Summer fun

We are hanging in there trying to survive this sweltering heat! Did I mention that Daniel loves to play Uno? Some dear friends of ours got him Toy Story Uno for Christmas and we play it ALL the time!! We are also enjoying swimming (his lessons are going great!), watering our tomato plant (it's getting so big!) and going to Karate 3 times a week.

I can't believe school is about to start. Their first day is on August 11th. Whoa! What happened to the summer? Daniel will be going into First grade! We were wavering at the end of last year if he should repeat Kindergarten (to get another year of maturity under his belt) or move on to First grade. We really prayed over it and deliberated over the decision and in the end, he scored so incredibly high on the aptitude tests (95th %ile in reading and 91st %ile in math!!) that we just couldn't bear to make him repeat. He definitely needs to mature a bit and we are full of trepidation about the new school year, but he needs a new challenge and he wouldn't find that by repeating Kindergarten.

We are excited that he will be moving to a Christian school for 1st grade. We had him in the public school last year so he could take advantage of their ESL program and learn English but we are so excited to get him into a Christian environment. We feel the Bible focus in conjunction with their teaching will be so great for him. And he is going to be at Jason's alma mater! (Go Centurions!)

They are having summer camp graduation at Karate school this weekend and he is testing for his yellow belt. So I will have much to post about soon!

We are trying to cram in as much fun into the last 2 weeks of summer as we can.......

Summer Vacation

We decided to head north and try to find some cooler temperatures for our vacation. We enjoyed exploring northern Michigan. Here are some cute shots from our week.....

Daniel running in the sand at the Sleeping Bear sand dunes:

He loves swimming at the pool. Our latest trick is diving for these sticks:

Pirate Cove mini golf was also a big hit:

The lake was cold, but we still enjoyed splashing around and digging in the sand:

We also rode a jetski out to an island and found one of the oldest geocaches in the world!

A good time was had by all:

We were in Traverse City for the National Cherry Festival. It was quite crowded and there were lots of fun activities going on. They had rides and food booths. Daniel rode the Ferris Wheel and the Tilt a Whirl (a boy after mom's own heart). If you ask him now - what was your favorite thing on vacation? He will tell you - the rides and sleeping in the hotel. (funny - I would have thought swimming or the jetski - oh well!)