CeCe's 7th Birthday Party

It seems like CeCe got to celebrate her birthday about 4 times this year!  For her actual party she just wanted her 3 closest friends (and Bryce) to go to Cappy and Papaw's house for the afternoon to swim, play and eat burgers grilled by Papaw! It was pretty tricky finding a day when all 4 girls could do it, but we settled on Monday July 18th.  I picked all the girls up and we headed to Olive Branch!  

When they first got there they all jumped on the trampoline but didn't last long before wanting to jump in the pool!

I made each girl a towel to keep

The birthday girl was so excited to have so many friends around!

They swam for a long time

Enjoying some fresh mint in their water

Twister

Croquette

Delicious hamburgers, fruit and panchos cheese dip

playing wet heads

She wanted a cookie cake this year.  Now Bryce says he wants one for his birthday!  I prefer to make their cakes/cupcakes, but I sure can't make this! 

This girl! 

CeCe and Maddie

CeCe and Sofia

CeCe and Mary

Bluff City Blue Fins!

We have had such a fun summer so far!  One big part of our summer has been the swim team that both kids are on.  They swim for the Bluff City Blue Fins.  They practice at a local YMCA.  They are the only Y in the league though, it's mostly country clubs.  This year both kids are at the top of their age groups (Bryce 9-10) (CeCe 6U because she was 6 at the start of the summer).  They have been racking up the 1 and 2nd place finishes all summer! We've known Bryce is a great swimmer since he swam in Savannah and he's still got it!  CeCe shocked us all...she is awesome!  It's so cute to see the smallest one (even though she's the oldest in her age group, she's almost always the smallest) jump in and fly across the water!  Butterfly has been his best and it's now her best too!  They are both going to be in for a rude awakening next year when they are the youngest in their age groups, but we enjoyed this while we could!!

Today was the much anticipated city meet.  All of the summer swim teams compete in one huge meet.  

Bryce has been fortunate to not have to compete against many year round swimmers this season but he found them all here at city meet!  He ended up doing great though.  7th in freestyle, 5th in the IM (Individual medley, they swim all 4 strokes in one race), 14th in breast (his weakest) and 2nd in butterfly!  This is out of about 45 9-10 boys so it's great!  He finished 7th overall in his age group!  He also swam up an age group in a relay and helped them get 2nd!  

Waiting to start the IM

LOVE watching him swim the FLY! 

Back

Breast

CeCe Duke rocked the city meet!!  Her age group was smaller with about 25 girls in it (with maybe no year round swimmers in it).  She ended up getting 2nd in freestyle, 4th in back and breast and 1st in FLY!!  She also swam on 2 8U relay teams and they got 1st place in both races!!  

Swimmers take your mark...

BEEP

I think one reason I love summer swim is that both of my kids get to do it together! 

My parents have been awesome to come to most of the meets.  Especially today, it was HOT and LONG but they stayed the whole time!  

At the end we thought they were just going to announce the team winners but we were surprised when CeCe got 2nd overall in her age group!!  It was the first group announced so it was fun to be surprised!  So proud of my little bird!  

Best news of the day.....Bluff City Blue Fins win the city championship for the 11th year in a row!!!!  With their super awesome Coach Bess.  She's been the best swim coach we've had so far!

As if I haven't bragged enough in this post :) I'm going to brag some more!  These are CeCe's ribbons from the 5 regular meets this season.....

 And these are Bryce's!!  

Summer Catch Up-Part 2

We had an awesome week at the lake with my parents!

 Bryce and I skied together!!  I've been wanting to do this with him for about 2 years and after watching him ski this time I knew he was ready.  It was so much fun!  

 And little bird got up on skis for the first time!  She didn't last long, but I'm so proud of her for getting all the way up! 

 Aunt Sandra came over and joined us for dinner one night.  It was great to see her! 

My parents left on Friday and 3 of my best mom friends (we all met in Pensacola, but none of us live in Pcola anymore) came with their kids for the weekend.  It was so much fun!!  I was a little worried about having 4 moms and 10 kids in the small lake house but it was awesome.  I hope we can do it again and again!  

Liam (10), Bryce (10), Sam (6), Jaelyn (9), CeCe (6), Luci (5), Autumn (7), Ali (6), James (7) and Julie (4).   

Robin, Brooke, Melanie and Lisa

Summer Catch Up-Part 1

I'm so far behind but want to keep these pictures for my blog book!

Bryce's class went on a field trip to Discovery Park in Union City, TN.  It was a fun (long!) day!  

 Both kids had field day the 2nd to last week of school.  I LOVE this picture of CeCe and her good friend Sofia doing the 3 legged race!  

 Bryce's class came in 2nd for the 4th graders! 

 Last day of 1st and 4th grade! 

 Both kids did summer swim team this summer and we have had a blast.  This was their first practice.  

 CeCe's friends Mary and Maddie were on the team too! 

 The 4 of us (and my dad) drove to Starkville for one of the Regional baseball games.  Hot day, but the bulldogs won!!  

 Unfortunately CeCe got nailed in the face by a line drive foul ball at the State game.  It hit 2 peoples hands before hitting her so it wasn't as bad as it could have been but it was still bad.  She had a bloody nose and her eye was swollen.  While she was in the first aid tent Dan Mullen came over to check on her.  She was a celebrity for a few minutes :)  

 She woke up a few days later and decided she wanted to donate her hair.  I researched and found that Pantene Beautiful lengths would take an 8 inch ponytail.  We got it cut that afternoon and it's precious!!  It has been the perfect summer hair cut since she's swimming every single day!  

In their first swim meet, both kids got a few first place finishes!!  

 Bryce's 10U baseball season wrapped up. It wasn't the winningest season ever, but he had a blast.  8 of the 10 kids on the team came back for the 11U season so we are all looking forward to this next year!  

 The kids and I went with my parents for a quick 24 hour trip to St. Louis in June.  We went to the City Museum for the first time and loved it!! 

 And we went to a super hot Cardinals game!  They lost, boo!!