Seven!

Yes, Abbie celebrated her 7th birthday on Sunday with a small party at our house, and I think that a good time was had by all. She and six of her friends spent the afternoon swimming in the pool, which must have felt great on such a hot day.

There were five girls and two boys and it was interesting to see how they played together. Ultimately, it became the girls against the boys. The girls found a flyswatter and plotted out how best to use it to attack the boys. They also made a container of what one girl referred to as "boy poison", which was a mixture of water and leaves. Interestingly, I think that the boys did slightly less plotting and were generally more oblivious to what was going on.

There was also an obsession with being up on the wall, jumping in the pool from the wall (which we discouraged), squirting each other from the wall, etc. You'll have to click on and enlarge the photo above to truly appreciate it. You'll see Abbie, an oblivious friend, and a totally oblivious boy. This boy is Eli (yes, the Eli that Abbie has a crush on). Notice how he is totally clueless, and Abbie is watching him intently, probably studying his every move. Classic.

Much to Chad and Emily's dismay, Abbie absolutely did not want a cake for her birthday. Rather, she decided on banana cookies - basically banana bread in cookie form. We piled them up on a plate and managed to stick a candle in them, so it worked out well. Yes, it looks like Abbie has set up camp and plans to eat the entire plate, and she just might have but kids summoned her back to the pool shortly after this photo was taken.

Earwax and More

Abbie really does have two sides to her personality (as I've mentioned before) - on the one hand, she is very logical and serious about stuff, on the other hand, she can be totally goofy. Every once in awhile, these two Abbie's converge in the same conversation. This is what happened the other night in the car, and it went something like this:

Abbie: I hate it when people pollute the Earth (serious side). It makes me want to kick them in the shins (goofy side).
Chad: Well, technically, by driving in the car right now, we are polluting the Earth.
Abbie: Why?
Chad: Well, the emissions from all these cars really isn't all that good for the atmosphere.
Abbie: Someone should invent a better vehicle that doesn't make pollution (serious side).
Chad: Well, maybe that is something that you should work on.
Abbie: How can I do it? I'm just a kid and I don't have any resources (serious side, again).
Chad: Abbie if you come up with a good idea for something like that, then I will make sure that we find the resources for it.
Abbie: Earwax! I'll need lots and lots of earwax (goofy side, obviously)!

Who knows, maybe all the world's problems really can be solved with a little earwax. :)

It's hard to believe that summer is just about half over. It has flown by so quickly. Abbie has this week off from all of her camps. She has already done tennis, swimming, art, and more. As it did last year, the week of art camp culminated in an art show at the end. Here is Abbie with one of her pieces:

Chad and Abbie took advantage of the break in her schedule by taking a quick trip to Minnesota. There has been lots of fishing, some lake swimming, and it even looks like Abbie has finally gotten the hang of riding a bike.

This is the video that Chad sent me this morning:

Nice work, Abbie! And, even better, no earwax was required to meet this challenge! :)