Movie Star Nora

I don't remember what we were talking about, but it must have been important to warrant such drama!

Underwater

Just before our trip I got a new camera- it is an Olympus Tough, and it is really tough!  It is droppable, smashable, and goes underwater 50 feet!  The pool at the beach house didn't go that deep, but we had fun with underwater photos.  Elsa kept asking to use it herself since she can now swim underwater herself!

Cousin Lincoln loved throwing the dive toys in for Elsa to retrieve:

This is Elsa's first underwater selfie!

Sunsuit

The balcony/porch was safe enough for Beatrice to explore, and of course I took a ton of photos of her doing so.  (Recognize her sunsuit, Gail?  :)

  

More Movie Star Nora

Beach Baby

I think they were swapping shells or sticks, but either way, they were terribly cute.  Beatrice LOVED the beach, the shells, the sand castle walls, everything.  

She even loved the waves until one swept her pacifier away... then she tried eating the sand so it was back up to the pool we went.

Learning the Beach

The first morning at the beach the girls were a bit cautious - they played in the sand and dug at the waterline a bit and had a lot of fun, but were hesitant to get too much in the waves.  (The hesitation didn't last long - they were running in the waves by the end of the day!)

This was Nora's "safe" way to full her bucket with water:

Elsa got a bit braver, 

and then discovered that if you dug in the surf you find live mole crabs and live cochina shells that burrowed back into the sand after the waves pulled them up.  Everyday then she collected bucketfuls of "pets" that she watched and released the next day when she caught new ones.

Then we got super excited when we found the mermaid!

Froggie friends and fairy houses

The end of the school year and our summer so far has been so full of activity and travel.  Everyone finished school with flying colors.  Joel loved his first year in seminary and received top marks for his work.  I managed to not just survive our first year here but really enjoyed our first year homeschooling.  Since the school year ended Joel has traveled three different weeks for work (we are so thankful for his job - contracting with his former boss/company), I've sent the big girls to three different VBSs, and we've traveled to Illinois and North Carolina for family reunions.  We are looking forward to having about of month with minimum travel now to actually rest before school starts again!  

We are still liking our apartment and love having our backyard - Elsa still considers it a "wonderful and wild" despite its tiny size and my continued attempts to "tame" it into a submissive garden.  Two frogs have frequented our backyard despite Tabitha Twitchit's watchful eye - a four inch brown toad and this little tree frog.  The tree frog has been caught and released so many times I'm surprised he still sticks around!

We think the frogs like our yard because they are friends with the fairies who live at the base of the poplar tree in our yard.  Elsa has taken it upon herself to do regular house cleaning and yard work for them.