At the creek

Last week we had one of those rare mornings when everything just worked out perfectly, even though it didn't seem like it was going to be like that at first! I took the kids to the gym so I could run, and although they all grumbled about being dropped off for an hour, they all had fun playing with their friends. 

After that, no one could agree on what we were going to do, so I chose the sand park. No one wanted to play in the sand, but they were all perfectly happy to play in the creek! Oliver and Buttercup even found more fossils and shells to trade at the Nature & Science Center. 

I love this picture, because I have another picture of a 3 year old Oliver doing this exact same thing in this exact same part of the creek. :-)

My sweet girl showing off her collection of shells!

Theodore climbed this little hill by himself, and proudly stood at the top and said, "Ta da, Mama! I climb mountain!!!!!" He was so proud of himself. I love that sweet baby!!!

Singing at the top of the "mountain" :-)

After they played in the creek for a while, we walked over to the sprinklers for them to splash around before we headed home. I was swinging and watching them play in the sprinkler, when I had such a wave of nostalgia watching the woman next to me push her toddler and baby in the baby swings. It was only 4 years ago, but seemed like forever since Buttercup and Oliver were that little! Time goes by so quickly. 

Playing at Bull Creek

The kids have been begging to go back to Bull Creek to play this summer, but the last time we went (about 2 months ago) the water was so low that it wasn't flowing very much at all, and it was too yucky for the kids to do anything other than get their feet wet. (Even I have to draw the line somewhere!)  

We've gotten a good bit of rain the past few days (yay!), so we cleared our calendar this morning and went out to see how high the water was. I warned the kids on the way there that we might not get to play if the road was closed or if the water was too high. But thankfully, it was perfect! It was a good bit higher than we're used to, but it was a lot of fun. We may have to clear our calendar tomorrow morning so we can go back again before it dries up. :-)    

Catching tadpoles

Yesterday afternoon we went down to the creek to see what we could find. Surprisingly, we found a bunch of tadpoles! I remember finding a lot of them 2 years ago, but I think it was later in the year, around June. At any rate, it was nice to see some yesterday! 

Big water at the duck park

We had a big (and much needed!) rainstorm last night, so naturally this afternoon the kids and I headed out to look at the creek. Since they've both outgrown their rubber boots and I haven't gotten around to getting them new pairs, I decided to go to the duck park since it seemed like the place where Oliver was least likely to end up covered in mud. :-)