Swim and Dance

Last week James had his first official swim meet, and Natalie had her first dance recital.  On the same day.  We were so happy that so much family came to watch our two little performers, who performed perfectly.

James is loving swim team, which I honestly don't understand.  Swim practice is nothing but swimming laps and more swimming laps.  And then turning around and swimming another lap.  It is exhausting just watching him, but he insists on going each day.  He has worked so hard, and I am constantly amazed at his ability.

He is in the left lane doing the back stroke

I mean, is he a stud or what? 

I was warned about doing swim team, mainly because the meets are so time consuming.  James swims in his heat for a total of 30 seconds, and then there is about an hour of waiting around (and snacking) for the next heat.  Thankfully, his first meet was on a Saturday, and I stayed home with the two little ones, who aren't very good at waiting around.  When I texted Brad and asked how it was going, this is the picture that I received.  Waiting around.....

 
James finished 9th in the freestyle, which is a-maz-ing.  The boys who finished ahead of him were 6 years old, and again, considering where he started, he has come a long way!!  This is actually just a participation ribbon, which of course he understood.  This kid is accustomed to earning trophies, not participation ribbons :)  

So after a long morning of swim, Ms. Priss had her dance recital.  I wasn't sure what to expect--Natalie flips between wanting others to have the attention or being a little ham.  However, on this day, she LOVED the attention.  She loved her Aunt Chesney and CiCi fussing over her, she loved us all being in the audience (especially Abigail), and she loved performing!  I went overboard with the pictures, but she was just too darn cute!!

The recital was at 2:00, and she started asking for her "mate-up" and costume around 9:30.

Sweet little friends.

Natalie spent a great deal of the recital looking for and waving to Abigail!  She, and James, were so excited that Abigail came, and all three had a sleep over that night.

Sweet cousins, minus John Brannon 

Natalie's fan club!

And more pictures, because she was just THAT irresistible 

She is waving at Abigail 

And my favorite

I have to include one of Lukey Man

And one of us going on "date night".  Funny story (well, maybe more of an annoying story for Brad): I pre-bought Entourage tickets (one of our favorite tv shows).......for the wrong week!  We got to the ticket counter, and the cute little girl said "Uh, Mam, we aren't showing that movie".  We ended up seeing Aloha, which we loved!  Brad says I do this "type thing" constantly........I disagree.  I'm busy keeping three kids alive :)