Ella the Fearless

I thought it would be fun to recap our beach trip and update the kids at the same time. It's been awhile since I posted anything, much less an update on the kids.

Ella.

Ella is fearless.  

She is adventurous, friendly, outgoing, and curious.

It amazes me how her positive traits are also her negative traits.

She doesn't like to fail {who does}, but when she falls, she tries again.  And again and again.

I love that about her.  I want to be more like that.

We've noticed over the last few months a really fun attribute becoming more prominent - voluntary helpfulness.

At the beach she was always ready to help out.  At home she is a big help, but I wondered how she would do when she would have so many fun things pulling at her.  Really well, as it turns out.

She even rescued fish from tidepools.  They swam around her feet and she scooped them up and ran them to the ocean.

I hope they survived the rescue.  It's iffy.

She now thinks that she can go fishing without a pole.  Her toes are the only bait needed.  She will not be dissuaded.

She built walls and castles and beauty chairs {?} out of sand each day at the beach.

Side note:  My sister always seemed to know when she was being photographed and subtly moved into a pose.  It was hilarious.

She wanted to make a splash pad {a playground with water} for her brothers and all the other children on the beach.

The tide kept crashing over it, but she wouldn't move farther inland because then it would just be a playground, not a splash pad.

I love her dark eyes.  Speaking of her eyes, she recently went through some vision therapy to correct a problem with her vision that was keeping her from being able to read.  Her eyes weren't working as a team to focus on the letters.

I am very happy to report that she no longer needs glasses and her reading has really taken off!  I had thoughts of pushing her to finish second grade quickly so that she'd be in the grade of her peers {she's 8 but in second grade} but I had some really great women who helped me to see that, though there is nothing wrong with that, it isn't necessary and what is more important is to instill in her a love of learning.

We've decided to enjoy second grade, and, funny thing, she's going pretty fast and will likely finish early anyway.

I kept trying to get her to smile at me, and she wrote this in the sand and went back to her splash pad construction.

"Mom is funy."  

We're working on spelling.

The water at the beach was unpredictable, of course.  Sometimes the waves were mild, and sometimes we couldn't stand in them at all.  We kept getting pushed around.  If Ella got pushed under, she popped up and was ready to try again.  She learned how to dive under the waves, and loved it.

At the beach, Ella's favorite things to do are go on long walks on the beach {I'm preparing her for her online dating profile later}, and to go out in the water with Handsome Hero, who is much better at water sports than someone who shall remain nameless but who is writing this blog. Last year, boogie boarding was the activity of short, but this year tubing was pretty popular.  Sometimes it was pretty hard staying on!

There is nothing this kid won't try.

We brought this silly shark raft, and it became a huge hit.  It had taped up holes all over and we had to keep blowing it back up, but they loved it!

Ella was actually too big for it, but she tried.

I love that she can laugh at herself.  She knew how silly she looked and thought it was pretty funny.

As much as I hate that she's growing up, I'm so proud of the young lady she's becoming.  I raise my coffee cup to you, my dear.  May you always be fearless.

Note: The foggy pictures were my lens clouding over from being in the air conditioning and not adjusting to the outside in time.