We began this month a few weeks ago celebrating Leah’s 14th birthday!  We now have four fourteen year old girls in our house.  Someone should have thought this through a little better!  For Leah’s birthday we ordered Chinese food from a local restaurant and Leah opened presents.  She did a MUCH better job opening them than she did at Christmas, where she seemed to have a lot of trepidation over receiving all the presents.

Her favorite present, though, seemed to be an American Girl wheelchair that we bought for her.  She was pretty happy with it and has been pretty proud to keep her American Girl doll in there!  One of her first comments was, “It is just like mine!”  That was great.

Here is a short video I put together of her opening her presents and then blowing out the candles on her butterfly birthday cake!  The video is a nice option because it allows you to see the look on Leah’s face as soon as she opens the box with the wheelchair inside.

http://youtu.be/-j-RQxqaGGc

We had to celebrate Leah’s birthday a little early because we left for vacation at Myrtle Beach, SC, and we were going to be there on Leah’s actual birthday, which was June 8th.  If any of you remember the Great Rainout of 2012, we tried Myrtle two years ago and we were treated to Noahesque rain all week long!  There was one partially nice day and then, as we were pulling out, the sun came out and they had a gorgeous day!

We pulled in this year and it was sunny and warm and we felt good, even though Weather.com said that there was a 30-40% chance of rain all week.  We would not, however, be discouraged!  With God on our side, who could be against us, even mother nature!

That confidence began to wane a little when we woke the next morning to rain hitting the roof of the trailer.  I will admit, I was more than a little irritated!  I vowed never again to set foot in this God-forsaken place!  But, it quickly stopped and we had five sun-filled days with not a drop of rain!  South Carolina has redeemed it self.

We started every day with a trip to the beach because, if you are going to go to the beach, you need to spend a lot of time there!  Nick quickly jumped into the waves.

Followed closely by Ali and her Boogie Board.

Riley, Jessie, and Leah, however, were a little more intimidated by the vast expanse of the Atlantic Ocean.  They head never seen anything like this and even with Brittany’s encouragement, Riley was non-to-sure about going in.

After a significant amount of reassuring, Brittany was able to get Riley (or “Riles” as the kids started calling her on this trip) to make some tentative steps into the ocean.

Leah is a crazy person with her crutches now.  She has gained an amazing amount of strength since coming to use seven months ago.  Her bi-monthly sessions with a marvelous physical therapist at Cincinnati Children’s has made her much more confident with crutches and, in turn, has made her more mobile.  She didn’t wast too much time using them to get down to the edge of the water!

The look on her face once she got there was invaluable.

Of course, you can’t go to the beach without making a sand castle.  And Mia and Leah, along with one of the girls that came with us, enjoyed building much of the time!

It was nice to see some of the relationships between the kids that is developing.  Riles has developed quite a fondness for both Nick and Jake and they all have a lot of fun together.  Here Nick and Riley treat each other to some salty splashes on the way to the shore.

After a long morning on the beach, we would usually head to the trailer for a little “down time.”  You know, time to let your sun burn fade a little and time for mom and dad to actually have a break!  Watching all those kids in the ocean is exhausting!  The kids played a lot of games together in the trailer.

After the required rest period, we would head over to the water park that was a part of our campground.  When we stayed at this campground during the 2012 rainfest, they had an outdoor pool and an indoor pool, but that was about it.  There was a weak little slide going into the outdoor pool, but that was closed when we were there (not like we would have used the outdoor pool much anyway!).

Since then, they put in a full water park, with a huge splash park, a lazy river, and three large water slides!  One that you went down on a tube and two body slides.  The kids had a ton of fun here in the afternoons.

Our campsite was a little bit of a distance from the pool, so it was an Israeli like trek over there with our entire clan, along with our friends who came with us!  Leah took these opportunities to use her new, hot-pink wheel chair!  Look out for Mustang Sally!

I have to put the Jake pictures in when I get them!

Leah had a great time starting out with Ali at the splash park!

Ali was a great help to Leah, except maybe right here where she was posing for the picture and Leah was struggling a little to get out of the water!

Riley and Brittany also enjoyed a little fun time at the splash park.

Riley will kill me if she sees that I posted this:

Why bother treating a new wheel chair any other way??

The kids also enjoyed spending a little time in the lazy river.  Here is max looking all ready to “laze” around for awhile.

Kelly and the clan ended up providing a lot of entertainment for those watching the lazy river!

All the kids were very brave and spent a lot of time on the big water slides.  Ali seemed addicted to it while Riley and Jessie were a little more reserved, choosing to go with people than go alone.  Leah was the bravest of the bunch, however, willing to climb the three-stories of stairs to get to the top to enjoy the ride down.  Here is one of her first trips down with me in front!

Sadly, I accidentally formatted over one of my SD cards that had several hundred pictures on it.  While I had TONS of pictures of everybody going down the slides, they are not here.  I will see if the Geek Squad can do some sort of magic and restore them.  Keep your fingers crossed!

