Triumphant Return to the Beach (among other things)

Well, summer's back in full force around here, y'all.  This is one of those times I'm glad I have a laptop, because I can take it from the toasty spot where the fan doesn't reach and sit in a completely unladylike fashion on the couch to type this post where the air is moving.  :)

Here are some of the highlights from this week:

Grumma and Grumpa borrowed one of our cars while
their truck was in the shop, and they brought Subway
sandwiches for dinner the next night.  The Princess
loved hers, though she didn't exactly eat it
conventionally.

On Wednesday, Piggy went to the vet to get her annual
(well, supposed to be annual, anyway) vaccinations.  She
was a very good girl for  her daddy, and we took her to get
a new necklace and ID tag afterwards.  This was her first
time in the pet store, and she thought it was pretty cool.

On a side note, Bubbles' ashes were returned to us on
the same day.  That was pretty hard, and we're still
nursing some raw wounds there, but the girls
at the vet's office are some of the sweetest
folks around.  Nothing about this has
been easy, but they've definitely
helped it to suck less.

My roses are blooming, which is kind of a big deal...
especially after I thought I'd lost them to the severely
cold winter.

Saturday brought our triumphant return to the beach.  There are still swim
advisories, but no reports of high bacteria levels.  We believe the reason
behind the advisories was the carp situation, which has since been resolved.
After a couple of unanswered calls and unacknowledged messages to the
department of public health, we decided to chance it.  You should have seen
the smile on our girl's face when the swimsuits were brought out yesterday.

There was a lot of this, both yesterday and today.  The Hubbs and I are
both feeling it in our arms, but the squee of joy from midair makes it
completely worthwhile.

In case you couldn't tell, she is extremely happy
to be back.

And so am I.  :)

Smiles galore, the whole time we were there.

After swimming, we decided to take a family car ride just over the border to
pick up a favorite beer for Momma and Da that we can't buy in our state.
The kids are still learning to coexist in the back seat, but most of the time
they seem to do pretty well.

Saturday brought a few scattered thunderstorms and one really good, heavy
downpour at home.  The clouds were just gorgeous.

Driving home through farm fields, the sun poked out from behind a cloud.

Leftovers from the botched camping trip: camp fire dogs!  I made them in
the oven instead of over the fire, but they were awesome.  We also had
S'mores with stove-top-toasted marshmallows and nuked chocolate.

There's been lots of playing this weekend, accompanied
by scores and scores of smiles.

This morning we woke to find the heat had broken after
last night's storms, so we took the family to a local
conservation area for a walk.  This trail actually featured
a brand new pond smack in the middle of it, so we turned
around and headed back to the car.

One town over, we hit another trail.  Piggy is really loving
all of the attention, but her stamina is pretty much non-
existent.  The humidity really gets to her, and she starts
panting and pig-snorting, compliments of her
cute little scrunch face.

Algae has bloomed in the swan pond.

Water lilies are starting to bloom...it's just about time to head to the
board walk on the lake at the other end of this park to  see a whole
bunch of them.

My first day lily of the year opened up today, and there will be many more
to follow.

Piggy came outside for a little bit of a salad.

...and then she slept on the floor.  And the couch.  And
the floor again.  Poor kiddo is tuckered out.

Heading into The Princess's last few days of summer school, we're preparing ourselves for the Fourth of July festivities around here.  What this means is planning an escape from the loud, chaotic parade (hated by The Princess and Piggy alike), the tons and tons of illegal fireworks (the bane of Piggy's existence) and the crowds of people who descend upon our neighborhood to watch the professional fireworks display over the lake (which historically concusses hundreds of catfish to death every year).  

We'll be spending lots of time at the lake while we can, right up until another big fish kill stinks up the beaches again.  Hopefully The Princess and her da can make good use of it while I'm at work this week.  It just seems like it's been so long since we were last there, and I can't even begin to describe how good it feels to get the fam back in the water.  Maybe at some point we can even get the paddle boat out again. 

Have a great week, y'all.  See ya soon!