Speaking of Swimming...

 Above we see Adelaide, moving into ready position. and later she enjoys a snow cone.  And flashes her winning smile.

 Andre is calm and cool, as always.  He's usually a bit of a goof ball and forever the absent-minded professor, testing me to my limits with his inability to remember the most basic of daily routine instructions (do you have your lunch box? did you put on deodorant? did you flush the toilet?  did you brush your teeth?  where are your shoes?  you left your lunchbox at school?  you left your soccer ball at practice?  you lost your water bottle? did you put on deodorant? remember where we store your backpack? why are your clothes all over the house?...I try so hard to create a very easy and consistent routine and to organize a specific place for everything...like all the books tell me to do...but...it is still hard...and he has no desire whatsoever to lose things or be smelly or anything...He truly is a sweet, obedient boy who aims to please...but my goodness...I get quite exasperated at times).  However when it comes time to compete in an athletic event, he suddenly gains 15 years or so and is nothing but focused.

 Jason gave me a new computer for my birthday...which I'm not entirely happy with because I had a legal copy of Photoshop elements on my last computer and also this new Windows 8 is crazy and is taking me forever to figure out all my basic things...anywho...the only photo editor I have right now is a free photoshop app I found, which is really not any good at all, but I can crop an image and it has some fun actions, so I decided to play around a bit.

 When nobody Andre's age signed up for the butterfly, this fearless boy shrugged and said, "I'll do it."  He'd been shown the stroke once but, went for it and did amazingly well.

 Waiting on the ready bench.

 Miles with friend Kora find a spot in the shade to watch the kids.

Snow cones on a hot Texas day.  Serious business.

Grace

Here is this girl, my first girl, my first baby, at a swim meet.

She is has made some kind of astonishing leaps in maturity this past summer.  I don't know exactly how or when but she suddenly switched from a little girl to nearly...a young woman!  Still over 3 months away from her 12th birthday, and sometimes still very much my  little girl.  But most times she is something entirely different.

I guess she described it best when she bore her testimony on Sunday.  She walked confidently up to the stand and sat calmly waiting for her turn at the pulpit.  She then boldly testified, like I've never heard her before, that she knew that she was a daughter of God and that He loved her.  I was almost shocked and then overjoyed by the power with which she shared her very own testimony.  It was hardly a fledgling at all, but a full grown, soaring testimony of her divinity, the truthfulness of the gospel, and what her relationship with her Heavenly Father means to her.  Of course she hasn't even hit her teen years and I know there is testing and hard times waiting for this beautiful girl of mine.  But what a joy it is to become acquainted (reacquainted?) with the woman inside this sweet little girl.