The river

With the arrival of spring, the pace of life in our house has, without a doubt, accelerated at an amazing (and almost alarming) rate.  From special events to swim meets to practices to meetings to out-of-town trips to projects to standardized tests (yuck!) to all the other various & sundry commitments we're currently juggling... I simply cannot keep up!  Thankfully, school is almost over (I've attempted to school year-round in the past, but with the changing of the seasons, I need a summer break as much as my kids do-- not a full 3 months mind you, but at least 6 or 8 weeks... 'til August... then we'll get back into gear) and I've successfully filled out my calendar with all the activities known to me at this point in time so that I can keep our lives in check... hopefully.  

The point-- the photos that follow are from 3 weeks ago (I think... I can't even remember when they were taken exactly, for goodness sake.  Just sometime after Easter-- I know that!).  Well, just a few days ago, I finally got around to downloading them from my camera to my computer, and after a quick perusal, I snatched a few to post here.

Every time we visit my folks, the boys beg to walk down to the river; it's definitely one of their favorite hang-out spots!  So whenever the weather is agreeable, we try to make a trek or two down that way.  This past visit, the Lord blessed us with a scrumptious spring day, so mom I decided to walk the crew down the hill for some fun.  The water was cold... ugh, maybe even freezing (of course temperature never stops the kids!), but the sun's rays were glorious and all of us-- even Mosby-- had a delightful time.  Here are a few snapshots (I was going to split them up into a couple of days, but decided I'd better post them all here.  Otherwise, 3 more weeks might pass before I get around to it!)~

Along the river bank, the beaver had been hard at work!

Bub gradually conquered the bitter cold water...

and finally waded across to the "island."

But when he decided to later take the plunge completely, it caused quite a shock to his system!

Noh-man, never to be outdone by his older brother, eased his way in, too...

but quickly had a similar reaction to the chilly water!

As I've mentioned before, Lolli loves mud...

but Big Man isn't crazy about it.  

He did eventually get his feet wet, though, and once, he even plunged all the way under. Amazing what a little brotherly encouragement will do!