Summer Happenings

We are smack dab in the middle of summer.  I love summer.  Not the Michigan heat or humidity but rather the freedom in our schedule.  I love being able to sleep in, I love not having to worry about school subjects, I love random phone calls for get togethers.  I just love summer.

Summer is not completely laid back around here, it seems like the calendar is always filling with something.

The day after we returned from our vacation our American Heritage Girls troop was serving at a local 5K Memorial Day race and marching in a parade.  Sadly Sweet Baby ended up not feeling well the last 2 days of our trip, so she was not able to participate in the parade.  It was terribly hot that day but we still had fun.

Here the girls are lined up to help a local boy scout troop with the flag ceremony before the race began.

As the runners came in they girls were passing out medals to each participant.  

The race was early in the day and the parade was around 6 pm.  After the race we went home to relax and cool off in the house.  We made sure we had water bottles in the fridge and ready for the parade since we knew it was going to be a hot evening.  

We loaded our wagon complete with homemade signs on the sides and back, cooler inside with water for the kids and flags taped to it  and headed to the parade route.  The girls all lined up complete with a banner we had made for the front of the procession, bags of candy to pass out to people along the route and fliers all about AHG.

Since we knew that most of the girls would want to be passing out candy, and we didn't have enough bags for each girl, we gave some of the girls little flags to hold, paired up a younger girl with an older girl and had them switch on and off.  This is one of my favorite pictures of the day. 

Up until recently Peanut has not been my child who seems to have an inherent "nurturing" streak.  She usually avoids babies, toddlers and preschoolers and pretty much just sticks to hanging with kids her own age.  However, lately, I've seen a change in her.  I'm sure part of it is growing up and maturing, part of it may be watching her older sister dote on little ones and mother them.  Either way, it was sweet to see her, as an Explorer, grab onto the hand of one of our newest Pathfinders and walk with her.  Another thing I love so much about this program - the little ones being mentored by the older ones and the pride the older ones get as they are looked up to.  In my house, our oldest takes the reigns on most things and it is made very clear to her siblings that she is the oldest.  In this program, my other two get to be the big kids, and I love that!