During previous summers, if we had a craving for a lake day we headed out to a little cove on Lake Lanier, or most recently ventured to Coot's Lake. Both are long-ish drives (an hour and twenty minutes, and about 45 minutes respectively) and while they hold special places in our hearts, we were very excited to be introduced to Acworth Beach this year. It's a little beach on Lake Allatoona with pretty decent sand, not too crowded, and a defined swim area for the kiddos - perfect! The fact that it's only about a 25 minute drive is what really seals the deal! We had gone once before in June, on an overcast, not-too-hot day and the place had been empty almost the entire time we were there. On this day, however, it was sunny, HOT, and while far from packed out, it was definitely busier. But we didn't care! We were there with some good friends from our SASCH homeschool group and had a wonderful time :-)
Victoria, Scarlett and Lincoln (Waverly stayed home with Grammie - it was too hot for her!)
Lincoln with his boogie board that he received from the Phillips crew for his birthday! He loves this thing.
Yes! He finally wrangled himself up on it :-)
Of course, a giant hole needed to be dug - Judd and Lincoln were happy to help!
Crouching Lincoln with his sweet friend Julia.
Lunch time! So thankful for the shade provided by Mrs. Lawson's excellent canopies.
After lunch, the kids returned to the lake and spent quite a while swimming before returning to the hole with a vengeance.
I joked to one of the other moms that if we had made digging in the sand for hours in the hot, hot sun mandatory, all of the kids would have revolted. But because it was their idea, they toiled away on this thing endlessly.
Scarlett with her BFF, Olivia.
Victoria, Olivia and Scarlett!
The boys went from being huge helps in the digging-the-hole project to pretty much just making it their mission to be goofballs and/or get in the way. Because... boys.
I'm not sure you can get more in the way and halt progress than just laying down in the "pond" and yelling.
There is always this huge, inflatable water slide there at the beach, and at the place you purchase tickets for the slide they sell a few frozen treats. The kids know they are not supposed to ask about doing the slide or the treats (we always pack a lunch and it would just get too expensive and be a deterrent to going on a regular basis if they wanted to do all of it each time), but with all of their friends at the beach we splurged and they each got to choose a treat. These giant rainbow popsicles were the treat of choice - yum!
Of course, Lincoln somehow ended up with two.
The group! Or at least most of the group - a few babies didn't make it into the shot :-)
We packed up and headed home around 2:30, after being at the lake for four full hours. The kids were tuckered out, and we had to get home, take baths, have a short rest and get ready for... KARATE! Lincoln had his first trial class last week - this was required since they do not usually take 3 year olds - and had LOVED everything about it. The girls caught his enthusiasm and had begged to take a class also, so we asked if they could join him for Wednesday evening's class to see if they actually liked it, or just enjoyed copying his moves!
Lincoln is the second kid in the middle row, and the girls are near the end of the middle row. The verdict was... they LOVED it too! They want to take Karate now instead of horse riding (Victoria) and ballet (Scarlett). I'm thrilled, as this will consolidate my running around, but we took a long while to chat with them about how if we sign them up for karate, this IS what they're doing this school year. We can revisit their other interests next fall, but we're not switching until then. They were beside themselves excited! So it looks like we are a Tae Kwon Do family :-)
If they hadn't been exhausted before, they officially were after their rigorous class. We got home, ate dinner and did some clean up before they all collapsed in a pile of pillows and blankets in front of the tv to finish a movie they'd started the day before - "Three Ninjas," fittingly enough - and then went to bed without so much as a peep.
Scarlett, working on cleaning up the living room - she spent 5 minutes arranging all of the items to be put away in their room, so that she could make it in one trip; I tried explaining that she could have already had everything put away in two or three quick trips by the time she had it all together in a way she could carry, but she insisted this was the superior method :-p
Lincoln, Victoria, Waverly and Scarlett - one tired crew! (I love that they always want to include the baby in what they're doing)
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