A great last day of daddy's vacation

We had a great day on Tuesday, L's last day of vacation. We went to Devil's Lake again and spent the day there. We set up our little space by the water and J was having plenty of fun with his things (bristle blocks, cars, trains, books). As we got pretty warm, I took J swimming. Most of the time I was walking around in the water while holding him. It took him some time to get used to it. Then he wanted to go to what he called the "big beach" where there were lots of kids playing. This is where he had a big melt down as he freaked out when I went to put him down near shore to stand ankle deep. He wouldn't put his legs down to stand. Finally he did, but he wouldn't move. I realized this was new for him, so I tried to get him to walk a little bit and get used to it. He just wasn't in the mood to try. I picked him up and we went back to where we were before. L came to the beach to see us and J went with him back to our chairs. I stayed in the water and swam for another half hour. Most of the time I floated on my back with the noodle and just enjoyed how peaceful it was. J slept in the car on the way home but that's the only nap he had. He did pretty well going out to dinner for pizza which was a blessing. There was a huge thunderstorm that woke me up in the middle of the night and I heard J softly calling "mommy, mommy". When I got to his crib he practically ran into my arms and then right away wanted to read a book. As we were reading he said "thunder scared me mommy" so I talked about God watching over us and how we are safe. He went right back to sleep after that. He has been waking up a few times a week lately since we've been having a lot of storms.


This morning when we came down for breakfast J asked for worship. I put it on and then he grabs me hugging my legs and says "I love you". This is so dear to me! I love that he's showing his affection. He was "reading" a book and I couldn't see which one but I clearly heard him say "Bubba and Stinky" as he was jabbering and turning pages. Sure enough, I looked and saw it was Super Truck with the characters Bubba and Stinky. It's so neat to see him do this. We had a play date at our friend Joan's. Heather and Wren came too. We did a lot of reminders about sharing and J needed a time out for getting too rough but my favorite part was how much J laughed. He would dance with the girls, chase the girls, and would break out in this contagious laughter. I love seeing them play together.

After lunch, we ran some errands. J had left his blankie at church so we picked it up along with two DVDs from his dedication. Then we did our week's grocery shopping, which was a bit late. J kept asking to go to the library so we went there next. He did so well, he just went right over to the legos and started playing while I browsed movies. I checked messages when we got home. An old message from his cousin Henry (3 yrs old) played. J sat there and smiled as Henry was saying "have J call me". We called my sister's but had to leave a message so I had J talk. He wouldn't say much other than hi. About an hour into his nap, I heard him crying really hard. I picked him up and it took him a while to settle. I just sat and rocked him, held him and sang over him as he slowly stopped sniffling. For our evening, we worked out at the Y and then played outside until it was J's bedtime.