May 29

A few weeks ago, I mapped out a rough outline of what our summer weeks would be like. I decided then that Friday would be "Adventure Day".

Today was our first real Adventure Day, and I wanted to do something exciting and new. But when I spread out the cards with all of our options in front of Caleb, he chose an old favorite: playing in the sand at a local beach. We invited Stella and her mom, Jessica (who is 39.5 weeks pregnant!) to join us, and had a lovely time.

It was an overcast day, with storms forecast for the afternoon, but the kids still wore sunscreen and their sun hats. And of course Daisy wore a party dress to the beach. Doesn't everyone do that? This dress is her current favorite, and she wears it everywhere.

This was the first time Stella had been to this beach, but she knew just what to do in the sand.

Jessica, Eli, and I lounged on our blankets in the shade, but apparently it was still pretty bright in the shade?

Several times during our visit, dark clouds rolled in. We really thought we were going to be rained on, but it always passed.

Then we broke out the bubbles.

Jessica is much more patient than I am - she helped all of the little ones with their bubbles. I meanwhile, took pictures and bounced a tired Eli in his ring sling.

Hi, sweet Lily!

The girl rubbed sand into her hair, creating a complete mess. Even after a bath and vigorous shampooing, there is still sand in her hair.

Eli eventually fell asleep in the ring sling. And then, when we weren't even expecting it, the rain came. At first it was light, and we thought we could ride it out. We moved most of our stuff to the shelter of a tree and tried to feed the kids lunch, but soon the rain came down in earnest. Jessica and I hurried to gather everything up and scrambled to get all of the kids to our cars. She lives the opposite direction from us, but we both found that when we got to our homes it was sunshiny and beautiful. So it goes. The kids still had a great time at the beach!

Once we were home, I quickly threw the older three kids in the tub to wash off all of the lake water. Then lunch, then naps...Around 3:00, Eli woke up. Once again, I tricked Caleb into climbing into the big bed with us, and once again I was rewarded with the sweet, sweet silence of all four children napping at the same time. It was lovely, and it lasted about an hour and a half.

After dinner, we headed to the pool. Chris has taken the older three to the pool twice already this week, so they were old pros.

Caleb is a little fish, and enjoyed swimming on his own and playing with the kick board and inner tube.

Daisy was much more cautious: she stuck to the shallow section and the kiddie pool.

Lily mostly stayed out of the water,  unless Chris was holding her. But isn't she cute in that polka-dot suit?

Eli was content to lay on a blanket and kick his legs and wave his arms.

What, you want to see a video of Eli's delighted wiggling? If you insist...

I am confident that he was wiggling and kicking like this because he really, really wanted to get in the water with his siblings. But since he's so little, and it's so early in the season, and it's rained so much lately, I kept him out. Cold pool water just sounded no fun to me.

Caleb whole heartedly disagreed, and had a blast in the water.

Daisy had a great time, too.

Even Lily had fun at the pool, even if she was apprehensive about almost everything.

And she really enjoyed when Chris took her into the deeper water.

It was a fun Friday evening.