We had a wonderful summer of traveling. First, to my family's cabin on Lake of the Woods for two weeks. We were all relieved to escape the July heat in South Carolina for the cool summer they had up north. The boys had a blast with the freedom to run around outside. The house is perfectly set up for laps around the deck through the kitchen, out to the porch, and back onto the deck. Grandpa spent most mornings yelling, "Don't slam the door!" (I think at the end of two weeks with energetic little boys, he was rather glad to have had girls who spend the summers quietly playing paper dolls or sunning on the dock.)
The boys weren't quite ready to jump into the cold lake, but they had fun playing in the baby pool Yingy put on the deck and filled with warm water from the tap.
They also spent as much time as possible in the fishing boat playing fishermen with the dock lines. They'd throw the lines over the side of the boat and pretend to catch whales and sharks. We had to stop Jay from climbing over the side of the boat several times.
Jay enjoyed the times he really went fishing and even helped Grandpa cut the fish into fillets and dispose of the guts (something we girls never, ever, under any circumstances, ever did). He and Cole now play fishermen on my bed with belts as the fishing lines. They are very precise about it, down to bonking the fish on the heads to kill them and cutting the fillets with a knife.
Jay with his block family: a mommy, daddy, brother, sister, baby, and cat. In the picture, it's naptime and everyone is comfy and cozy in their block beds. 
