Summer is Over

Ben and I returned to CC on Wednesday.  Ben is in Challenge 1 (9th grade) and I am directing Challenge B (8th grade) again.  The girls spend the day with our church friends, the Olivers.  They have toddlers and Mollie Grace and Annie are good at entertaining them.  Ben wrapped Annie's blankie around his head to be obnoxious and annoy her when we went to pick the girls up.  This is the only "first day of school" picture I took of him.  I'll get him in the girls' first day of school picture in a couple of weeks.  This is the last week that Point Mallard is open on weekdays so we squeezed in one more afternoon with the Burlesons.  I've lost track of how many times we went with them this summer.  As we were walking towards the exit one of the girls asked, "What is summer over?" and I replied, "today." And that's pretty much true.  We actually did have a slow Saturday today, though.  Possibly our last for a while with soccer games starting Friday.

 

Nashville SC

Saturday afternoon we drove to Nashville (about an hour and 45 minutes) to watch the Nashville Soccer Club with Ben's new soccer team.  It rained almost the entire drive but stopped about 5 minutes before we arrived at the stadium. This was our first MLS professional soccer game.  We watched with about 24,000 other fans.

Garden

Our garden has pretty much been a fail this summer.  This is our first tomato.  While we were in Jackson for Mollie Grace to attend Twin Lakes, the deer ate most of our tomato plants.  They have slowly grown back.  We've had several handfuls of cherry tomatoes, three squash, and a bowlful of blueberries.  We just planted the blueberries this spring so we were excited to get any berries from them.  We've had lots of strawberries, though.  

 

Jackie and the Beanstalk

Annie attended a musical theater camp for 1st to 3rd graders at the School of Fine Arts (where she dances) the last week of July.  When we arrived on Monday we discovered that she knew nearly everyone in her class from dance.  She had lots of fun.  They performed Jackie and the Beanstalk on Friday at the end of class.  Mama and Aunt Connie were able to watch as well.  Annie was narrator 1.

July cont

The final week of July, Annie went to theater camp at the School of Fine Arts, we made two trips to Point Mallard, Mollie Grace had an orthodontist consultation, and Mama and Aunt Connie visited.  After lunch Monday we dropped Ben off at Point Mallard to celebrate Reed's birthday while Mollie Grace went to the orthodontist.  After her appointment, we caught up with everyone at Point Mallard.  On Wednesday Mama and Aunt Connie arrived.  Thursday we went to Point Mallard again and the girls convinced Mama to go down a slide.  That's Annie and Mama carrying their tubes up the hill and Mama coming down the slide in the pictures.  Thursday night Mama and Aunt Connie fried fish outside while Annie cooked and served pretend food to Mollie Grace and another neighbor, Raylea. MG found a turtle in the swing yard that they named George Morton.  He wandered off that same day but has returned at least once.  

 

Horse Riding

We arrived home Sunday afternoon and Mollie Grace had horse riding Monday morning.  After her ride, she helped Mrs. Joyce wash Gus to prepare for the show that weekend. 

Topsail continued

They added selfie stations at the beach and Campbell Lake, so we were able to take several family pics.  On Friday, Jim and his family spent the day with us.  As always MG dug a giant hole.  There were 1000s of "sea roaches" just under the sand that the girls enjoyed catching.  The final picture is of Marcie napping in my lap on the ride home.

 

Topsail

It was a rainy year at Topsail. One morning we weren't able to go to the beach because of the rain.  There were several afternoon thunderstorms.  We got caught under the shelter at the bathrooms during one.  However, we still had a lot of fun and took advantage of all the sunshine.  There was also more seaweed in the water than we had ever experienced before.  Mollie Grace left the beach looking like a cross between Medusa and a sea monster.