The campground had several other amenities that we were able to enjoy.  One was a miniature golf course, where we were able to get a couple of rounds of golf in over the course of the week.  Again … those pictures were deleted on the SD card.

They also had paddle boats, where Kelly will swear that she spent the hottest hour of her life paddling around with the girls while I enjoyed a restful jaunt around the lake being chauffeured by two nine-year boys who were insistent that they peddle.  Sometimes it is less important WHAT you do that WHO you choose to do it with.  Pictures?  Well ….  You know.

One constant for the week was Jessie loosing her earrings!  She just had her ears pierced not that long ago,   so Kelly spent much of the week scrounging for earrings to put in her ears while Jessie spent most of the week with mismatched earrings!  The end of the week had her switching the final earring between ears to keep them both open!

God has blessed us with such happy girls, and Jessie is no exception.  She laughs all the time and loves to be near us ALL THE TIME!!!  But I wouldn’t have anyone else as my shadow.

Sometimes I get a view of Riley that reminds me of why her face haunted me for two years before we went back to get her.  I truly can not imagine life without this lovely young girl in our family … or any of these wonderful kids!

One of the last nights the campsite had a Luau out on the beach.  We were a little late coming to it so we missed the limbo, but Ali and Brittany took advantage of participating in the hula-hoop contest.  Ali showed some serious skills.

And Brittany showed great form.

But in the end they were both beat by solid competitors!

It was then time for the Tug-of-War challenge, which was boys against the girls!  It started with the Caleb and Luke, who lost to the girls.  Then Ali tried her hand, and they lost to the boys.  Finally, our friend Bob anchored the man team and brought home a W!  The link below will take you to the video.

http://youtu.be/_-ZWKv3t7MM

In the end, the camp pastor always preaches a sermon about the wonders of Heaven!

While we looked on from the edge, I was able to catch a quick picture of Max.  Amazing what a young man he is developing into!

The week was full of a lot of fun…

And a lot of good times with friends…

South Carolina, you did us right this week!  We may come visit you again!

Cameron

 

Wow.  What a beautiful Memorial Day Weekend!  The weather was warm and dry!  I would have to say that it was pretty perfect.  The kids spent part of the day Saturday decorating our back patio with chalk!  Remember how, not too long ago, these girls didn’t want their picture taken?  We’ve come a long way, baby…

We spent Memorial Day at Kelly’s brother’s pool.  They have a lovely house and a beautiful pool  Next best thing to owning a pool is having both a brother-in-law AND a sister-in-law with beautiful pools!  Luke practiced his push ups in the shallow end!

Brittany and Nick worked on their early summer tans.

The girls talking to their cousin, Abby, who just had knee surgery.

My nephew, Daniel, takes a little dip in the hot tub!

Here is a view of everyone getting ready to head upstairs for lunch…

The family gathered in the kitchen to have some hot dogs and salads, your typical Memorial Day fare!

Then back out to the pool and the hot tub to burn off those calories…

Ali had surgery on her face this week, so in some of the shots, like this one with Nick, her face may look a little darker than usual.  But that is just the after-effects of the laser treatments.

Uh … could there BE more beautiful girls than this??

I am not sure if Uncle Todd appreciated jumping in from the hot tub into the pool, but when you invite little boys over, you get what you get.

Leah was a little tentative getting into a new pool, but this pool was really nice because it has an extended shallow area that allowed her to get in and sit without worrying about it getting too deep to quickly.  She is threatening to splash me and my camera for the excessive picture taking.

After the last pool party, when Riley didn’t get into the water, she “promised” that she was getting in this time.  And, true to her word, she did!

Brittany was helping her learn to swim, but became a little side tracked when her hair got caught in her sunglasses!

Ali took her turn trying to teach Riley to swim.

They enjoyed a little time under the waterfall also!

She isn’t heavy.  She is my sister.

Caleb took a little peek into the hot tub.

Jessie and I spent time “playing” together in the pool!  Jessie wants to “play” all the time!

The three amigos decided to make their way into the pool together.

Ali spent a little “swim instructor” time with Leah.

Sometimes swim instructions looks suspiciously like dancing!

And sometimes you need to use various tools to help you with your instruction.

Some pictures turn out cute …

… and some do NOT!

The hot tub seemed to get a lot of attention, especially by the “under 8 years old” sect.

Brittany’s legs look freakishly long in this picture!

Old Blue Eyes was in attendance.

The boys were being wise and making sure they applied extra sunscreen throughout the afternoon.  I am not responsible for what a goofball Nick is…

Late in the day, Uncle John spent a little time helping Leah also.

While the pool was beautiful, the hike in and out was a little rough for Leah.  She did great coming DOWN the steps, but going up proved to be a bit more difficult.

What a great day to honor those who have gone before us and sacrificed their lives in order that we can live free.  We tried to explain “Memorial Day” and “Freedom” to the girls this weekend, but these are concepts that seem to be lost on them.  How blessed we are to have been able to bring all these girls (and Caleb) home from areas of the world that do not have the freedoms that we do in the United States.  We do still live in a great country.

Cameron