Swimming Classes

Charis started taking swimming classes this summer and loves it! She needs a little work on her strokes but this is the first lesson. She loves swimming so much and is a lot more brave around other kids. She jumped in, blew bubbles and even went under water. She is doing great, I am so proud of her!

Riding her bike to the new park

With the new house, we have a new neighborhood park. It is a little farther away but still within walking distance. Today, I decided to have Charis ride her bike. She did GREAT! It was up hill and a long ways for her but she stayed positive with a lot of encouragement from me and rode all the way there.We, of course, stayed a while and played on all the new playgrounds. It is a school playground and they have three playscapes, two swing sets and two climbing pieces. She really enjoyed running around and even learned to climb up the spiral slide. A huge accomplishment to any 4 year old.On the ride home, Charis did amazing. It was a little down hill and she got going so fast that I had to jog to keep up. Going fast makes her nervous and excited, so we are definitely going to be doing this again.

Homemade fruitsicles

We made fruitsicles from fruit and juice for a special dessert for Charis. She was so excited and loved them! It was hard to get her to take a normal picture while eating such a yummy but cold dessert.We love you, silly lily!

Bubble wrap

Who knew that all you needed to keep your kid entertained while packing was bubble wrap?
Charis would hop and dance around on the bubble wrap to pop the bubbles for as long as we would let her or until it ran out of pops.

July 4th

We had all the Elkinton's over to our house for dessert and fireworks. Kris and Charis are always so excited to set off fireworks and July 4th is like Christmas to them.
Charis popping the snap pops. She loved getting to try a few new things this year, usually she gets only sparklers. Then she got to help light a few other things...And GIANT sparklers...
Then everyone got to set off a few fountains, roman candles, smoke bombs, jumping jacks, etc. and more sparklers of course. It was a good 4th of July and a fun way to celebrate.

Eggplant

I am trying to add more vegetables to Charis' and all of our meals. Tonight we tried eggplant. Success!?She liked it but maybe not as the main dish again. She was tired of it by the last two bites.

Charis wrote her first book!

When I got home from work, Charis had a surprise for me. She wrote a book! In Montessori, they teach writing (because it is active learning) first and then reading. So Charis has been doing lots of writing and some sounding out words to write them. Kris helped her with this project.They read this book today and Charis wanted to continue the story about what the mouse at the end of the story would do next.She is so clever and imaginative.

Charis' summer reading

Check out Charis' new summer reading list on the left side of the blog. I have decided to post only chapter books, otherwise it would be miles long. Charis was so excited to share what she is reading this summer with her friends and family. We go to the library every Wednesday after her vision therapy (kind of as a reward). She gets to pick at 5 to 10 books each week. We started and finished our first book today, it was a little on the short and easy side. But she really liked it.