31/52

We went on our longest  hike yet, 6.25 miles round trip. On one of the hottest days of the year. This is probably somewhere after mile one. You were hot and tired and just wanted to get to the cool swimming hole we promised you was just around the corner. With lots of snack breaks and carrying you on our shoulders a few times, we made it.

You were so brave! I thought for sure you wouldn't go near the natural water slide at Opal Creek, but you rode it probably 8 times! This is your very first time! Way to go buddy!

30/52

You guys called to me from the other room. "Mommy! Come take our picture!"

29/52

Beach baby! This is probably the first time you've actually really enjoyed yourself at the beach. Most times you don't like the wind and the sand and water but this time you jumped in and really played. You did get cold at one point and a snuggle under the towel fixed that.

And you, well you could have stayed at the beach 6 more days straight and still not had your fill.

28/52

Almost every night, just before bedtime, the two of you switch from being each other's antagonists to the happiest of playmates. Perhaps united by the mutual enemy of bedtime, you conspire to make it nearly impossible for me to break up the fun and send you off to dream land. The tickling, the silly, newly invented games, the sweetness and snuggles and giggles on top of giggles, how can I be the bad guy and stop it, when the majority of the day I was the referee, breaking up the squabbles over who touched who's stuff, who was laughing at the other's misfortune, who had the bigger pickle. So tonight, instead of hurrying bedtime, I let it be. I let the giggles soak into me, and pulled out the camera.

27/52

A camping trip to the lake with cousins and aunties and fun in the water and the woods. You braved the swimming area with your tightly fastened life jacket and kept inching deeper and further, clinging to me and yet testing how much you could float on your own and then looking up at me with giant eyes saying "I'm being brave!!" And then out came the inflatable orca and you hopped on with auntie and braved the deeper waters.

My little sailor. Off you went with Grandpa and the boys to zip across the waves. You returned soaking wet and saying "That was Epic! I rode on the hull the whole time!"