a little suspect to me. Anyway, C8 & K9 went off and played and Q7 spent the morning in her room.

After lunch, though, things picked up. I took them to Chillum Splash Pool, where we spent 2.5 hours in the pools, and 3/4 of an hour at the playground.

I got zinged for taking photos, but I didn't delete them. So, let's start with two videos. Not sure why they were doing bridges under water, but I thought it looked cool.

About 20 minutes before I planned to leave, they hit the lilly pads ... so much fun trying to walk across the pool on those pads. Q7 just swung across on the netting if she lost her footing. C8 fell in once or twice. And K9 was very deliberate and did not fall off the pads!

 

With this visit to the splash pool the girls found their cousin camp theme: Water. The first day they went to the pool (and the 2nd). The 2nd day they spent hours on water balloons. Today, the splash pool. Tomorrow they want to go to a public play-in fountain (and the library. And we have to go to piano lessons). The last day they want to go to a splashground, but it may end up being the sprinkler under the trampoline for a while, then the pool. Good summer theme, though, I think!

Cousin Camp

Cousin camp has begun~

OK, it isn't all the cousins. Just one cousin, K9. But I don't think I could take all of them from both sides. So far, we've done ... nothing special. Saturday we went to the pool and a pool birthday party (including pinata), C44 and I had Bánh mì (basically Vietnamese submarine sandwiches). Mine was rather un-Vietnamese, as I had no cilantro on it. But it was DEEEEE-licious. And the girls had pizza from Franklin's. And of course they stayed up late. So late that I had to separate them, and put Q in her bed. She railed at me for about 5 minutes then she fell in the crack between her mattress and the bookcase and fell asleep.

Today was similar. I sent them outside, they blew up water balloons for 3 hours then came back in. I sent them outside again, where they ate lunch, then they had a short period of time inside and then we went to the pool. We swam, ate baklava, and came home. They played outside before dinner (Go outside or do chores is my new mantra). Dinner, reading, bed.

Nothing special, but pretty much all fun.

Going to try to get them to sleep slightly earlier tonight ... possibly wishful thinking...

What a beautiful sight

Q7 has been singing a lot. This she made up earlier this year.

Silver Spring Fountain

We've done this before, of course, but the kids were begging to do this again after a Sunday morning at Kenilworth Gardens and then Eastern Market. I had a great time at Kenilworth Gardens, even found a leaf for a hat. Because those lotus leaves are BIG.

I had a hard time getting action shots of Q7 because she never stood still long enough. C8 loved just parking herself in the water so I was able to get some crazy ones of her.

 

There seems to be nothing better than getting soaking sopping dripping wet in the middle of town. We actually hadn't been for over a year, maybe two, and Q7 got there and commented that she had a picture in her mind of the fountain tiles as a rainbow. I think she was a little disappointed that it wasn't a rainbow, more of a swirl of blues with a sun-splash of yellows, but not so disappointed that she didn't go in.

Gymkana!

guest blogger Q7.

Gymkana was fun but we had to do cartwheels every morning but I mostly liked mostly everything. Birdcages were fun, especially on circuit (on the rings) not on daddy.

Cartwheels are horrible! I was bad at them. I was good at circuit.

Circuit is when we go on:

uneven bars (a high bar and a low bar together),


the rings (I bet you know about those),  

a moon bounce,


and parallel bars (parallel bars are two bars that are shortish and you do a little walk -- like a straight hare, a human hand walk, a kitten, and stuff like that on them).


The trampoline was super fun.

C8 liked the trampoline and balance beam best ... here she is!

New things

C8 is the same age that I was when I got glasses. Only she has one near-sighted eye and one far-sighted eye. Q7 also tested into glasses but she begged so much the eye doctor said she could wait 6 months and get her vision tested again to see if she still needs them. Fine. C8 didn't fuss at all during the exam, she even started talking about how she'd need glasses, etc. So we thought she was OK with it. Until we went to pick them up on Friday.

First she tried not going to the eye doctor's to pick up the glasses until I said we were going to Yogi Castle afterwards to celebrate getting glasses. When we got there she barely put them on when she tore them off again.  She had to try them on to make sure they fit correctly. She did not like that. She could barely stand to look at herself in the mirror.  But she did it. Until we left the store then the tears and crying started, so we had to go home instead of Yogi Castle.

Eventually, though, we got C8 to wear the glasses for some time here and there, and we did go out to dinner to celebrate. We had to take pictures on the sly. But look how cute!

The next day we got another sneaky shot at Udvar-Hazy  on Saturday ... even cuter when she isn't pouting.

I've told her she doesn't need to wear them to Gymkana this week and next, but by August 1, 2013 she should be wearing them full time.

W got a dose of Glasses-Reality when she was waving and yelling "Hi Lillian! Hi Lillian!" from the pool yesterday to a girl who was definitely NOT Lillian. I am not sure the lesson sunk in, but C44 and I took note of it.

Fourth of July Bike Parade

Is this just a rerun of last July? No. But the last few things I've posted about sure feel like it! We did the bike parade last year. But it was HOTTER. And we had two lovely visitors. And our AC was broken. Thank goodness the AC wasn't broken this year, but no guests. Although in June we had some AC issues while visitors were here. But back to the point at hand. Fourth of July bike parade at the pool!